The good thing about horse shows is that when you’re showing your stuff in the ring, you don’t have to be good all the time.  You only have to be perfect when the judge is watching you. 

I’ve been thinking about how to set reasonable goals on this becoming more functional through taming the EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEM.  Which took me to thinking about horse shows and treatment centers.  That’s a match, right?  (Ah, perhaps more of a match than you’d ever believe.)

Because when you’re in the ring atop your expensive steed–no matter how horribly your horse behaves, no matter what kind of deadly mood he’s in, no matter if he’s bucking like crazy the entire way around the ring–you must have an expression on your face showing what an absolutely lovely ride you’re having.  Your horse’s head can be between his knees and his heels over your head, and you gotta be smiling as if you’re having the best time ever!  Your expression is saying that WHAT’S HAPPENING SIMPLY ISN’T HAPPENING. 

In the treatment center we teach a similar skill, FAKE IT ‘TIL YOU MAKE IT.

Thus, what about making a goal, for now, of toning down our EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEMS  when the judge can see us?  When you’re in the ring, it’s okay to twist yourself into a pretzel and pull all kinds of obvious gimics to keep yourself aboard–when the judge is turned the other way.  So, here’s the deal.  We “fake it ’til we make it” and “smile like we are having the finest, comfortable ride” when we’re in public. Or pick one arena and make that your showring.  Home or work.   Or, maybe just with one other person you want to relieve of your easy to erupt anxiety.  (I know one…no two…no…)

Why put on a show?  Why not just “go with your feelings” all the time.  For starters, you will drive other people crazy or away.  More important, you’ll pass up the chance to gain a little management over that inner force. As “real” as emotions “feel” they’re just feelings and not in line with facts. People who are not ruled by their EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYTEMS have better relationships, work experiences, and better lives. 

What’s fun is that by pretending you’ve got it together you get it more together.    

  I haven’t forgotten the Mexico confession. Working up to it.

  I’m an “unabler,” the fella on “Intervention” admitted.

Of course, he meant to say he was an enabler.  I like his version better.  He was describing the “unabler” as someone who gets rid of her anxiety by taking the other person “off the hook”–paying their bills when they are spending their money on drugs or cars and apartments they cannot afford…for starters.

Bored? http://Twitter.com/mysteryshrink

Enabling is just way we respond because we are “intolerant” of other people being anxious. We are “allergic” the other person being anxious.

Well, guess what? No matter how perfectly we try to arrange our lives and how carefully we try to arrange the lives of others…People we know and love get anxious.  Sinking into their EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEMS, they spray anxiety on us.  “I can’t do it!  It’s not my fault!  The teacher didn’t tell me!  I’m going to miss my plane and then I’m REALLY GOING TO FALL APART. No, it’s hopeless, there’s no way out of total disaster!” they insist.  And we are infected. We dive into our own endless pools of EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE.  We are stuck trying to get rid of OUR anxiety by ridding them of THEIR anxiety.

If you’re as porous as I am, if the “other” is someone I know, much less love, or care about–(Okay, could be the sacker a the grocery in a bad mood, but he’s really a hard worker)–if the person is someone close, all he has to do is open the morning paper with a “whack” and I’m in there… boom… trying to talk him into having a good day.  Just to help him, of course.

The many faces of the please CALM DOWN so I can CALM DOWN routine are too many to cover in one day, but here are a few favorites:

Minimization: “Oh, it’s not that bad.”

The Judge: “You      caused this to happen, you know.” 

Miss Lake Superior:  “You know what I WOULD DO…”

The Miss Lake Superior First Runner Up  whose response is so enlightening she (ah, yes, our Dr.L) is awarded the tiarra:  “I’m not listening to your whining. In the same situation I would not have: EVER MARRIED THAT GUY, GONE ON EVEN ONE DATE WITH THAT GUY, OR SPOKEN WITH A GUY who had a friend whose mother was a smoker or didn’t agree with me…if you had been lucky enough to BE ME,   you wouldn’t have these worries now, but here you are…so tough.”

We’ll go with these few for now, minimizing, judging, claiming we’d do better in the same situation.  Guilt Alert: Remember, if you are reading this, you are probably a person who’s not much of a problem for others and most importantly, you have a capacity to look at YOUR OWN BEHAVIOR. So, pat yourself on the back for having that kind of guts as you catch yourself doing back-flips to calm someone else down because you too, are a little pourous.  THE REALLY GOOD NEWS: When we breathe, “Cool air in, Warm air out,” in place of the above routines, we reduce our stress. Along with not being quite such a pain to other people.    

 . . . ah, Mexico.

“Which is more important? The world that is made up of facts, or the WORLD AS YOU SEE IT?”

On an afternoon in August, I was mowing the lawn when I ran out of gas.  Whew.  As if perspiration wasn’t already blinding me.  I located the full gas can and returned to the mower in the middle of the back yard.  I opened the gasoline hatch and rotated the handle off the can. 

