Insecurity

[WRITE]

this topic came up on another thread, but I still have days when all kinds of thoughts run through my head:

what was that look about?
no one really cares/ likes me/ understands...
nothing ever goes right...
etc

A lot of this is catastrophising I can see just as I write it out, but how do we unprogramme ourselves from these thoughts?
They've been with me since early childhood and were reinforced and voiced by my family and husband.

Will we ever reach a point where we don't have these thoughts or is it just a matter of recognising and not reacting to them?

~W

[isittoolate]

Hi Write,

Insecurity is my middle name!

Such thoughts, from my POV, come from not have a trusting relationship with parents and siblings from day 1.

If said people and I had shared experiences, fun, a pat on the back, laughter, talking, been given knowledge on various topics, been treated with respect, been given boundaries, been supported in our endeavours.............before even starting school..........

You get the picture. It all begins when we our powerless to do it ourselves, so our parents must be prepared to bring this into our lives. If they are not, then everyone goes willy-nilly without goals, and might as well have been raised by wolves!

Anyone who reads this, please correct me if I am wrong--this is how I see it and we are out of our own control from the beginning.

Love
Izzy

[moonlight52]

Hello Write,
When I have these kind of insecure thoughts I (as quickly as possible) replace them with a picture or thought of my kids .
This calms the insecurity and the stress level is gone.I guess any very pleasant picture or thought will work.
Thoughts of love your music the way you express yourself with words (which flows like a waterfall).
My therapist suggested this method and it has been working for me.

Today I really needed it and it really helped.
So much so I cleaned out the laundry room with the good vibes my inner love thoughts produced
so right away I relace the insecure thought with a new loving one...
hope this helps..............

love to you Write

moon

[WRITE]

might as well have been raised by wolves!

I think some of us were....

not have a trusting relationship with parents and siblings from day 1.

it's hard isn't it (((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((( )))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

any very pleasant picture or thought will work.
Thoughts of love your music the way you express yourself with words (which flows like a waterfall).
My therapist suggested this method and it has been working for me.

Thanks Moon. I'll try it.

I think in many ways this is my most challenging time, for I am so aware of everything. All my over-reacting or if I am being controlling or anxious or projecting....sometimes I think I'll never calm down again! But I know I will, and this is just a rebuilding bit.

relace the insecure thought with a new loving one...

I am still not as loving to myself as I might be sometimes, very quick to call myself stupid and slow to reward myself....the saying positive stuff out of situ never worked much for me si I need to pay attention and give myself praise or talkignto right there in the moment I need it.

Maybe I'll never manage my emotions as good as other people people but it is a lot better.

I'm enjoying a lot of life now even bad days all ahve good bits!

Great to see you doing well Moon, love to you too.

Also to Is and everyone else.

  goodnight, sleep well.

[Hopalong]

Hey Write:

saying positive stuff out of situ never worked much for me si I need to pay attention and give myself praise or talkignto right there in the moment I need it.

Good insight. I think saying positive things to yourself in your head is never out of situ because your LIFE is the situ! It is always, always worthwhile to be your own encourager, champion, and appreciative friend.

Stupid my arse. DON'T BE MEAN TO WRITE, OKAY?

(Please type 50 times. I am a wonderful person....)

love,
Hops

[WRITE]

Dear dear Hops X

Nothing is enough somehow is it, when you've had years of trauma or abuse...!

Today at work a family member stopped me and said 'I've never seen anyone get so much out of these patients' she means that they are actively engaged rather than be passively entertained. But I forgot to think about it and instead wondered why the manager didn't speak to me about the job we discussed last week, why my colleague/ friend hasn't invited me to her leaving party. whether I should keep the groups so active given the lady fell....

I sort-of filter out the praise and accolades, focus on the problems etc.

Part of it is we were raised to not be 'up yourself'. A phrase we heard a lot was 'bring you down a peg or two...'.
I guess it was a remnant for the class system.
Part of it is alwasy tryign to be prepared for the next trauma...

I don't know if I am a wonderful person Hops too, I sometimes think I am just so messed-up, there's too many things wrong with me.

I wonder if I'll ever feel whole and normal.

I keep reminding myself it's a process but I do wonder where I'll fit, if I dare to keep trying, if ex will unravel my progress.....

Maybe I'm a bit overwhelmed today; I have been working so hard lately, and not let-up because I had so many bills.

I finish teaching one group tomorrow, one more class with another, one last week. I've ordered more business cards in two designs, one for funerals and memorials.

I get a lot of good feedback but sometimes I feel like a bottomless pit of unfilled needs and unloved me....it's funny because I said that about ex, nothing is enough for him.

