That's new! compassion?

[Sandstone]

I noticed that I can either think of myself "Nothing much wrong here" or "Everything is a disaster", and I have a lot of trouble inhabiting the middle ground. Stating to myself a more accurate middle view - that I have a couple of conditions and I am slowly learning to manage them - actually induces feelings of panic.

Thinking about it, I realised that those two disparate views represent the fractured halves of my whole - the defensive aspect ( or inner adult or ANP ) and the vulnerable (or inner child or EP). My wholly unaccustomed response was "Oh, poor ANP. It is so hard to have to keep everything together all the time"

Now I know I'm supposed to feel compassion for my inner child, and also that this is impossible for me, but to feel it for my inner Adult was completely unexpected. Anyone else encountered this?

 

[MyWillow]

Not yet but a timely post. I just realised - to my shock and horror - that my t has never judged me. Not for dissociating or not wanting to name my symptoms or changing the subject to avoid painful feelings or for being hyperaroused or for not eating enough or drinking too much or going over old ground or not engaging in self care or working too much or committing to too many volunteer roles or not sleeping well or not facing what I need to. Maybe that’s where it starts. Because I am so f*cking hard on myself that it feels terrifying not to be.

Thank you.

 

[ladee]

I am there with you right now. Feeling compassion for the adult??? I had no idea what to do with those feelings.. still learning... but what a beautiful beginning for you @Sandstone.... stay with it.... maybe we will learn to like it.

 

[AnD]

Thanks, for bringing this subject into the light.

 

[Sandstone]

I suspect that by writing about it, I'm moving the experience back into the realm of thought rather than feeling - observing it from a distance. Still, I want to mark the moment of change.

I am so f*cking hard on myself that it feels terrifying not to be.

Interesting - my old boss once asked why I was so hard on myself, when she wasn't, and I responded in puzzlement that someone had to be. That glimpse of a possible other world is surprising isn't it? And you experience the idea of inhabiting that ground as terrifying, I feel panic at it. The need to stay where we are is a visceral safety thing, basic and central to our survival.

Compassion - why is it safe to direct it outwards, but not in?

 

[ladee]

I am at the beginning of this part of my journey too @Sandstone, setting outside in the cold this morning, smoking that first cigarette of the day, and a feeling I do not ever remember feeling, came over me, slowly, like a gentle fog rolling in, but I could see and feel...

And flashes of my life, just snippets of my life, gently going thru my mind.. not harsh, or ugly, just looking back over my life. And I felt 'compassion' for me, that woman who has endured, who fought like a tiger, who dug herself out of the rabbit hole a million times... it was a mixture of sadness and a deep deep pride in myself for surviving long enough to really get to live.

Maybe it's being given to us now because we have a deeper understanding of who we are, what we have lived thru, really getting to see and feel our own strength...not failures and set backs, but truly achieved growth... some of it was a sadness I had never felt for myself before... I am looking forward to the day, I can look at myself, with real understanding and real compassion for all I have lived thru... and that something was saved in me to give to others.... because it is those same people who are showing me my way back to myself, if that makes sense...

If only to let you know you are not alone on this part, and to know there is another grown woman in my circle, that is finally getting to feel compassion for our self... I'm not alone either...

We will find our answers along the way.... but this is new territory... I just keep moving forward, and stop when I feel the need to stop, and feel what I need to feel. it's new, I'm excited and scared at the same time... but here we are.... This is absolutely a good thing.... so we are stumbling and tottering along this new path... full of unknowns.... yet is is a good thing... a gift we have been given...

We will learn as we go... we don't get the answers first, we know how growth works... I'm just grateful it is happening for both of us... we get to have a turn... and we aren't alone... gentle hugs to you and me....

 

[Deleted member 12723]

Compassion - why is it safe to direct it outwards, but not in?

Being aware is the first step to the next step I think. It takes practice and being able to catch yourself. Breath and you have this and are on your way.

 

[joeylittle]

Compassion - why is it safe to direct it outwards, but not in?

No answer, but thank you for capturing this concept in words so well. I'm totally stuck in my struggle with this. I have a not-fully-formed thought about how allowing self-compassion threatens the dysfunctional sense of self - but that still doesn't get at why the negative core belief system is something one will cling to, even though it's painful.

 

[Sandstone]

I can't "sit with it"; this doesn't seem to be something that can be felt to order, or even held on to when it appears. But it comes back in flashes, in brief circumscribed moments, and I don't want to let it go.
I think there is another (positive) emotion in there, that I don't even feel able to name. I feel a totally unaccustomed warmth inside me. What an unexpected prize! I thought healing was all going to be painful hard slog.

why the negative core belief system is something one will cling to

My thought, also half formed, links back to something I said to my first T seven years ago "It feels like a fight for survival". I frame it in Structural Dissociation terms, that the ANP has to hate and fear the experiences and emotions contained in the EP, in order to keep those memories and sensations at a safe distance. It is the only way we know how to survive, and anything that might destabilise that containment system is experienced as, and may well actually be, a threat.

I was about to write "a threat to our integrity". in fact, it is a threat to our non-integrity.

But this new sensation, of self-compassion, is not threatening in itself.

 

[ladee]

I don't know if we cling to that core belief, or it clings to us... if that makes sense....I am just now getting to a place where the core belief is moving a little off center. And there is a deep sadness under the uncovered part. Thank goodness it didn't move in one big motion, I don't know if I could survive , just from what little I felt yesterday... mine has stayed in place , I guess, to still protect me, from the situations I was put in, to be an adult at a very young age... To be a 'marriage counselor', at the age of 7, and other things that I had a lot of fear of 'letting people down".

And no matter what I have done thru the years of my healing journey, I couldn't MAKE that core change... so finally thought, ok, I'm broken, I get that, I have got to heal more than I ever dreamed possible, so, this is as good as that part is going to get. And have just stopped messing with it...

A series of events has brought me to a safe place, all the way around, in my life... and now, now it is starting to move.... and as I said, it wasn't anything I've consciously done, haven't given it any thought in years... and I've learned some self compassion along the way, but it always felt like it was on the surface.... This is different.... the sadness I felt yesterday, was different than anything I have ever felt before.. no words to describe it... but I know it was only a tiny tiny edge of light...

So , for me, I don't feel I could have done anything different... I am scared and excited. maybe I can put it into words in my diary... I just know this is different...

 

[ladee]

We cross posted @Sandstone, and you put it in words I couldn't come up with. It is just very different. but am looking forward to how this unfolds. And very grateful to know I am not alone , that someone else understands....

And while there was sadness, there was also a gentleness I have never felt.

 

[Deleted member 44579]

Hi @Sandstone I think it's what we learned from our roots or childhoods... If we were not shown compassion throughout our lives.. How are we supposed to embrace it as an adult. But I think because of that it's a learned behaviour.. And that can be changed.... When I'm being negative towards myself.. I stop and say what are you doing this for?... Is this really going to help you?... And then hopefully the negativity goes away.... It's such a shame as adults we can't be kinder to ourselves.. After all the horror we have been through.
Or maybe that's why.. We are used to horror. We are just continuing the cycle. It's f*cked up.. Isn't it?