Great. The gas can had an opening about four inches in diameter and flat on the top of the vessel and the hatch in the mower was less than an inch across.  How was I supposed to do this?  The heat was killing me.  My EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEM was launching me into idiot ramblings such as, ”Why am I the one out here in this heat?  I do everything around here! I’m not even supposed to be out in the heat. Who left the mower half empty anyway? My whole life has been just like this.  Me getting stuck with all the hideous jobs.”  And . . . for leading role in Playing Victim, the nominees are . . .

Okay. So fine.  I could make this work.  (Motto as a child:  If at first you don’t succeed, force it.)

I’m not helpless, right?  I go into the house and search for a funnel for twenty minutes. Right. We didn’t have a hammer.  What made me think I could find something as specific as a funnel? “Why am I the one always stuck without the right tools?  I could use the urn from the coffee machine . . . no, that sounds risky as far as future coffee.  I collect several manilla folders from my home office and head out, patting myself on my sweaty back because I am such a genius. 

Back at the mower, I make a funnel out of one folder and pour.  It collapses.  Fine. My hands are shaking like crazy.  I’m blind. A bit dizzy. Yet, clever girl that I am, I persevere.  I made a tiered, graduated funnel using six manilla folders.  And it works!  I stand over the mower wondering exactly what the chances are that a breeze could set the mower, gasoline folders, and me up in a mushroom of flames.  Particularly since I can’t control my body movements my knees being shot and all.  My mood?  Victim has racheted up to snivelling and just wait until . . .

I turn to return the cap to the gasoline can.  Which is when I notice that the “cap” for the tank, which I had unscrewed and set aside, is actually an excellent, pliable funnel.

This is my world, and welcome to it.

Tomorrow: How Much Does Your PERCEPTION determine your life?

 If you were famous enough to have YOUR OWN ACTION FIGURE would you have Self Confidence and Self Esteem?  More to nail on the Psychobabble Wall of Things that Aren’t True:  If you get enough Praise . . . you will have SELF CONFIDENCE  and SELF ESTEEM. 

But wait!  Praise is a good thing, right? After all, praise makes us FEEL good. We’ve even told parents and teachers that praise (social reinforcement) is the way to get kids to accomplish tasks. We’ve told husbands and wives that praising their spouses can MAKE THEM FEEL LOVED.  Can’t get too much praise, can’t give too much praise . . . right? 

Maybe.  But, What is, “Do these pants make me look fat?”  but one more attempt to suck approval out of another person and duck responsibility for ourselves? (By the way, you regular readers know and have taken the pledge to never, ever, ask anyone that question, or any similar question. You guys remember that any part of your body or personality that you complain about grows to enormous proportions in the eyes of the other.) 

The problem is, if you buy that enough love and praise results in Self Confidence and Self Esteem, it follows then that, if you DO NOT FEEL loaded up with these feathery showstoppers, self-confidence and self-esteem, you must have–somewhere along the line–missed out on sufficient praise.  Now, I wish the worst part of this misguided notion is that we will overblame others (See “What’s Love Got to Do With It?)  . . . but that’s not the worst part.  The most damaging result of this belief is believing –   “I don’t have self confidence and self esteem because I did not get the love and praise I needed AND I did not get the love and praise I needed to be a person with self confidence and self esteem BECAUSE I’M NOT DESERVING OF LOVE and PRAISE”.  And that’s just not right. The whole chase approval, get praise routine is a dead end.  The movie The Wrestler speaks to this issue with clarity, pain, and beauty.   

Warning:  Plot information to follow.  If you haven’t seen The Wrestler and you want to be surprised, stop now. Also, you probably want to avoid the movie if a lot of nudity, a lot, is going to bother you. 

The Wrestler, Randy the Ram (Mickey Rourke), reaches physical maturity to discover he doesn’t know how to participate in adult relationships.  At about the same time he starts spending hours at the gym and learns what body-building enhancing drugs can do for him.  Wha-la!  The Ram is getting noticed.  Being admired.  He even has his own Randy the Ram action toy on the market.

Tomorrow:  Is having an action toy in your image the same as being a real person?

 

 

 

 Yep.  Nail another of the reliable psychobabble topics to the wall.  Just rip it out of your head and ram a spike through it.

We’re supposed to have this SELF-CONFIDENCE  BEFORE we accomplish tasks, projects, and relationships.  Fine.  So Just where are we supposed to get S-C? 

We can’t buy it, obviously, since people with lots of stuff are missing S-C as often as the rest of us bargain hunters.  Okay, so your parents, right?  Your parents, if they loved you, were SUPPOSED to GIVE you Self-Confidence.  So that worked, right?

