Earlier quoted context omitted.
> A lot of people could probably skip therapy entirely if they could just arrange to hear themselves think. I'm sure you aren't completely implying this but as someone who went through therapy and attended group classes where I encountered dozens of people with significantly worse forms of anxiety, there are a lot of people whose problem IS their thoughts. Negative thoughts are capable of preventing people from doing…
Could you explain a bit more about your negative thought problems and how therapy helped? I'm in a similar situation and am looking at options to help myself. Thanks.
For me, negative thoughts are triggered by certain situations, namely inter-personal relationships and the fear of rejection. In scenarios like dating someone I'm really interested in or befriending a stranger whose respect I want to earn, I immediately assume the worst: that they think lowly of me, they dislike me, they are having a terrible time, etc. Internally, I'm going haywire and panicking. And unless I get an explicit sign of approval, I ended up with a lot of self-loathing.
This made it really hard for me to make new friends, to socialize, to go to parties... I'd over-analyze unfamiliar social situations which would cause me to not want to socialize, which would only make me feel more lonely with a lack of self-confidence. I didn't want to smile at someone like a stranger and experience what its like for someone not to smile at me back. I didn't want to be honest with a woman unless I knew with 100% certainty that they were interested in me because rejection was soul crushing.
The tipping point for me was when I went on a friendly outing with a woman who I liked. I felt like I couldn't be myself and was internally frantic throughout the entire day we spent together. I cared too much for her approval that I ended up about as interesting as a blank piece of paper.
From that moment, I knew something wasn't right and that I needed to get professional help. I knew that there were things I wanted in life, like more friends, a significant other, and more comfort in my own skin, yet I wasn't anywhere close to it. Thinking about things only made me more depressed.
There's two major things that helped me.
The first was I ended up going to a Psychotherapist as she said she could teach CBT. But she didn't really explicitly teach it, so much as talked me through my thoughts and we came up with ways to incrementally challenge me. Things that she helped me discover through talking were:
- She reveal to me that I an abnormally strong inner critic which prevents me from taking risks in order to prevent me from potentially getting emotionally hurt. He keeps me safe, but also prevents me from growing.
- She taught me the importance of meditation and mindfulness, so as to be more aware of my current state and to recognize I don't have to be carried away into the flow of emotions if I am aware that its there and/or what triggers them.
- She constantly challenged me to try uncomfortable situations socially
- She revealed to me my inner child who has certain vulnerabilities. If I could learn how to take care of him by imagining myself with him, I could learn how to deal with certain problematic situations such as social rejection. I was honestly skeptical at first and felt this was overly new-agey, but I have found it helpful to think about what I'd say to my younger self to assure them when I experience something that I know would hurt them.
My therapist ended up becoming a figment of my mind, where if I'm in a situation, I consider what she would say to me and act accordingly to it.
The second important thing was that I needed to not rely on others to bring me happiness, but I had to be able to generate on my own. For some, it's their religious faith, a certain hobby, physical activity, their work... for me, it was learning. Via HN in early 2017, I took Learning how to Learn which opened up my eyes to the process of learning. And then from there, I just haven't been able to stop learning things that continue to amaze me. Suddenly, I could find things that interested me and happily engage my brain instead of passively relying on some entity to bring happiness to me in the form of games, social media attention, etc.
When I finally had both therapy and self-generated happiness, everything clicked. I recognize it isn't a mind-blowing fact: without a purpose, life can feel tough and lackluster.
In summary, my psychotherapist revealed unique things about me that I'm more aware of that I wouldn't have recognized without a third-party perspective, and gave me the mental and physical tools to deal with triggering situations. But that was only half the equation, the other half was finding something purposeful in my life that brought me excitement and a sense of accomplishment, something that no one could take away from me.