Today I have a headache, maybe that is making me feel helpless and melancholy. I feel like I wasted an afternnoon because I couldn't get anything done...I feel incredibly driven you know.

In the last three years I have left my marriage, kept my family together, recovered from a serious illness, lost 60 pounds, started a business, done tons of voluntary work, started a writers' group, developed two music teaching programmes.....it seems a lot when I look at it written down but I am only thinking of all the other stuff, projects I couldn't complete, my lack of formal education, my book not finished, the weight still to lose.....

How come all the positivity other people say I exude aroudn them doesn't come to me?! One woman said to me recently 'you make people feel ten feet tall'.

Why don't I feel ten feet tall?

Will I ever be enough? Am I like ex, broken?

***

okay, end of whine, at least my headache is clearing as I have typed that.

***

Something else I realised today when one of my colleagues came up and kissed me on the forehead, I get tons of attention from men. El Crusho came and kissed me last night too.

I am seriously nuts when it comes to men and relationships!

Even if someone is hanging around loads I tell myself they can't be interested really, or I sabotage their best efforts.

It's hitting home more and more thqat I have been with ex al these years not out of some big altruism, or fear or anything else, but because I won't let people close.

I won't ask for what I want, or risk anyone getting too close.

I felt kind of ashamed typing that....strange. Maybe this is the inner layers of the damage I am touching on now.
Most of the time I feel fine, then this huge wave of misery comes.
I thought it was the bipolar, but I think it may just be me!

Oops, the whine was supposed to be finished.
Thanks for letting me go on a bit.

I don't know what to do with myself today.

Think I'll go do that visualisation thing Moon suggested now I poured all this out of my system...

[Gaining Strength]

This is an excellent topic for me WRITE.  So glad you got it going.  When I read this thought:

Will we ever reach a point where we don't have these thoughts or is it just a matter of recognising and not reacting to them?

I recognized my own belief that I have slipped away from.  I have had a hard time recognizing and label these thoughts so that I could then not react.  I do believe that as I practise that more and more it will become a habit that replaces that wretched one I developed as a child.

So glad you are pouring the toxic stuff out here so you can replace it with good stuff. - your friend - Gaining Strength

[WRITE]

become a habit that replaces that wretched one I developed as a child.

you are right GS, these are lifelong habits formed at our most vulnerable times. It is hard to break them, and at times of stress I think they return.

I'd love to know what you think of this.

Thank you CB.
I have printed off the bigger article and will read it when I feel better.

The headache morphed into a giant migraine and I've been asleep for a couple of hours, it's starting to recede now.
I don't get this often but it is always accompanied by a horrible change in mood- I literally feel like the hand of doom is upon me, and also the atmospherics here are strong today- an impending storm looming which has not broken yet....
I felt earlier the pressure in my head would explode.
It's worse because of the bipolar I think.
Funny how I panic though and don't prepare myself as it comes on, everything feels not as bad now.

Interestingly, I may have unwittingly contributed to this.  I have always thought that she could do anything

I'm not sure I understand? You mean you told her she could do anything and so now she tries to?

The thing for me is things often don't feel real unless there's some element of struggle, and I can't easily settle- there's always another challenge, another hill to climb.
And I always try to do it the hard way, the different way than everyone else.
I don't have degrees or many qualifications and I don't like that way of learning something!
I feel like the world is full of overqualified people with no lifeskills....yet why I translate this into I should fight it I don't know.

I fight everything.
Injustice.
Incorrect perceptions.
Things other people leave alone I'm in there, and I don't walk away until I'm satisfied.

It's like I have this compulsion to change things, to crusade.
At work if something is wrong I set about changing it, my ex I can't give up on even though I know it's crazy to keep trying when there's so little change and it's so damaging to be around him much.

Sometimes I feel like I dash my brains out on life, there's a part of me that is out of control and only feels alive when I am taking risks or struggling.

This insecurity is coming from spending more down time I know, feeling like I am just beaing calm and normal and cooking, eating, watching movies, walking, working.

It feels like life is passing by and I am wasting it.

I should be doing something- composing, painting, writing, setting things up....

Maybe it's all the years of running from myself or my situation.
Maybe it's having bipolar and mania.
Maybe it's just habit.

But one thing I can see it doesn't matter what I DO, I am never satisfied. I could always do more. Do better.

That was my pattern with my mother, I was always trying to impress her. Never did not once.
She hated me.

I thought I exorcised her and she's still here, I don't know why.

I'm writing some music at the moment for a concert for a friend's husband's retirement.
It's really pretty so far, I am pleasd with it, but the thought keeps comign to me that my mother wouldn't like it.
None of them would.

Why does it matter so much?
Why do I secretly want to please people I thought I outgrew?