Well, no.  So, phooey there.  Every parent I’ve ever worked with loved their children and most desperately wanted to GIVE their children S-C.  Their love didn’t do it, and given that little confession, I guess you get it that a psychololgist can’t GIVE it to you, either. 

Things are looking pretty desperate.  But wait!  We can marry someone who loves us enough to GIVE us Self-Confidence.  Right.  Talk about a way to wear out a relationship.  And your kids?  Even if they do everything right and the family is doing great. . . Nope, they can’t GIVE it to you. Even when they try very hard.

So what now?  Oh, yeah.  We already nailed that S-C business to the psychobabble-I’m-not-going-to-look-for-Stuff-That-Doesn’t-Really-Exist-WALL.

This Self Confidence business has held us back long enough.  Part of the effort toward a life based more on facts, and less on wild emotions, toward a life with more solid successes that come from steady progress (no eat-cookies and lose weight, send in your old gold and go to Tahiti,  or borrow more money to save yourself money funny business) . . .

Means facing the REALITY that to accomplish anything, we have to take the first step, SELF-CONFIDENCE or NO SELF-CONFIDENCE.  The only thing that matters is that first step.  Then the one after and the one after.  Knowing we will fail sometimes.  That if we aren’t knocked around a bit, our goals are way to low. 

As for where having 14 babies while unemployed and single comes from? . . . Now there’s a woman taking LIFE RULED by the EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEM TO A NEW LEVEL.

 Okay.  Some more on FUSION . . . sticking yourself to someone else’s anxiety.  Making THEIR anxiety about YOU. 

We lose power over ourselves when we cannot operate separately . . . when our “mood” is determined by the “mood” of another person. When our sense of doing okay is dependant on another person (usually a spouse or a child) doing okay . . . we are going to try very hard to keep the other person calm so that we can be calm.  Though, of course, we deny such a motivation.  We say we are twisting into a pretzel to keep them calm . . . because we are just TRYING TO HELP THEM. 

  Operating to keep everyone around you calm is very tiring. 

The “Women in Therapy” Incident:  At last, this example is a time when I actually managed to stay separate, calm, in charge, and barely ruffled.  At least I did in “Women in Therapy, Part 1.”

  Part One.  My husband had an important deposition on this particular afternoon.  I was out at the stable schooling my horse in a jumper ring away from the barn.  The stable phone at the ring chimed several times, but as it was always for the kids that rode and dismounting to pick it up was a real hassle, I paid no attention.  When I finished riding and returned to the main barn the phone continued to ring and, as I was right by it and not on a horse, I answered it.  It was my husband–ballistic.  His car wouldn’t start and he’d been trying to reach me. (We lived near the stable.) I rescued him as quickly as possible. Still he filled the twenty minutes to downtown in a rain of fury . . . of course returning to the faithful topic of the time and money I spent on the horses. 

Here’s the thing.  My big moment of emotional steadiness.  I did not get angry or even particularly anxious. I knew he wasn’t really upset by me. I knew  he was okay with the horses.  He was anxious about the trial to come and providing the best deposition he could for his client.  What he said, for once, didn’t set off defensiveness. I took in my book and read in the lobby during his deposition.  On the way home he apologized as I knew he would.  And I said I was okay, I knew he knew I would never have intentionally left him out to dry.

Okay.  That was Part One.  You did notice the halo and the little blue birdies fluttering about?   Cue up “Whistle While You Work.”

Tomorrow, Part Two.  It’s not nearly as lovely. 

 

It’s really hard to change the way we habitually deal with anxiety.  So celebrate your little victories and do not water the times when your EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEM takes charge and you waste time, can’t sleep, make a fool of yourself, irritate someone you love, procrastinate, get into too big a hurry and make a mess… and others. 

Think of the emotional field of people, job, traffic, weather, friends, etc. as the GARDEN IN WHICH YOU LIVE.  And, while we’re MAKING UP THE WORLD IN WHICH WE LIVE (since we humans can’t help it.) Your garden has rows and rows and rows of blooming possibilities. Some rows were planted for you (family) and some you planted yourself.

A garden is a CHANGING ORGANIC ELEMENT.  We tend to the of the SELF as stagnant.  Fixed.  Maybe even broken and stuck that way.  A good part of our SELF GARDEN we keep hidden from others, some from ourselves.  The good news?

A garden CHANGES ALL THE TIME.  Some change is out of our control–weather–so we’re not going to waste energy trying to change what is beyond our power, right?  If you’re short, you’re short. If you’re young you’re young and if you’re not young, you’re not–no matter how many Extenz drinks you buy (Yep, you only pay shipping and handling, of course. But have you really ever thought how much it might cost to receive a soft drink through the mail? And that doesn’t count how much it costs for them to “handle” your drink–another one of those “let’s just make up a figure” expenses.) 

