I don't have any clue as to what I can commit to doing to prevent the consequences of this thought. Do you have any suggestions?
You've mentioned that you read..and even printed out...my first post to your thread..
But in order to get the "right anwer"...you need to ask the "right" question.
And the right question is not "what can you do to prevent the consequences of this thought". That's sloppy gardening--just snipping off the aerial portion of the weed, above ground. You'll have it back, in no time--consequences, of leaving its roots in the ground.
The thought is the root--and until you address it, it will always bring consequences. Thoughts always do--and you get those consequences automatically until you change your thinking...just as you automatically get a gumball when you drop your quarter in the gumball machine. The cause-effect is that distinct.
Try an exercise. It's a combination of Zen practice, and weightlifting. No, really. Zen weightlifting. Allright?
First of all, you have to decide if you want to lift weights, at all. That's your decision, obviously--you can either walk by a weight room with its equipment and say "Yay! Allright! What a gift! Watch me go! I'll be strong in no time!"...or you can look in the doorway and mutter "UGH! Look at all that hard work. I'm fine exactly how I am, thank you. Thanks, but no thanks."
Because you don't get stronger without resistance. Your leg muscles never would have gotten strong enough to carry you around if you hadn't taken those first steps, right? You could have just sat there, after all. But you'd be an adult having to use a wheelchair--at the least, if you weren't so unhealthy as a result of never moving that you had heart trouble, too, etc etc)...and so you'd be at least somewhat more restricted than you would be if you'd learned to walk, right?
These are the terms I've had to think of this "addiction to shame/martyrdom" condition that I described in my earlier post.
And the consequences of you "walking past the weightroom of your thoughts"--is always going to be that you will remain small, and weak. You never engaged the resistance...of the "weight" of those thoughts telling you "just sit there", "failure is easier, after all", "that's what they expect anyway, what's the point of trying for more", etc, etc.
In other words, until you step back, and begin to notice those thoughts as what they are, rather than claiming them, and allowing them to have their way with you...you're "walking by the weightroom"...
You're ignoring a marvelous opportunity! You don't gain strength without resistance, and here you are, with all of these weights to life, in the form of these "dragging-down" thoughts! And you're wasting them!!!
But if you're going to lift weights--well, you have to notice them, first, don't you? Silly question, I know. But really...think about it...
You have just been "having" these thoughts...right...without even NOTICING what kind of thoughts they are..."Weight thoughts".
So naturally, you haven't been resisting them. The metaphor would be...using a dumbell as your door stopper (in this instance, keeping a door CLOSED)...you're not using it for what it was intended for! You could be getting some good exercise here!
And I honestly believe that, and use it, myself--I did in my earlier life, quite successfully--as a "way of life". Since an extended period of prolonged severe trauma--which flipped the machinery around--it's been rough getting back to an even-keeled perspective. I'll be the first one to admit that. But I still remember that "workout routing", and I'm beginning to be well enough to put it back into action. And to good (although not perfect) effect, recently. It's a process, of course. Even a former body-builder needs basic rehab before they can hit the weights, again-and it's still a process of gradual rebuilding--recovering back to that previous condition over time.
But I'm personally convinced that thoughts like these are "meant to be"...that they're nature's way of "giving us weights to lift", without which we'd develop neither the mental/emotional strength,,,the "intestinal fortitude" necessary to live, enjoyable lives...
but as a challenge without which we'd have little sense of having really accomplished something...one of the greatest sources of satisfaction in life.
The most basic tool is attitude, because it's necessary even to pick up any other tool, to then apply it. If your attitude is "why bother", you could have a complete tool kit, an entire weight room, at your disposal, and...well?
It's not easy. But nothing worth doing is.
I remember being in a tennis-finals match during high-school. I had enough talent, I guess, to get me there...but I was an incredibly lazy athlete, all-around. Did as little as possible at practices, skipped most. But for some reason, as I was getting beaten at this upper-echelon level, by those who'd really applied themselves....and at the verge of just saying "who care's, why really put myself out, anyway..."
I imagined all of the others things I'd be doing, if I were to just chuck it. Go home and watch TV, or read? Really? Would either of those be as satisfying as really applying myself, right there and then, and at least having that experience--and possibly the thrill of winning?
It really just jumped out at me, just then, an aha? moment..."Why waste this opportunity for something not nearly as satisfying? What's the point of that?"
So get at that root--those "martyrdom" thoughts---the consequences take care of themselves. Begin "simply noticing" every time one comes up. It would be even more effective to carry a small notebook, and write the thought, short form--and beside it, for example "weight thought". In doing so, you're "labeling" them for your subconscious, beginning a process of changing their association for your unconscious, from something you're "claiming" as your own, and even entertaining...to something "foreign" to be resisted...and this process itself blooms into an automatic tendency, a habit, over time. You'll begin to see them only as "weights" to be "lifted", resisted..not only not a legitimate part of yourself, but an opportunity to get stronger by not being affected by them, letting them "in", or "get to you". The first steps in change are the hardest. But the discipline needed to turn a bad habit around, by holding firmly to a good habit which counters it--is more than worth the pay off, in the end. It's just a matter of one step after another.
Be well
