The Missing Piece.
The missing piece is action. What I typically do is acquire knowledge, understand systems, and plan. What I seem to lack is action in executing the plan.
What I find truely interesting and inspiring is Jung's concept of synchornicity: how some beneficial "accidents" occur at the most propicious and helpful moments; when they are needed. Information appears right when the brain and mind needs it. A case in point was last night my Supervisor dropped a HUGE $100 book on me believing one chapter on "Encouragement Therapy" would be good for me to read. It WAS! And one of the things I got from the 'chapter' (which was really more like an article, in it's brevity) entails the fear of failure and the reticence of action and acting in doing things. "Doing" requires effort. What stood out was that children need to be encouraged to take responsibility for making desicions so they can learn how to "act" in their own behalf. Here is a paragraph I thought important:
"By the same token, children may become irresponsible when they believe that the world revolves around them. Parents symbolically represent what children begin to expect from the world. The more inaccurately parents represent reality, the more likely children will develop discouraging beliefs."
This makes "sense": If you are told "this is how the world works" - and it DOESN'T, then you've got a problem! Something is wrong, and it's probably you! And it is, because your beliefs are wrong, not you. Except that you are, WE are, our beliefs. It's how we get our needs met, for love and security, and we keep trying to get our needs met with a belief system that continues not to work. Our identity is our belief system, so our identity doesn't work. So we feel guilty, because we then believe there is something wrong with our identity, where, in reality, it is our beliefs of how we were taught the world works. Okay, so far? The whole problem is in being able to learn how to accept reality, which may not be the same as our "percieved" reality. To get to learn the difference between the two.
So here is the paragraph that really "Lit me UP!":
"There are numerous ways for children to begin to see themselves as incapable rather than capable. When they perceive that they are worthwhile only when they perform well and succeed, they begin to lose confidence and shy away from those areas where they see themselves as incapable. This discouraging trend is especially noted at the onset of school, where the focus is on the number of wrong answers rather than the EFFORT made (my bold type for emphasis for me, Effort = Action, RW). When heroes, successes, and perfection are valued, the only way to avoid humiliating defeat is to choose discouragement and give up. The child concludes "I am incapable and have no assets," often generalizing this discouraging conclusion to other areas of life. And how does someone who is incapable act? They don't! Any thought of risking change provokes anxiety and fear of failure. The person buys safety at the cost of life." - (Handbook of Innovative Therapy, "Encouragement Therapy", Lew Losoncy.)
The fear of even making an effort is to avoid humiliation of failing to succeed. The task for me is to start to see the rewarding feeling of giving the effort whether the effort ends up in success or not, FOR THAT ATTEMPT! I can see the word "generalizing" in the paragraph above and now it stands out as even OVER-generalizing. OVER as in "obsessive"! That the fear to not act or not even attempt to act applies to EVERYTHING!
"If I don't know I can succeed at doing it, I'm not even going to try!"
This describes my habit pretty well. Perhaps I should endeavor to change it. I'm thinking the "effort" to change it will be worth it.
The only thing is to not go overboard on the changing, to "swap poles" as it were. To expect immediate and permanent changes in courage just because I have this new knowledge. I'm thinking it will take time, awareness, and effort. To start as a child does, little by little. To learn to encourage myself, and reward myself; and to suffer through the pain of the old belief's fears until I change them. It will take courage to face the failures and humiliation of needing to succeed OR ELSE! To learn again that it is okay to fail. I do not have to please and agree with my parent's perceptions that they taught me. In protecting me, and their own images for their sake, they protected me from reality. Failing is not a death sentence. It is not total destruction. It is the effort toward the goal that counts, not just the goal.
Okay. I've almost convinced myself. I just need to read this over and over to encourage myself until I start making the changes to make a conscious effort to act without fear of humiliating (self-)punishment.
Tah! Smile if you liked this Journal Entry.
[Perhaps that's why we, as co-dependents, choose to enable people who are failures and remain failures, as a reflection of our identity as failures ourselves. We can't succeed at changing them, or ourselves. We fear the failure of effort so we attach ourselves to actions that guarantee our failure to continue; because that's who we believe we are: failures. And it's true for me, I fear effort unless there is a guarantee of success. "I am efficient", I'm not going to "waste" any effort if it doesn't get me what I demand. "It's the outcome that counts", I tell myself, "not the effort to keep trying so I can eventually learn how to succeed. Only immediate gratification will do. I want help NOW! And I want it given, not requiring any effort on my part. No suffering! No pain, emotional or otherwise."