Or creams or surgeries or, God forbid, have you even seen that full-body spandex thing info-mercial? It’s a garment that, somehow, the women in the ad are able to get into and the “before” and “after” shots are prit-tee impressive. I will mention that the photos are all of women standing.  Attempt to sit down or breathe and all bets are off.

Where is Yoda when I need him?  Manana.

 The woman who lost 100 pounds on burgers is an example of someone who could listen to her THINKING self amidst the crowds telling her what she should do. 

Well, doc, you say, when do we get to HOW to engage the THINKING GUIDANCE SYSTEM?

Now.  A start.  Your THINKING GUIDANCE SYSTEM is in gear when YOUR BEST THINKING is your point of reference for decisions.  Remember, only your TGS considers options in a thoughtful way, your EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEM , has only one goal (no matter what rubberly rationalization you’re using) and that one thing is —-

    do whatever you have to do to rid yourself of anxiety.   

An easy place to start the task of recognizing when we are slipping from our thinking point of reference to an emotionally driven position, is to talk about FUSION.  FUSION …is when your actions and “feelings” are determined, not by your own thinking point of reference, but determined by “catching” the anxiety of another. 

Examples:

A woman on a plane is reading a novel.  The man next to her asks what she’s reading. She shows him the title and says she really likes the author.  The man sneers and replies staring out the window, “Yeah, I guess if you can’t read more complex works-you have to stay with books like that.”  (Do you feel it?)

 While in graduate school I went on a cruise with a friend who was doing a seminar for “Adult Children of Alcoholics” (a fad diagnosis that has, gladly, passed). I was able to pay minimal cost as an additional person in the seminar leader’s cabin. The first day I attended an introductory group session in which emotional overdrive and ”group-think” were in high gear.   Group-think happens in low functioning gatherings in which each participant is encouraged to become “one” with the group by confessing similar experiences. Refusal to become “one” with the group is labelled as insanity or denial. When it was my time to “join” I thought back really hard to uncover how my life had been affected by addiction.  Then I had it.   I actually said that I was affected by addiction when my mother was ill and taking cortisone to stay alive. (Which didn’t work all that long. She died at barely 42.) 

The point?  Before I felt the suck of the group anxiety, I’d NEVER thought of my mother’s desperate efforts to deal with her fatal illness as CAUSING ME to GO THROUGH the wretched helplessness and personal trauma–of an adult survivor from a drug-distorted home.  Never.  But for those shining few minutes… I’d given up mom… and REALITY… to be part of the group.

The really scary part was that I didn’t realize until after the meeting what had transpired.  How I’d lost (given up) my point of reference.  What if I hadn’t realized what happened?  What if the warm affirmation of the group had propelled me into a life living out a new label?

Just saying.  Later.  More fusion.

  First: This is not a new diet.  No secret is included.  All I’m doing is reporting what one woman decided to do and did based on her work to get a big more in charge her EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEM.  Remember, no frowns or self-beatings.  This is where your unconditional friend presides. And you are okay, so smile.

This woman, I’ll call her M, lived alone and had a limited social life.  She was forty-six and had been divorced almost twenty-years.  M worked at a good state job and enjoyed quiet evenings with her own company reading and watching favorite shows. She also enjoyed travelling. Limitation travelling was the reason she wanted to think through the weight issue.

To strengthen her access to her THINKING GUIDANCE SYSTEM, she constructed methods to break the rhythm of reflexive,non-thoughtful, eating.  Then she came up with her own program.  For breakfast and lunch (meals she didn’t really enjoy) she ate an apple and two rice cakes.  At nine in the evening she went through the Whataburger Drive Thru and picked up a double meat cheese Whataburger with double onions. She went home and enjoyed her meal in front of her favorite show.  She did this for months.  She lost the weight.

I know, I can practically feel “Yes, but…” missiles about nutrition, what time of day a person ought to eat, the importance of your astrological sign, and your body frame, someone pointing to a pyramid and, of course, plastic food.  Somewhere out there is even a joy-killer somewhere saying,  “But, Doc,      don’t you think it’s WRONG to enjoy such bad foods.  Don’t you think we should ‘eat to live’ instead of ‘live to eat’?”

Grrrrrrrrrrr.  M lost the weight.  Did all those nutritionist talks ever change anyone’s behavior? I mean anyone except that rude guy in the back chanting, “eat to live instead of eat to live.”

And Dr. L, of course.

  Lack of information is not the reason we persist in self destructive behaviors.  Yet, more information (even if it’s absurdly dishonest) is what we throw at people and problems.  What we throw at ourselves.

Change in our lives comes with MANAGING ANXIETY BETTER.  More information doesn’t do it.   And before I rant along here all serious, keep in mind the motto of this site:  IF DO NOT TAKE LIFE SERIOUSLY, IT ISN’T WORTH LIVING.  IF YOU ONLY TAKE LIFE SERIOUSLY, IT ISN’T WORTH LIVING.

