> If nothing has inherent meaning then you are the one who has power to give meaning to things. You can avoid giving meaning to mishaps, mistakes, past, nasty comments and anxiety while cherishing and making other things more meaningful (to yourself).
Yes, that's exactly it.
It's amazing how just noticing that I'm making myself miserable can bring a smile to my face. Or at least, a grin.
> The feeling of being able to do anything devolving into sleeping like a rotten piece of meat within a few months.
Yeah, been there.
> Obviously, I can ignore the emotions and look at things objectively but then, I would start disagreeing with lot of people including doctors and become more 'robot' like.
Some doctors are competent, and some just push whatever's trendy, or heavily detailed. Generally I recommend ignoring them all, except for some psychiatrists. Based on my experience, SSRIs are dangerous for people with bipolar disorder. They made me seriously hypomanic, but emotionally numb.
Also, I used to think that emotions determine how I think. But eventually I got that patterns of thinking determine what I feel.
It's just that stuff reminds us of a morass of similar past experiences. And there are associated feelings, which have been reinforced through repetition since we were very young.
The three canonical ones:
there's something wrong / I'm wrong (1-2 years)
I don't belong (early school years)
I'm on my own (teens)
But you can train yourself to realize that you're being triggered. And then decide freely how to deal. But it's never fixed. You just get better at catching it.
> They made me seriously hypomanic, but emotionally numb.
The worst part about that is my avoidant behavior of self care in the pursuit of work that feels good. There are other issues that made it that way. It's akin to being addicted to hard drugs (not meant to be insensitive. Can't find any other analogy atm). Mind and body want different things while also being on their own in the reception/outcome. Priorities shuffle in a matter of minutes if you are not concentrating and controlling yourself. Having so much self control is exhausting when others don't have to do this and makes me wonder whether am I alive at all sometimes. Letting out anything becomes difficult and I really believe my future is gonna be full of substance abuse.
> It's just that stuff reminds us of a morass of similar past experiences. And there are associated feelings, which have been reinforced through repetition since we were very young.
I know but things went wrong my entire childhood and they still are.
While I try to avoid things that reinforces negative emotions, some of them are just unavoidable.
Eg - washroom...painful memories there.
I wish I had means to reward myself but I don't. Things that may have worked as a reward is an addictive dependency now and I truly don't care about most things including what I get to eat or whether even I get food at all.
That last part alone makes people doubt and fill in holes with their broken explanation which then I need to reassert how eating food in some situation is objectively better hence I do it but I wouldn't in lack of friction to avoid eating it therefore I don't desire the food for it's merit but external factors force me into it.
Do people enjoy things on their own merits or external factors coerces them to enjoy something?
I can't figure out the answer because I do most things for avoidance.
I'm getting that you're working hard at what you enjoy. And that other stuff -- eating, and self care generally -- only matter for practical purposes.
As long as you are taking good enough care of yourself to stay healthy, I don't think that it matters.
> Do people enjoy things on their own merits or external factors coerces them to enjoy something?
> I can't figure out the answer because I do most things for avoidance.
That's a hard question. Some of the things that I enjoy are bad for me. Such as ice cream. So I've learned to enjoy basically frozen fruit juices. And I don't have ice cream around. That's certainly avoidance.
I also make my own frozen food. Typically rice, beans, carrots, other vegetables, and some meat. So that's what's around to eat, and it doesn't take much work.
Otherwise I'd eat junk, and end up fat and unhappy.
Yes, that's exactly it.
It's amazing how just noticing that I'm making myself miserable can bring a smile to my face. Or at least, a grin.
> The feeling of being able to do anything devolving into sleeping like a rotten piece of meat within a few months.
Yeah, been there.
> Obviously, I can ignore the emotions and look at things objectively but then, I would start disagreeing with lot of people including doctors and become more 'robot' like.
Some doctors are competent, and some just push whatever's trendy, or heavily detailed. Generally I recommend ignoring them all, except for some psychiatrists. Based on my experience, SSRIs are dangerous for people with bipolar disorder. They made me seriously hypomanic, but emotionally numb.
Also, I used to think that emotions determine how I think. But eventually I got that patterns of thinking determine what I feel.
It's just that stuff reminds us of a morass of similar past experiences. And there are associated feelings, which have been reinforced through repetition since we were very young.
The three canonical ones:
But you can train yourself to realize that you're being triggered. And then decide freely how to deal. But it's never fixed. You just get better at catching it.