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Logan
USA
203 Posts |
 Posted - 12/30/2004 : 15:07:46
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This is from an email conversation with a friend of mine (prompted by her asking me if I'd heard any positive reviews of tempurpedic products); it's my nutshell version of Sarno's theory and my complete recovery (and my chucking out of all "special" pillows etc.):
What Sarno is talking about has more to do with how we're conditioned from birth on, especially as women, to suppress our fear, anger and sadness. Basically, we suffer from the socialization process every Western toddler undergoes, learning to check the id and identify with the parent etc. which American society just takes to an extreme. We get rewarded for being Type As, and the only time it's justifiable to be human, selfish, vulnerable, lazy etc. is when something "goes out." My dad never called out sick unless he was laid out on the couch on ice packs.
I didn't recover any buried memories or any bull**** like that. I did go back and basically "saw" how messed up my childhood was, for the first time. I did recreate what I might have felt as a child in certain situations, because at the time I was in a sort of shock state and didn't feel anything or I was shushed up about what I did feel, I know you know how that is. I also started really paying attention to every little glimmer of emotion that crossed my mind during a regular day and I was surprised at how often I consciously felt anger, I just wasn't "aware" of it before. It was like I had this instant denial mechanism that immediately shuffled anything unpleasant off my consciousness' stage and behind this curtain; it was still there, it was just slightly obscured.
In addition to recognizing that mechanism, I took a long, careful look at what exactly was going on in my life and how I REALLY felt about it when the pain hit me initially. Basically, I had made all my dreams come true; I'd gotten married to a great person I loved, bought a house, graduated college, gotten the best possible job I could with my degree (so what if I made less money than your average janitor?) and I still wasn't happy. I'd lived up to my end of my imaginary bargain with god and where the F was the reward? I'd done everything I was supposed to do to be perfect and my life (especially my family) was still just as F'd up as ever. The world was still the mess that it will always be and I was still basically powerless over most everything (especially office politics which made me feel like I was in the 7th grade all over again) and I was PISSED about realizing this. But of course, I was too good of a girl to let myself be pissed. The last straw was my public humiliation at the hands of an infant terrible curator = two nights later I was woken by neck spasms that, no ****, felt like tazer blasts. Why? The car accident a few months earlier made it a "logical" spot for pain and the pain did serve as a pretty good distraction from all those other agonies for like four years.
It's not always great to be emotionally aware, I know, I think I freaked M out at first because I vented at him over stuff and cried a lot when I'd hardly done that before but he got used to it. And I'll take feeling like crap or an emotional freakshow now and again over a life of constant pain.
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n/a
374 Posts |
Posted - 01/01/2005 : 03:22:46
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Thanks for that, Logan. I'm not a newbie, but reading your insightful and well written post pretty much sums up my experience as well.
You are so very right when you say that society, British as well as American, conditions us to suppress negative emotions. It's no wonder many of us end up in pain.
I smiled to myself when you talk about your dad - could have been mine. He was very proud of the fact that he hadn't missed a day's work in however many years and that he hadn't visited a doctor in years either.
Best wishes for 2005
Anne |
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Kajsa
Denmark
144 Posts |
Posted - 01/01/2005 : 11:45:52
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Thank you Logan
I like your post!
"The world was still the mess that it will always be and I was still basically powerless over most everything"
Do you still feel like this? Or did your work with TMS (and yourself) change this?
Kajsa |
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Logan
USA
203 Posts |
Posted - 01/01/2005 : 13:54:22
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Kajsa,
Of course I still feel like this! But I also feel that life and the world are exquisitely beautiful and lovely, so much so that I weep with joy. (Man, I can't believe I just admitted that! How sappy!)
The problem, my problem, which I am trying to transcend, is seeing every piece of bad news, every war crime, every hate crime, every time the underdog gets beaten, as an affront to my personal vision of the world as it "should" be - ALWAYS beautiful and lovely and fair. I guess you could say that my perfectionism and goodism have met in this vision of an existence that could never be. I'm attempting to change this crazy way of seeing the world, to see things as perfectly imperfect, a balance of good and bad, an integrated whole, and to not take these natural ups and downs so personally. Sometimes it's harder than others but I'm making progress!
And for the record, I'm really proud of my family. In healing from TMS and doing all the emotional work I did (and continue to do) I am learning to stop beating myself up for not having a Brady Bunch existence, and to really SEE them. Now I can appreciate them for who they are and who I am because of them.