So, let’s not get a stranglehold, life or death on ourselves.  We’re going to MUDDLE through.

Let’s take weight management.  (Remember, humor.  Smile, it keeps them guessing.)  The facts: all diets work (short term).  If you take in fewer calories than you expend you will lose weight.  It’s not about your blood type, your personality type, what time you eat, or what order you eat foods in, secret fat-burning herbs or foods, or machines. and plastic balls. Neither is weight-loss about “shopping at Walmart” or all the pounds you’ll lose after you order a metal dectector–two of the more recent ridiculous claims. Grasping onto more information, buying a “new” diet is back to thinking 10 MINUTES AT A TIME.

Now I’m not into the double-message culture that has way too many women living lives constantly racked by self-hate, anxiety, and guilt.   But as I worked on an eating disorders unit for a while, I sometimes consult with women whose EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEMS have steered them toward eating to relieve anxiety and carrying the accompanying extra pounds.  These women interested in working on managing their anxiety better as a way of thinking about eating patterns do not need me or anyone else to hand over another diet or a weight chart. I want to tell you about one woman who lost over a hundred pounds eating hamburgers.

But, first I digress to share with you the PLASTIC FOOD Incident. 

After a early and complete hysterectomy I was (gratefully) put on hormones which required some adjusting.  “Some adjusting” being a clinical term for IMMEDIATE CHANGE BECAUSE I AM NOW CRAZY and I don’t want to end up in prison.”  Thus, I ended up with an appointment with a Gynocologic Endocrinologist Assistant.  The GEA asked me to describe the symptoms I was experiencing.  After saying “I’m not the lovely, gentle person I once could convince myself I was,” and  ”I now consider climbing a staircase right up there with swimming the English Channel,”  . . . I mentioned a bit of new flesh showing up around my middle without any changes in my behavior.

And this is what she did. No kidding.  Now, keep in mind this helpful lass is about twenty and I’m not.  This is what she did . .  without even a stutter-step of questioning whether her approach might  be a bit shop-worn. . . even bizarre?    

She smiled as if, “Oh, I know just what you need,”   and reached into a drawer. She then brought out a little plastic steak, a plastic clump of broccoli, and a rather appetizing slice of plastic chocolate cake.  She set these items in front of me on the table.   The innocent GEA then began to explain how calories function in the human body, adding that she finds demonstrating with the plastic food helpful in her explanation because so many people do not realize that PORTION size matters.

Oh.  So, I guess that same stunning NEW IDEA would apply to making bank deposits, too?  I never thought of that.  Surely, this lass had not been listening when I mentioned, I WAS CRAZY and MAYBE, JUST MAYBE not as PATIENT with wasting time as I was before the surgery?

Okay, next I’ll fill you in on how the woman lost a hundred pounds eating hamburgers.

  About the woman told the priest about her dream and asked if gossip was a sin.  He sent her on with instructions to take a pillow up to the roof of her house that night, plunge a knife into it, and return the next day.

She did and the priest asked what happened when she stabbed the pillow.

“Feathers,” she said.  Now we have a little lesson here . . . but hark!  The lesson has nothing to do with the kind of gossip that goes on BETWEEN PEOPLE.  The lesson is that each of us has inside of us an

INNER TORTURER. . .   stabbing our brain and poofing down all sorts of  “WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?”  “YOU CAN’T DO ANYTHING RIGHT,” “YOU ARE JUST NOT UP TO THIS LIFE THING!”

In other words, your EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEM is a big, fluffy sack of self-doubting feathers, just waiting for you to jab them into action. 

And, I for one, in 2009 am going to do something about it!

Note:  The reason I do not keep up with or publish comments is because this computer has in it a monster with a pillow full of SPAM which makes life hell.  No where in the ballpark with my lovely

INNER TORTURER,  but them my PERSONAL I.T. has had many more years of, pretty much, uninterrupted experience.

  “Which is more important?  The world you can touch, facts, or the WORLD YOU ARE RESPONDING TO?

The movie “Doubt” is a story about that question.  In it, a priest is accused on very little, no, on no evidence of molesting a boy.  Interesting statements of the accusing nun (not exact quotes):

See he IS who I THOUGHT HE WAS.  Proving that the priest is WHO SHE THINKS HE IS quickly becomes more important than the truth.  The priest: “What proof do you have?”

The nun pounds her chest as says, “None.  But I have my ‘CERTAINTY’.”

The priest:  “Your ‘certainty’ is no more than your ‘feeling’, it is not a fact.”

I’ve always been impressed by how we make other people up as we go along.  How much of WHO WE ARE is our playing out of our parents’ “certainty” of who we would become?  In what ways have we limited our goals playing out the expectations of others? 

