Life can be so confusing sometimes. Why do some people walk out of your life? They offer no explanation. You have done nothing wrong, that you can see. They interact in the lives of others. What is so bad about me and my family that we should be ignored? These people have been family friends for years, now there is nothing. It kind of hurts. But people grow, change, move on. None of us are the same people we were a few years ago. Our lives change. We change. It is a part of the ever painful growing process.
As someone who deals with major self worth issues, when people behave a certain way, it really confirms some fears and doubts in my mind. When people decide that I am not worth their time or effort, when friends don’t respond to emails, when family members choose other people over me, it confirms several things in my mind.
1. You are worthless. Now, in reality, I know that no one is worthless. But there is this “voice”, so to speak, who spends a ridiculous amount of time trying to convince me that maybe I am the exception to the rule. God made me. If there is no other reason that I have worth, that one is good enough.
2. You are stupid and unlovable. The two seem to go together in my mind. In other words, you are unlovable because you are stupid. This doesn’t necessarily mean intellectually stupid. Good grades and decent teachers through the years convinced me that I am not academically and intellectually ignorant. But socially, emotionally, in the ways of propriety, I am quite dumb. One’s imperfections could never make him unlovable though. I can learn. You can learn. We can all learn. Perhaps it is when we choose to ignore our problems and no longer improve upon them that we grow truly ignorant.
3. You will never be as good as the people around you. Why not though? What is so much better about others? We are all human. We all have normal flesh and blood. We all succeed and fail in different areas in life. Nothing about me makes me any worse than anyone else. Nothing about anyone else makes them any better than me. This is the truth, yet it is so hard to grasp.
4. You are a joke and everyone knows it. This one I can’t combat, and it haunts me quite regularly. Maybe everyone secretly knows that I am going nowhere in life. Maybe they are all in on the secret that I am wasting my time here. What if everyone can see that in reality, I am just another flop. Maybe the joke is on me, because I am the only one who doesn’t know.
Usually these thoughts can be pushed aside. There are times, however, that they play in my mind constantly. They make me want to stop trying, crawl in bed, take a lot sleeping medication, and ignore life. Life cannot be ignored though. A pesky one she is,always nagging, knocking on the door, intruding when least desired. There seems to be no break. Even dreaming is not enough of an escape as dreams are disturbing in their own unique way.
There comes a time when one grows bored of living on the brink of success but seemingly falling back to the thrill of below average. Surely life won’t always be this constant, unsatisfying limbo. Is this depression talking? Or is this how people feel in general? Some days it is almost as if I don’t even know what I want anymore. I want to be loved but don’t want to be with people or let anyone in. I want to go home but I don’t want to deal with some of the people at home. I want to continue doing the work here but have a bit of an existential crisis on a daily basis. This is life. Yay.
Sometimes, in my head, I pretend to be a different person, with different clothes, a different name, and different outlook on life. I imagine what life would be like as that person. That person pretty much says “screw it” to everyone and everything. She doesn’t live confined to expectations and rules of other people. She does what she wants. She loves who she wants and how she wants. She helps people and doesn’t get hurt in the end. What would it be like to move about life as that person? Would it be as amazing as it seems in my head?
Reality screams that this imaginary land will have to always be imaginary. There will always be expectations and rules. Someone will always be disappointed or disagree with something. Where is that Utopia all the Disney movies seem to speak of? Where is Prince Charming? Do any elves or singing animals come with the package? Where is the sign up sheet?
How do you deal with negative “voices”, thoughts, emotions, and feelings? Do you shut them out or fight them away? Thanks for reading. Cheers!
Dearest Depression 
Blocking negative thoughts has been work, but I can now do it. Believing in myself is a different story. Expecting to be what I expect–I have finally come to the conclusion that my expectations are too high. One question, or thought, presented to me by my therapist. If you are in a group, and a person joins the group, do you judge them based upon how they act, dress, speak? My answer is–oh, no. She then asked why I thought others would be doing that to me? Something I think about every time I feel awkward or stupid.
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These are fantastic thoughts. Definitely an interesting approach to self thoughts. Will try this out. Thanks! 🙂
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For me trying to counteract all those negative voices is constant work. Mostly it’s exhausting and frustrating and there are times when I fail miserably, BUT I do believe that it pays off. It’s a real shift but I think you can block them out eventually, with lots of practice and hard work. I think the first part is being able to hear the voices in my head as they happen – and to recognize them for what they are. That takes some work because the negativity has become part of the general white noise in my head – and I don’t always recognize it for what it is.
Once I can become aware of it, then I can work on substituting the negative thoughts with more positive, affirming, compassionate thoughts.
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Whoo! What a process that is though. Glad to hear you have success with your battling the voices. They are not always so nice. We must keep fighting! 🙂
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