Brainwashing yourself with the truth, or, how to create a positive self image.

[Loner]

For some things, perception is reality. Many people are successful, not because they are more talented or capable, but simply because they believe in themselves, and work towards creating the reality that they believe can exist. People who lack this belief are more easily discouraged by obstacles and tend to defeat their own efforts with anxiety and doubt which keep them from committing fully.

It is interesting to me how people form a self image. Life experiences either pleasant or unpleasant instill people with the beleif that they can handle what life throws at them and they become stronger people, simply because that is narrative they choose to write and believe about themselves. The primary source of my own self image seems all too obvious, my view of myself as worthless, unlovable, and weak came about because it is what my family taught me to believe. How can I now manage to form a positive self image?

I've been pondering this for a while. I am 27, old enough that the story of my life has had a few different chapters. Recently I have been looking back on my life, as objectively as I can, and looking for rational factual evidence to either support or refute the idea that it is reasonable to believe I will meet with success in various aspects of life. For a long time I have seen my life as a series of failures. When I was being nice to myself I would blame these failures on my family and my past, other times I would blame myself, but I always focused on the general plot line to be one of a succession of failures.

Recently though I've been looking back, not at a series of failures but at individual situations, and doing the best I can to look back with the perspective of a stranger with no bias about my story at all. When I separate my self hatred, shame, doubt, and other emotions away from my memories, I can actually view many of them positively, and as things that SHOULD have instilled me with confidence.

Even things that at the time left me feeling very down on myself, I can look back on now and see that while it was an unfortunate situation I handled it very well. Looking at things objectively, if I were somehow able to just erase all the things in my life, I have had enough positive reinforcement to logically support the conclusion that I should believe in myself and except myself to be successful. This is a huge revelation, because I typically have viewed my life as nothing but failures and unfulfilled potential, even as isolated and controlled by fear as I have been though, I can see objectively that I have had enough experiences that should of instilled me with a positive believe about myself. I don't really actually VIEW myself in that positive light, but looking at my life story, I can see that it seems like a reasonable conclusion, when all emotion is removed, for me to believe in myself.

 

[discarded]

My psychologist once asked me to list all my successes in life and I could not think of one. Then he asked me to list all my failures and the list seemed endless. Yet he took my list and one by one we worked through the it, discussing what happened and why I viewed it as a failure. Then he pointed out from his perspective all the positives and at last I started to see that it was negative thought pattern that made me view it that way. If one little aspect of each situation was evenly slightly negative then I labelled the whole situation a failure. I couldn't seem to see any good if the end result made me or someone else unhappy. Gradually over a long time I have started to view things differently and to view things in the positive rather than the negative.

For example, my husband's PTSD is somehow my fault and especially his non acceptance of my help. But now I can see that I have not failed, I have tried all that I can to help him, I have researched the subject, I have sort out help for him, it is out of my control that he will do nothing about it and is not a reflection of my failure to fix him.

There are still a times, mainly when my depression kicks in that I revert to my negative thinking. I don't know why I started being such a negative thinker or when challenges became insurmountable problems, I just have to focus on trying to see a positive in every challenge and makes it seem a whole lot easier.

 

[p-no]

When I separate my self hatred, shame, doubt, and other emotions away from my memories, I can actually view many of them positively

Can you feel proud when you view them positively?

 

[Loner]

So far this has been kind of vague, and I am not sure I have exactly got my meaning across, so I'll list some specific examples.


Some of these are kind of crass, superficial, etc, but I hope I'll get my meaning across.

I got in a bit of a fight a couple years ago. I was at a ski area of all places, and some guy misheard what I said to him as I passed by him, and swung his ski pole at my face. I stopped below him, mostly out of shock, I assumed it had to of been an accident, and was expecting an apology to be incoming, instead, he comes at me with his fist raised up to punch me. He was uphill of me so he had the advantage, and he was a good deal bigger than me. I could tell he was overcome with rage and wasnt thinking clearly. I remember everything slowed WAY down and it seemed like i had all the time in the world to very calmly raise my ski pole up as if I was going to stab him in the face with it. I had no intention of hurting him, but as he saw my ski pole pointing at his face, his eyes left me, and attempted to focus on the very small and moving point of the ski pole. In that half a second he had lost his balance, I lowered the ski pole, and leaned back as he fell past my harmlessly. I should of been full of myself after that. That was some like, action movie hero calmly effortlessly disarms the bad guy without even having to hurt him at all type stuff. Instead I had an emotional flashback to being frightened as a child, felt small, weak, and felt a very real reminder of what I viewed as the unpassable void that existed between me and 'normal' people.