Okay, here’s where I usually slip into a guilt bog thinking, “And what about the children I’ve influenced and limited?  And my husband?  He’d probably be president if I didn’t work out my anxiety by being critical of him?

Enough about that.  I have to sleep at night.

Where I end up on this is another interesting question.  If in my head I SEE OTHER PEOPLE AS DANGEROUS and CRITICAL . . .  . . .how much of that is the WORLD I’M RESPONDING TO IN MY HEAD that doesn’t even exist?

In what ways am I LIMITING MYSELF by the ME I’ve CREATED IN MY HEAD that doesn’t REALLY EXIST?

ba-deep, ba-deep, ba-deep.  More hard stuff to come trying to engage the THINKING GUIDANCE SYSTEM ain’t for sissies.

Optimism:  A company running an ad on television which says, “Find all the gold in your house, put it in a brown envelope (that we will send to you for FREE!) and mail it to US!  Then, once we receive your envelope, we’ll pick some random amount of money out of the AIR and send you a CHECK (for however much we decided, while giggling hysterically, we wanted to send!)

Oh, the pillow thing?  Later. I won’t forget.  Cause it’s important and has feathers in it.

 Okay.    We’ve had lots of examples of the EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEM messing life up for us.  So where does the THINKING GUIDANCE SYSTEM come in?

And what does it have to do with fettucine?    Everything!!!

The THINKING GUIDANCE SYSTEM is:

   The part of our brain which can TOLERATE ANXIETY.

   The part of our brain which can GATHER and USE FACTS in decisions.

The part of our brain which can SLOW DOWN and consider, WHEN I TOOK THIS CERTAIN ACTION BEFORE, HOW DID THINGS WORK OUT?

The Fetteccinne Incident, a move made thousands of times a day.  I’m working at a hotel and it’s four in the afternoon.  I haven’t had lunch, so I grab coffee.  This routine (thoughtlessly) is repeated until nine-thirty.  I’m at the bar having a cool glass of wine before calling it a night.  Boy am I starving!  I order fettuccine alfredo to take up to my room.  After all, I haven’t had a meal all day.  The fettuccine was terrific. 

OPTIMISM SIGHTING: That little readout at the bottom of a television ad that suggests you look up their advertisement in some random magazine.

But the heartburn at midnight was awful.  At two, I got up and stumbled down the hall for a Coke hoping that would help.  I didn’t get much sleep at all.  NOTE: I’m not suggesting that “not eating” is good and holy and “eating fettucine or any other lovely food is bad.” Just as many people “don’t eat” under rule of the non-fact-based EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEM as people who “eat” on decisions made by the same system.

The point is, the EMOTIONAL SYSTEM doesn’t pay attention to the FACTS.  The EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEM ignores past experiences.  You can bet that wasn’t my first lonely midnight heartburn.

  Okay, the first step of this better living in 2009 is giving up the negativity.  This means, not only avoiding the anxiety-builders on every newscast, not only learning to turn another person’s negative spin into something positive, but cutting our own NEGATIVITY.  ME?  CHANGE?  Are you nuts?

Whoa.  This is hard for me.  Negative comments are the way people in my family show how in-the-know we are.  I have been told by persons close to me that    ”You do know that it’s okay with us if you go through the world without evaluating it?”

What?  You don’t NEED to know what I think of this television show?  That politician?  New Yorkers?  Californians?  Canadians?  What about Paris Hilton?  Do you really want to know?

Do you really need one more person to point out that those FREE male enhancement pills, the free computer instruction discs, the free energy tabs are about the “shipping and handling?”  No, you know that.  My comments add nothing except down energy.  (Hey, I sort of got away with it, but we all have to have outlets.)

I recommend outlets in which no one is actually being damaged.  Which means no one is in position to hear our negativity. 

Which leaves talking back to the television (only when alone) and belligerent dialogues with that insanely saccharine voiced woman telling you how important your call is while you are on terminal hold.  I personally have grave fear that my responses (a kind term) when she says, “I’m sorry, your call is so important–are being recorded.  Let me try to get you the help you need by seeing if any of the following options meet your needs.”

 **See previous entry for BLIND OPTIMISM, federal highway department.

  Motto for 2009: “You know, I’ve been thinking.  I’ve decided I would look GREAT in a string bikini!”

Yep.  The very thought is beyond ridiculous if I’m talking about what someone else would think.  I’m not sure I could talk a salesperson into letting me try on, much less purchase a string bikini.  I chose the string bikini statement because someone who loves me very much just the way I am said that once spying a string bikini on a store manikin.  He couldn’t have been more wrong.  And I’m not being coy.  I would look ridiculous in a string bikini, then and even more now.  But not according to him.