I think it all comes down to perfectionism. When I first started my TMS work I would not have said I was a perfectionist because I'm not OCD about cleanliness or outwardly ambitious for material success but the more I examine my hidden beliefs about the way things "should" be, the more I realize how long I've been living with this inner dictator who has made (makes) life impossible for me. Perfectionism is a terrible disease that keeps us from living, I still struggle with it but I'm beginning to recognize it for the monster it is. |
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tennis tom
USA
4749 Posts |
Posted - 01/01/2005 : 20:32:30
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| Great posts Logan! Good way to start the New Year off. Keep up the good work. I agree, perfectionism can suck especially when it becomes procrastination. Perfectonism has it's place but it should be our choice what we want to apply it to. Something of value. Most things in life don't need to be done perfectly. Mediocre is just fine for most tasks, after all, mediocre just means average - nothing wrong with that. Trying to do everything perfecly is a waste of valuable energy. Save energy for the important things. |
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Kajsa
Denmark
144 Posts |
Posted - 01/02/2005 : 07:58:45
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You write very well Logan and I can also connect a lot to the
problems you write about - being a perfectionist.
I am not at all a perfectionist when it comes to cleaning or housekeeping or that kind of things. But I have always been very hard on myself about interacting and speaking and writing in the "correct way". I have been the "good girl" with good grades and a succesful life in many ways -but never ever happy.
And I have also been pretty hard on others.
For me writing in english, without a dictionary ( I am not at home) and knowing that the grammar stinks is hard. But today I allow myself to do it anyway..
I am not really familiar to what kind of problems you have been fighting Logan but I remember that you once wrote that you had to fight them aggresivly - that you had to just go ahead and DO things that prior was hard for you. Am I correct?
Coud you please write a few lines about that process.
All the best,
Kajsa |
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Logan
USA
203 Posts |
Posted - 01/03/2005 : 11:17:41
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Kajsa,
I am not sure what "hard" things you are speaking of so I will just give you a little summary of things I have done in my healing.
Writing is the hardest thing for me to do because I want so much to do it perfectly. It was something I loved as a child but it became something I loved/hated after a shaming incident in a junior high creative writing class. As a matter of fact, I am procrastinating right now because I am anxious about not being able to write a short fiction story the way I want it to be, so I am here on this board instead of immersed in my new story.
That said, I have made some progress getting over my perfectionism/fear-of-failure in the past two years, mostly through taking classes and talking to other beginning writers. I've written two 15 pg. stories, two short plays and a poem - something I hadn't done since high school (15 years). Every time I pick up my pen, I feel that ice water feeling in my stomach, like I have no business thinking I'm a writer, but I keep at it anyway.
Skiing is something that always had terrified me. My husband had been urging me to learn how to downhill ski for years and I always refused vigorously - what, why would I want to pay $$ to hurtle down a hill?!
When I started my TMS healing journey, it was late fall/early winter and I decided I was finally going to learn how to ski. I figured there was no better way to tell my brain that I wasn't afraid of physical activity than to take up something "extreme," something that my ex-chiropractor would have had a kitten over. In two years I've gone from white knuckling my way down the bunny slope to flying (and smiling) my way down "blue" runs. It wasn't easy for me to learn at all; no one would ever call me a natural athlete, that's for sure. Every time I go I still feel little butterflies of terror before that first run, like what if I've forgotten it all? For that reason alone, that repeated reconquering of fear, I highly recommend it!
What else? It's still somewhat hard for me to admit I need to express anger. I am working on telling people when they have angered me in an immediate fashion, but still have a ways to go on that. Usually, I don't say anything and let it build. I feel uncomfortably "weird" about beating my couch with a mini-baseball bat while screaming, but I make myself do it to get that built up anger out. I noticed a HUGE difference in how my neck and shoulders felt when I did start doing this dilligently. I'd say I went from 85% better to 100% in a month.
Around this same time, I also went to Disneyland and rode the big, loop-to-loop-coaster in the California Adventure. I went on every bumpy, jerky, rollercoastery ride in the two parks. When I saw the warnings about not to go on them if you have "back injuries," I laughed and pointed at each sign and said, "Ha! I'm so glad that doesn't apply to me!" Since I got back from that trip, I haven't had even one "flare up." The only time I feel even slightly tense or tight is if I put off the couch beatings for too many weeks.
I hope that helped! |
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Kajsa
Denmark
144 Posts |
Posted - 01/06/2005 : 04:09:09
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"I hope that helped!"
It sure did! Thank you Logan.
All the best,
Kajsa |
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might be helpful for newbies