The most romantic experience of my life was 4 years ago when my Australian roommates had a friend come visit them for a couple weeks. Amy was gorgeous, athletic, and nice. I was smitten as soon as I met her, but I told myself not to get weird or creepy she probably didn't want anything to do with me. As soon as I spent some time around her I noticed how smart and funny she was, and somehow I ended up kissing her, and she slept in my bed every night after that. At the time, I really enjoyed meeting her, but I was devastated when she left. I had spent almost my entire life very much isolated from people and alone, she showed me how nice human interaction could be, but also showed me how alone I was when she had to leave. In this way I chose to view the experience in a positive light, but in many ways, I still chose to use it as evidence and reason to view myself in a negative light. I beat myself up over the fact that, due to my PTSD, i was unable to be sexually active with Amy. I told myself how rare it was to find a girl like her and I felt like it would never happened again. It just made it all the more clear how alone I was. Looking back now though, I should feel uplifted by that experience. A beautiful smart funny nice Olympic Gymnast wanted ME! Oh yea, did I mention Amy was an Olympic Gymnast? Getting a woman like that into bed is something most guys would brag about till their dying days, and for some reason she liked ME! It wasn't out of pity, she wasnt lonly, she wasnt a slutty girl, she just connected with and liked me.


I look back on these and other stories from my life, and I see that it seems reasonable that someone else, having lived the same stories, would have been instilled with confidence from them. I am not yet, but at least it seems like a reasonable conclusion for one to come to in my shoes. I suppose rewriting your self image takes time, and this is a start.

 

[Loner]

Even the story of my childhood abuse and lack of love from my family can be viewed in a very positive light. It seems possible at least for me to see the fact that I am not weak for clinging to hope that my family loved me deep down for so long. I felt weak that I didn't break off contact with them until I was in my early 20s, but really, that is just an example of how strong and loving I am. I could also rewrite the story of my mother molesting me. I feel dirty and ashamed about that, but although I don't remember much of it and am not sure this is entirely accurate, I am fairly sure that the whole reason my mother hated me and was so cruel to me for so long, is because I hurt her feelings because I didn't respond in a way that flattered her when she molested me when I was young. I feel ashamed at what she did, but really, I should feel proud of the way I acted, even as a small child desperate for love and affection I knew what she was doing was wrong and acted accordingly. This is the reason she hated me (shes a narcissist) but that isnt because I deserve to be hated, its because I was martyrs for standing up for myself and my convictions, in some small way.

Maybe I'm starting to feel pride about these things. It seems like theoretical pride, like I am just now viewing it as possible to someday feel pride about my life and myself, but I don't yet.

 

[Loner]

Discarded, many people would view your support of your husband as courageous, selfless, caring, and requiring of a lot of strength and patience.

I could go on and on and on and on about stories from my life that I used as evidence to support self hatred when they should of been evidence to support pride in myself.

 

[p-no]

Maybe "theoretical pride" is a good start!
Maybe (seriously) it would be good to instead of write out the whole story (e.g. the story about Amy and you) to write out only the positives. Maybe that could help you put more weight on those positives and after a while you might even feel that theoretical pride!

I used to do that. I put little notes on my mirrors, on the doors, wherever, that read "you are pretty", "you are loveable", etc. That really did work. At first, reading those notes felt as if someone (the writer of the notes, so to speak) were lying or even slapping me with those phrases that felt so untrue. But after a while, reading them made me feel good about myself. I adjusted the focus from "negative" to "positive".

So, your story about Amy could end up being this:

"The most romantic experience of my life was 4 years ago when my Australian roommates had a friend come visit them for a couple weeks. Amy was gorgeous, athletic, and nice. I was smitten as soon as I met her. As soon as I spent some time around her I noticed how smart and funny she was, and somehow I ended up kissing her, and she slept in my bed every night after that. I really enjoyed meeting her. She showed me how nice human interaction could be. A beautiful smart funny nice Olympic Gymnast wanted ME! Oh yea, did I mention Amy was an Olympic Gymnast? For some reason she liked ME! It wasn't out of pity, she wasnt lonly, she wasnt a slutty girl, she just connected with and liked me."

Does reading this make you feel a bit happy? Maybe a bit proud? Thrilled? Any positive feeling? (All questions to be answered only for yourself.)

