Does Anyone Use Competence As Part Of Their Therapy?

[Friday]

I've been doing very badly for the past several months. Past 3 years have been a pretty unsteady decline (oh how many different ways can things get worse, and how fast? Gee. Let's find out!). I had a brief period about 2 years ago where I started to stabilize, and then again a few months ago for half a minute.

In both cases? I was doing something I was good at. It felt good. Cat stretching, oh thank goodness, I'd forgotten what this feels like good. Wow. I'd forgotten what competent feels like. Something I can take pride in. Something I can relax in. Something I can enjoy. Not because it's fun, per se, but because dammit... I'm good at this.

I had to abandon both, one for money (or the lack thereof), and one for another reason.

It hit me tonight... I'm not competent at anything. Not at anything I'm actually doing. The only things that are presently in my life? Are things that -at best- I struggle with, and at worst am flat out bad at.

I think, if I can find at least one thing I'm actually good at -and know it- that at the very least it wouldn't hurt. But I'm also positing it might be more than that. So many seemingly simple things are so durn hard. Even breathing is hard. LOL. To be fair, even if everyone here says "I'm brilliant at loads of things, and I'm still a walking disaster!" I'm still going to try it. I have no idea what or how, but it feels important.

I'm curious, however... For those doing badly; do you have something in your life you do every day that you're competent in? Those doing well or well-ish? Any relationship here?

 

[shimmerz]

Wow. I'd forgotten what competent feels like. Something I can take pride in. Something I can relax in. Something I can enjoy. Not because it's fun, per se, but because dammit... I'm good at this.

Yes. This fed my soul. And it is like a snowball rolling down a hill, building in momentum and size. Yes. This is a very big problem for me. I have no idea what I could possibly be good at again.

 

[jaccat]

I write. It's kind of weird because all the s**t I've been through, all the ups and downs I've had, I've held on to the fact that I can write. That in fact I'm good at it. It's been something of an anchor for me, not only because the act of writing is itself a release but because, no matter how many people put me down I held on to that fact. It was my little secret. You can take everything from me but you can't take that.

 

[ihateusernames]

I don't know whether it will help or not. I'm not very far along my own attempt to say.

I got a similar idea in my head and have been trying to learn a new skill for about a month. I'm getting better at it and that does feel good. It's a good feeling when something clicks and you can feel yourself improving. It's also something to look forward to practicing every day. It's nothing big, it's just a new art medium. I got the idea to help me transition back into work (still job hunting, but something's gotta turn up eventually) as I've been home with a toddler and feeling like I never accomplish anything, which leads to feeling like I can't accomplish anything even though I know it isn't true.

 

[City Slicker]

I think, if I can find at least one thing I'm actually good at -and know it- that at the very least it wouldn't hurt.

@Friday Jones, I have something at which I am competent. What you posted above is interesting because 'finding' one thing at which one is good and 'knowing it' can be two different things.

Sometimes competence is hung up with personal enjoyment. We feel we are competent because we feel some measure of joy or satisfaction when we do it. But then there is the external validation - we know we are good at it because of the amount of feedback we get from others about how they see our competence - they see us as good at it so we must be. Or we know we are good because there is an external outcome measurement that allows us to see the results of our efforts.

Despite that I have something at which I am competent, when I am at a low point, I will pick apart what I did wrong faster than you can blink an eye to the point where I can have myself believing I should never perform this activity ever again and save myself humiliation. Those will be times I am fully convinced I am not competent at anything and I have simply fooled people into believing I had some skill.

And then I worry that they aren't smart enough to see I fooled them all. ; )
Once it gets to that point, I can usually start to get grip on myself lol.

 

[Born to Run]

I so totally get what you mean, and the same here. Simply no energy. What comes to mind is the Maslow's pyramid of hierarchy of needs, however I believe you are not looking for an explanation. I wish also to be competent again, but also accept it as is, as I know I am a bottom feeding fish of the pyramid right now, who can only later be a surface feeding fish again. The only thing I have been able to keep going is the care and taking in of new rescue rabbits, and after 25 years I have built a lot of expertise. Still when I am doing bad I feel guilty to them, and feel incompetent. At least they have each other.