And another thing- why do I use all these things to scare people away?
I've been doing it more and more, showing people my writing, music, painting and they are shocked a bit I think. It brings out the competetive and the admiring and the interest in people. But nobody has the right response.
It's the response I wanted from my mother isn't it.

It's funny years ago I found in one of her old purses with some photos and documents a paper rabbit made with gummed squares and a cotton-ball tail. It was so unusual for her to be sentimental or interested in these things I was surprised to find it, but then all I wanted to know was 'did I make it or my sister'?
I wanted to know who she cared about more....

This is self-sabotage isn't it, because I am doing okay.
Feels like an internal self-destruct sequence which starts whenever I get anywhere near happy.
My mother couldn't bear people to be happy, she really couldn't.

I'm beginning to wonder if she was N, though I didn't know her barely as an adult so I can't say really.
I know she blamed me for a lot of her problems, and for a lot of the family problems.
I am the eldest.

[Hopalong]

Write, honey. You sound plain worn out, but you're having a hard time giving yourself permission to be worn out. To be lonely. To be yearning. To be wanting a degree, success. Seems like you're having a hard time being halfway nice to yourself...

I don't know if I am a wonderful person Hops too, I sometimes think I am just so messed-up, there's too many things wrong with me.

Okay, then how about writing 50 times:
I am wonderfully messed up.
I love every single gloriously messed up part of me.
I make messed up look fabulous.
I am a role model of messed-upness.
I am perfect in my messed-upness.
I am wonderful and messed up.
I am a wonderful mess.
I make wonderful messes.
I make music out of messes.
I hear music in messes.
I see people in messiness.
I see the mystery in mess.

Or something like that...

Sometimes exaggerating our moods to the point where they drop out of their usual plane helps them become just another piece of the mystery (and messiness) of being a human being, having a life.

You are not defending so much, I think Write. You are letting life in.
I think you're managing your illness wonderfully. You've just been through a serious transition that really demands grieving, and you were going so fast maybe you outran it for a while.

(((((((((((((((((((((Write))))))))))))))))))))

love
Hops

[teartracks]

Hi WRITE,

Insecurity...uhmmm.  How do I handle it?  Actually, I need to think about that.  But here's how I'm thinking right now.  I think I have a bag of insecurity fixes.  When an insecurity is triggered, without being conscious of it I  automatically reach into my bag of fixes and find the one that works for that particular insecurity and apply it like lipstick.  If another kind of insecurity gets triggered, I reach into the bag and find the fix for that 'feeling'.

When I'm in a healthy frame of mind, I don't use the fixes.  When I'm thinking healthy,  and the insecure mantle drops over me, I recognize the feeling (I usually recognize it as insecurity (or a feeling of depression) within a half hour time frame), then I go back to the moment it was triggered what was that look about?
no one really cares/ likes me/ understands...
nothing ever goes right...
etc and correct my thinking.

The battle is always for the mind!

tt 

[teartracks]

Hops,

You've just been through a serious transition that really demands grieving, and you were going so fast maybe you outran it for a while.

You have the sweetest heart.  Would you consider being the board's house mother?

Love,

tt

[axa]

When I hear those ancient voices who discount and abuse me I do the following

Ancient Voice:  I have nobody

Axa    You have me

Ancient Voice  I am so alone

Axa  Not anymore you have me

Ancient Voice  I am no good

Axa  You have succeeded in surviving abuse, pain, loss, have a lovely home, have talent, etc

I find answering these voices helps me because their words are not true.  I have messed up so many times and it is from the messing up I am learning about Axa who is the person I need to learn about.  She has left me down many times but she has also saved me and I am learning to trust her the more I allow myself hear her voice.


axa

[poetprose]

I believe my sense of self , esteem and worth are ok, In that I feel ok about me, I believe i have a sense of purpose and worth to myself and friends and family, I have hobbies and try to take care of my body as best as I can...  I look forward to another day, and thank God for the gift of life... generally I have a not to bad disposition , and find happiness in many many things....

But what my problem is , is that I need to feel "safe" this is something that has followed me into my adulthood, I know it stems from my childhood, and that there is nothing in the world that will take this away , because it is too deeply ingrained in me..
and it follows me whereever i go......

Here at this forum I feel safe... sessions with physcologist make me feel safe..... arround certain people i feel safe, If I am the one chosing the events , or experience...

this needing to feel safe, is probably related to PTS, but if it is it is ongoing.... and in terms of trust, it is sad to say but i trust strangers more than certain family members.....