I hope so. :)

 

[maddog]

Loner, my goodness, I want to print off your posts and pin them all around my house so that I can look at them each day and take courage, and inspiration.

Because that's what they give me, courage and inspiration. I think there's a lot more for me to think about here, but as a first reaction, I think I understand exactly what you are trying to portray here, absolutely "get" the significance and contrasting interpretations of the stories you recounted and believe that the steps you have taken to date to even begin that theoretical pride and positive regard of yourself, are critical - perhaps the most critical you will ever take.

People continually tell me I need to view aspects of my life and actions in a positive light, and to somehow see the sum total of what I have achieved in life in the face of considerable adversity. I am, to date, almost always genuinely unable to do this, but I do have tiny flashes of the potential, and your post gave me some more.

This really warmed a dark morning for me, thank you. If you have gained such wisdom and insight at age 27, then I truly believe that you have a long, prosperous and empowered life ready to gradually unfold ahead of you, and it will be a life you will have earned.

Maddog

 

[discarded]

Thanks Loner, for the pat on the back. I hope some day I can feel that I have not let him down and that I have not contributed to making his situation worse. I really hope more than anything that some day he will see I only wanted for him to get well and though I may not have handles the situation very well, I did my best for him. I do feel ashamed about some of the things I have done, my ignorance about this illness is really a poor excuse.

 

[Loner]

I am so f*cking scared of success. Its terrifying. I want people to dislike me immediately because then I dont have to feel even more hurt when they get sick of me later. Someone actually liking me is one of the most terrifying prospects to me because then I just have to worry so much about when and howthat will end or if they really like me or what things I could have done that they already disliked etc. If they just dislike me then I can see objectively that it isnt my fault, and just not care about them any more. I'm trying to believe in myself but I'm finding it very hard. I wish I could just enjoy interactions with people for what they are and not worry but I cant .

 

[saffy]

The primary source of my own self image seems all too obvious, my view of myself as worthless, unlovable, and weak came about because it is what my family taught me to believe. How can I now manage to form a positive self image?

I can fully understand that and have experienced this myself. Hearing something over and over again make you believe it. When you believe it your behaviour emulates this and so you are bound by a self fulfilling prophecy.

Confident people have high self esteem. They do not allow others to tell them differently. They will say, who are you to judge me?

Low self esteem is correlated with confidence and confidence is correlated with levels of anxiety and stress. If you are confident in something you are less anxious about it. Cognitive anxiety is characterised by fear of failure and negative expectations about your performance.

So if someone is confident in their ability to succeed and keeps a positive self talk dialogue he is more likely to succeed than if someone who is not confident in their ability and tells themselves they will fail.

Self–esteem is how you think and feel about yourself; this may be positive, negative or move between the two points. This usually dictates how you live your life and the decisions you make – and how you view others too.

The more positive feelings you have about yourself, the higher your self-esteem is; the more negative feelings you have the lower your self-esteem is. Our materialist world, where people continually compare themselves with those around them, highlights our insecurities and often leads us to feel negative about ourselves and the way we live. We lose sight of the value of our own individuality and then feel inadequate and unsatisfied. It can become an enduring personality trait.

Working to improve your self-esteem takes time and effort. It requires courage and honesty to confront the things in yourself you don’t like but long-term it is a worthwhile task which should help you to feel better about yourself and your life.

I suffer from low self esteem and a lot of this was based on how I was perceived as a child by my parents. I thought I was not worthy, not able or not important to be equal or in sight of their expectations. Their expectations though were out of reach and I was judged and conditioned into being someone they wanted me to me instead of being accepted for the person I actually was. I say now 'who are they to judge me'.

I am working on my self esteem and working on positive self talk. Learning to be assertive and set boundaries and learning to like myself. That way anyone negative towards me will be ignored as I know what they say is not true. Their words do not justify me and who I am at all.

Best wishes
Saffy :)

 

[p-no]

I wish I could just enjoy interactions with people for what they are and not worry but I cant .

Practice. Practice, practice, practice. Seriously. I think, I have too little to do, I mean positive things, in my life. So when I e.g. meet new people I meet them once and enjoy. The thinking and overanalyzing happens afterwards when again there isn't much other stuff to do. I have found that I think a lot less if I have a lot more to do. The more often I spend time with people, the more I can enjoy and the less I think and worry.

Don't give up, Loner.