 

[Casey_03]

I wonder if there is any link between avoiding (subconsciously or otherwise) doing things you are competent in because you are afraid of succeeding and then having to raise the bar? i say this because i am this way ... i have always found reasons to NOT do the things I excel in because a) then it would require an actual commitment and b) the bar would be raised and i'd have to keep excelling or risk disappointing myself/everyone else. i've always been better at failure, mainly because I set myself up for it. i let myself fail to prove my own low self-esteem right. is there any chance that sort of thinking is also playing a role in your situation?

 

[Weemie]

competence is a big issue for me. i strive to be competent in everything i do. being wrong annihilates me. my best friend has remarked something to the effect that, "it just kills you to be wrong, doesn't it? you'll never admit it!" and my rebuttal will be all about how i'm actually right... so ya. ambition is a big thing, too. i need to go places, i need to do things, i need to be active and learning and engaged and i need to feel confident that i know what i'm doing. when i perceive something as a slight against my abilities (interpreting things my sups do for example as they are thinking i'm incapable, pushes my berserk button). knowing that i can do things and contribute to society gives me a great deal of comfort. knowing that i'm the person people go to when they have certain issues makes me feel like i belong at my job, like i have a purpose and i'm not just filling a seat.

 

[oasis2003]

Yes I think I am only competent at avoiding being competent . I fear failure so avoid trying things, even though I want to try

 

[theshadowoftheliving]

I'm competent at my job. It's a job that is, ultimately, based on my ability to think and interpret and create new information. I'm actually really GOOD at my job, and that has been making me panicked lately, because I feel that competence slipping as my PTSD symptoms get worse. Simultaneously, I feel like therapy is destroying my belief that I am competent, because it focuses so much on "problematic thinking patterns" (their words, not mine) and other ways in which my thinking is flawed. But when I can forget what therapy is telling me and get lost in this thing that I am good at, it feels so amazing.

 

[Neverthesame]

I would think it matters, absolutely.

Being competent at something, having a skill, means, life.

All day every day we look around and see the things that we're supposed to be, have and want. House, car, kids, pets and jobs. We are supposed to have first world problems. The things we should fear the most, should be whatever bullshit is being made up on CNN this month, having enough for retirement, and what would look good growing next to the merigolds in the garden.

(Insert huge swearing fit as phone refreshed page after I had to do something. Then dodgy network failed to upload half of what I had written. I am an old man. Sigh.)

Anyways. Now we are stuck in that "Oh, shit!" moment. Not alive, nor dead, just here. It feels, at least to me anyway, like being in some kind of purgatory. We spend so much time and effort trying to get ourselves to a place that somewhat resembles normal life. That intangible idea of what other people have. At the end of the proverbial rainbow, is what? Rubber chicken?

(Sorry, been working on this one for a day now. I wasn't kidding when I said I am a slow typist. Sleep is elusive today)

Anyways. Being able to crawl back into what feels like normal, or what any of us can paint as normal. I dunno, I find it still feels wrong. As much as I can suck it up, pretend to be alive, it's still purgatory. It just looks nicer on the outside.

I of course can't speak for your head Friday, nor have you ever given me the impression that I would need to. You have a knack for words I rather envy. I'm just glad I am slowly remembering what basic grammar is supposed to look like. Lol.

The point, yes. I do in fact have one. I hope.

Competency. The importance of being useful, as opposed to used up. A purpose, more than a distraction. Something to contribute to the world around you. To show the world around you, but most importantly, to show yourself. That you are not done, not dead, not hopeless. That really is something past the "Oh, shit!".

At least that's my theory. I sincerely hope you can find some peace and balance again.

 

[Sighs]

Yet another lightbulb moment delivered to me courtesy of the ever fabulous @FridayJones!

No seriously - how about this for competency @FridayJones? You are incredibly articulate, witty and insightful. Girl, you can write! You can express emotions, make reasoned arguments, paint pictures with words. Not many people can do that really really well. You do.

And my lightbulb moment? Maybe this is why my vet seeks constant approval for everyday things. "I brought the washing in!" "Was dinner okay?" Some days bringing the washing in is a major achievement. Cooking a nice meal and thereby taking care of me might be his one and only competency that day. I never thought of it because objectively he is competent at friggin everything. I mean, the man cooks, cleans, sews, repairs engines, hunts, butchers, tans skins, horserides, shoots firearms and bows, trains dogs, repairs fences, plumbs watertanks etc etc. He makes me tired just listing it all. I could never figure out why he wanted high fives for the day to day stuff.