The only way we’re going to get our lives back is by producing our own feedback channels run by that part of ourselves that’s like that guy who said I’d look great in a string bikini..  You can go to FOX News for the conservative take, NBC for a more liberal take.  And to your own channel for the best take for you.  This is the channel run by that director who is absolutely CRAZY about you. We are not tuning into the channel manned by others.    Alert!!  CRAZY and unwise are not the same.  Remember best thinking over emotionally based decisions is what we’re going for. The reason no comments have been shown on this site is that I haven’t sorted through the thousands and thousands of spams.  I’m trying to catch up now and must say—Buying more exercise machines, male organ size enhancements, and God forbid, those all-in-one girdles–is not the kind of CRAZY that goes into having a better life.  It’s the kind of crazy that keeps everything the same except you have less money.  

The crazy we’re going for is the kind that gets you to submit that short story, write that novel, paint that picture, run that race, because if you’re not crazy confident you’ll talk yourself out of it.  Crazy confidence is not about buying easy-sounding solutions.  It’s about DOING something that changes your life. I know, kind of confusing.  Manana.

WHY IS SOMEONE ELSE’S WAY OF SEEING YOU MORE REAL THAN THE WAY YOU CHOOSE TO SEE YOURSELF? 

It’s not like their opinion is right.  It’s JUST THEIR OPINION.

This year we are going to LAUGH, LAUGH, LAUGH.  And anytime anyone doubts us, most particularly ourselves, we are going to have this sentence pop out of our mouths:  “You know, I’ve been thinking about it and I just realized I would look great in a string bikini.”

And when others scoff, pass out or threaten to have us picked up by the men in the white jackets, we’ll ask, “Which is more important?  The world I can touch?  Or the world to which I AM RESPONDING?”   To which others will say, “You’re crazy.”   And you’ll say, “Great.   It’s working.” 

 **The unbelievable optimism from the federal highway department:  On the endless nothingness of IH 8 between Yuma, Arizona and El Centro, California, along the shoulder are signs saying, “No parking except in case of emergency.”  Now there’s optimism.  Someone’s going to park there for a picnic?

  “The BowFlex has given me more than new strength, it’s given me a new LIFE.  Nutrisystem has given me more than a new body, it’s given me a new LIFE.  This xx allery medication has given me more than clear breath, it’s given me LIFE.”

Oh, if only we could really experience a better life by obtaining something, eating programed food, or taking a pill. 

We can’t.  Think about it.  If it really worked, WOULD EVERY SINGLE, NOT MISSING ONE, ALL so-called women’s magazines HAVE A NEW DIET ON THE COVER EVERY MONTH?

These “articles” and info-mercials are dead ends.  I do admit their allure.  It’s even worse in other countries where their is no attempt to even flash the unreadable disclaimers across the bottom of the screen.  In Mexico you can buy a jar of fat-sucking gel.    This way you can choose the places where you want the fat to come off (One jar per household, please.)  You can order a box of patches (just pay shipping and handling) which you can place on the area you want to reduce “and have the NEWLY DISCOVERED SECRET work through the night.”

Buying something, even temporarily changing your body, does not work. Maybe you get a short spurt of false esteem but that’s it.

There is a way though.  We can work toward CHANGING the way we RESPOND.  We can, with very hard work, CHANGE our AUTOMATIC ways of THINKING to take better care of ourselves. 

Your brain is in your body.  No one else can take care of your FEELINGS.  No one else can change your THOUGHTS.

So, here’s the job for 2009.  I’ve always been intrigued about the phenomenon that when a son or daughter has been absolutely proven to have committed brutal murder, the parents still believe their child is innocent.  The theories for who did the crime are bizarre.  And what about that husband in North Texas who, after his wife was shown to be the only person who could have (and did) stab their two sons to death–still claims his wife as a maligned angel?

I know, weird way to get to the point.  But 2009 is when we work toward having a friend life that in our corner.  Ourselves. 

No, we’re not going to murder anyone.  We’re actually going to be a lot nicer. 

Taking care of you is the kindest thing you can do for those around you.  You can’t be loving when you’re angry at you.  You can’t reach your dreams if you’re not backing yourself with wild commitment.

2009, I’m ready.    ARE YOU?

The Movie Revolt Incident:  It was Friday afternoon after Thanksgiving.  After lunch, a group of six laws and in-laws in my husband’s family decided to go to a popular horror movie.    On the way, one sister-in-law announced she’d drop off the rest of us and come back to pick us up, as she did not want to see this particular movie.  That’s when things began falling apart.  I opted to skip the movie as well.  A third expressed doubts and the pro-movie people started suggesting other movies.

Yikes.  We stopped to buy a paper and look for another movie, though we three rebels were okay without one.  The start time for the horror movie past, one brother-in-law threw up his hands and criticized his wife for not listening to him when he said they should bring the paper with them from home.  I started apologizing for some random thing (and thinking how these family “togetherness” holidays were overrated).  The original “rebel” launched in on a story from childhood when she didn’t sleep for days after a horror movie.      Her husband added that she was “always like this with his family, but anything goes when they are with her family.”