[Margo]

this topic came up on another thread, but I still have days when all kinds of thoughts run through my head:

what was that look about?
no one really cares/ likes me/ understands...
nothing ever goes right...
etc

A lot of this is catastrophising I can see just as I write it out, but how do we unprogramme ourselves from these thoughts?
They've been with me since early childhood and were reinforced and voiced by my family and husband.

Will we ever reach a point where we don't have these thoughts or is it just a matter of recognising and not reacting to them?

~W

I have it in my mind...... replace, replace, replace...... just as Seastorm reminded me a couple weeks ago. 

Everything remains the same unless we go out of our way to make changes and form new habits.  Feeling better about ourselves doesn't just happen.  We strive and grow and overcome obstacles to do it.  The striving and growing and overcoming has the positive byproduct of showing us we are worthy of more confidence from ourselves, for ourselves.  Self discovery, overcoming bad thought processes we have about ourselves.  It's coming to the realization that we have strengths we didn't know we had and abilities that we never used, for many different reasons..... that was our role in our FOO or someone had to tear us down to feel better about themselves or someone lived in such terrible fear of being abandoned they kept us broken down so they had less fear themselves but.... it's a self fulfilling prophecy, isn't it? 

If we understand ourselves better and become less afraid, we're left with more energy for positive things.  Fear and shame are poison.  We can't just extinguish them.  We have to  R E P L A C E  them if they have a very strong hold in our lives.  It takes time and being kind to ourselves.  Learning self care.  Discovering what our passions are and enjoying them.  Learning to enjoy them, rather.  Then there's learning to redirect all the thoughts that come with changing those patterns...... feeling selfish or unworthy or like coming out of our skins because we're so uncomfortable doing something for ourselves.  We're used to living for other people.  In their service, so to speak.  Waiting for their every signal so we can decide if our anxiety is extreme or relaxed on any given day.   God help us..... it's about stuggle and replacement and faking enough self love and empathy until we form new patterns and get comfortable with them. 

It takes a while and there's discomfort involved.  It's walking through the fire..... to fine a better, more peaceful place, but that place is there waiting for us.  What I find most striking about the whole experience is...... I'm always surprisingly comfortable I become with replacing bad things.... with good things.  It was a very large surprise when I got used to having a nice man in my life, once apon a time.  I MISSED him and his very kind treatment of me when he was gone.  I was amazed bc I'd been forcing myself to endure his proximity, long enough apparently, that I had gotten used to better treatment.  Amazing really. 

There were all kinds of little replacements and realizations in my very early 20's.   I despised them all..... but they remain as true now as they were then.  New replacements will be as hard won, I relalize.... I don't think it gets any easier, really.  Just better if we continue to strive for ourselves.  Does that make sense?  In other words, every replacement is difficult and takes diligence.  No matter what stage we're at.  A habit is a very difficult thing to replace.......  But it can be done!  Back to the old saying... "We stay until the pain of staying is worse than the pain of going."  That's a terrible way to begin a journey.... in so much distress but..... that's where the work of growth takes center stage, unfortunately.

::sigh::  Then, of course, guarding against backsliding into unhealthy choices and situations again..... is an ongoing struggle that we sometimes lose..... even if we're trying to be diligent and make better decisions.  I've found that I can THINK I'm making a choice based on A B and C then find that D E and F were much stronger factors..... the factors I was TRYING VERY hard to avoid all along, you see? 

The good news is.... there are always road signs pointing at the truth, if we pay very good attention and dismiss immediately as we go.  We get better at recognizing them, once we are aware.  We get more selective about what and whom we let into our lives.  Thoughts and aquaintances..... we can also learn to "file" them in appropriate places in our hearts and lives.  SOmeone may be fun and entertaining to be around.... but they may not deserve a position of trust in our hearts.  We file them somewhere safe and we make sure we guard ourselves and keep us safe, for that is self care and our very important job. 

Then...... then..... once we've glimpsed and gained, sweated and learned...... we solidify our lessons by sharing them with others.  It's the natural progression of learning and I think everyone here is at a different point in their journey so there's so much to be gleaned from each of our struggles. I guess it truly gets better when we've made enough replacements that our lives are weighted with more good than bad..... 
Margo

[Hops guest]

Aww thanks, TT.
We'll have dorms...James is in the boys' one.

Hee. I am a very lax mother figure, so dunno if it's wise...indulgence is my MO.

(My D thinks I'm an oversensitive wuss.) She pointed it out more nicely than usual last time we had a ftf talk, I just looked at her and said, that's true...I am more sensitive than a lot of people. I'm not ashamed of it, it's the way I'm made. She looked at me kind of puzzled and we stayed peaceful. (I think it was a moment of acceptance, recognition on her part that I'm not made this way specifically to frustrate her.)

So thanks, TT...I'll take it as a good thing!

hugs

MawHops