All because one person attempted a INDIVIDUALITY move.

Thinking in terms of natural systems, each of us operates with a TOGETHERNESS force and a INDIVIDUALITY force. 

What?      Think of it like this when you are anxious and find relief calling a friend, your togetherness force was in affect.  If you feel calmer at Thanksgiving when you escape to the back den and the football game, your individuality force is in action. 

Forget the complexity.  In the next several days we will look at ways to manage anxiety when our force for individuality is overwhelmed by the presence of others, each of whom INSISTS ON BEING THEMSELVES instead of only being in ways to MAKE US COMFORTABLE.

Whew.  I’m tired just thinking about it. 

  Usually, when someone first comes into my office, what they’re wanting to know is:  “How can I keep doing what I’m already doing, and get a DIFFERENT RESULT? 

   People are fairly predictable, so why aren’t we using that to improve our lives?  We are each one predictable in how we manage anxiety.  Do you try to take control?  Try to get the other to change?  Do you withdraw?    Sink in defeat?  Have a cheesecake?  Gossip?

Oh, all these options are grim.  And we’ve CHOSEN to create a world for ourselves that is lovely and joyful.    We have decided to be like our grandfather who died with a great big smile on his face instead of meeting death screaming and crying like the other passengers in his car.

  Many people don’t have any idea what goes on when psychotherapy is effective. 

Effective psychotherapy is not:

FEELING BETTER when you leave the session because you’ve “vented.”    This kind of psychotherapy can make things worse by supporting the following misconceptions:

1.  Venting improves lives and relationships. 

2.  The psychologist, because he can tolerate your venting, is a much better person to be emotionally intimate with than your spouse or family.

3.  If people love you (spouse, family) they should put up with anything, including your venting which is laced with criticisms and claims of victimhood.

4.  Having not been challenged to THINK, you leave your session more convinced than ever that YOUR MADE UP VERSION of the WORLD and EVENTS and the PEOPLE in your relationship system    –is indeed correct. 

That’s where we’re going with this.  REAL CHANGE is difficult because to CHANGE your BEHAVIOR, you must first CHANGE YOUR MIND.

Really.  You have to accept that what you respond to on a daily basis is not THE WORLD, but the STORY YOU’VE MADE UP ABOUT THE WORLD   based on facts plus lots and lots of powerful ANXIETY.

Are you willing to challenge your own mindset? 

Are you willing to consider that your spouse IS NOT the person you’re convinced he is?    (Now, we’re not talking paranoia, but going the other way.  Is it just possible he’s a more caring, kinder, brighter person than you ever thought possible?)

What would your life be like if you gave him the benefit of the doubt?  Jumped to the best possible assumption instead of the worst?  (He’s late because he’s a selfish, disorganized, uncaring person.   Or add in a worse case senario that puts yourself down.  He’s late because he doesn’t respect me, because I’m a doormat, because I’m not attractive.)

Yes.  I know it sounds ridiculous to think a husband would not bother to be on time because his wife was not as attractive as she used to be–but somebody’s buying all those exercise machines, programed meals, four stage cosmetic routines.

   “Tell me, Doc.  How can I keep doing what I’m already doing, but get a DIFFERENT RESULT?” 

In relationship counseling, each person comes in essentially asking, “How can I keep doing what I’m already doing–but get a different response from by chosen other?”

After thirty years of “practicing” psychology, I don’t know specifically what actions will work to improve a particular relationship.  I do know which behaviors more or less guarantee failure.

Think of it as if you are standing in a clearing in a forest.  Narrow trails sprout from the edges of the clearning into the trees.  I don’t know which of the trails will end up where you want to be, but I do know which trails will lead you to a dead end or worse.

The first of these is the trail that reads:  I can improve this relationship and my pleasure in this relationship by CONVINCING THE OTHER TO CHANGE.

Who’s in charge?  Don’t you want to be in charge? 

I’ve had thirty years of marriage, too.  And, like any good spouse, I have applied this YOU CHANGE approach daily, even giving hour by hour suggestions.  And, yet, the man goes on being himself.  What’s up with that?

Where do I turn.  Then, there’s the mirror.  Eek!   Me?  I have to change me? 

But that’s hard.

Challenge One:  Take charge of what goes on inside your chest cavity.  Your feelings.  That bundle of energy or hope or whatever it is that determines the expression on our faces, the energy and optimism or lack of joy with which we approach each and every situation.

     Hey, in case you do not have a well-developed INNER TORTURER, or a spouse, relative, or friend willing to teach you to DOUBT YOURSELF, there’s always Dr. L. Perfect on the radio. 

     You can call in and she’ll give you the words to beat yourself up with.  Regularly.