Does that sound anyway familiar to anyone but me?]
By the way, to me "Sobriety" means "Not drunk", not "not any".
What I find truely interesting and inspiring is Jung's concept of synchornicity: how some beneficial "accidents" occur at the most propicious and helpful moments; when they are needed. Information appears right when the brain and mind needs it. A case in point was last night my Supervisor dropped a HUGE $100 book on me believing one chapter on "Encouragement Therapy" would be good for me to read. It WAS! And one of the things I got from the 'chapter' (which was really more like an article, in it's brevity) entails the fear of failure and the reticence of action and acting in doing things. "Doing" requires effort. What stood out was that children need to be encouraged to take responsibility for making desicions so they can learn how to "act" in their own behalf. Here is a paragraph I thought important:
"By the same token, children may become irresponsible when they believe that the world revolves around them. Parents symbolically represent what children begin to expect from the world. The more inaccurately parents represent reality, the more likely children will develop discouraging beliefs."
This makes "sense": If you are told "this is how the world works" - and it DOESN'T, then you've got a problem! Something is wrong, and it's probably you! And it is, because your beliefs are wrong, not you. Except that you are, WE are, our beliefs. It's how we get our needs met, for love and security, and we keep trying to get our needs met with a belief system that continues not to work. Our identity is our belief system, so our identity doesn't work. So we feel guilty, because we then believe there is something wrong with our identity, where, in reality, it is our beliefs of how we were taught the world works. Okay, so far? The whole problem is in being able to learn how to accept reality, which may not be the same as our "percieved" reality. To get to learn the difference between the two.
So here is the paragraph that really "Lit me UP!":
"There are numerous ways for children to begin to see themselves as incapable rather than capable. When they perceive that they are worthwhile only when they perform well and succeed, they begin to lose confidence and shy away from those areas where they see themselves as incapable. This discouraging trend is especially noted at the onset of school, where the focus is on the number of wrong answers rather than the EFFORT made (my bold type for emphasis for me, Effort = Action, RW). When heroes, successes, and perfection are valued, the only way to avoid humiliating defeat is to choose discouragement and give up. The child concludes "I am incapable and have no assets," often generalizing this discouraging conclusion to other areas of life. And how does someone who is incapable act? They don't! Any thought of risking change provokes anxiety and fear of failure. The person buys safety at the cost of life." - (Handbook of Innovative Therapy, "Encouragement Therapy", Lew Losoncy.)
The fear of even making an effort is to avoid humiliation of failing to succeed. The task for me is to start to see the rewarding feeling of giving the effort whether the effort ends up in success or not, FOR THAT ATTEMPT! I can see the word "generalizing" in the paragraph above and now it stands out as even OVER-generalizing. OVER as in "obsessive"! That the fear to not act or not even attempt to act applies to EVERYTHING!
"If I don't know I can succeed at doing it, I'm not even going to try!"
This describes my habit pretty well. Perhaps I should endeavor to change it. I'm thinking the "effort" to change it will be worth it.
The only thing is to not go overboard on the changing, to "swap poles" as it were. To expect immediate and permanent changes in courage just because I have this new knowledge. I'm thinking it will take time, awareness, and effort. To start as a child does, little by little. To learn to encourage myself, and reward myself; and to suffer through the pain of the old belief's fears until I change them. It will take courage to face the failures and humiliation of needing to succeed OR ELSE! To learn again that it is okay to fail. I do not have to please and agree with my parent's perceptions that they taught me. In protecting me, and their own images for their sake, they protected me from reality. Failing is not a death sentence. It is not total destruction. It is the effort toward the goal that counts, not just the goal.
Okay. I've almost convinced myself. I just need to read this over and over to encourage myself until I start making the changes to make a conscious effort to act without fear of humiliating (self-)punishment.
Tah! Smile if you liked this Journal Entry.
[Perhaps that's why we, as co-dependents, choose to enable people who are failures and remain failures, as a reflection of our identity as failures ourselves. We can't succeed at changing them, or ourselves. We fear the failure of effort so we attach ourselves to actions that guarantee our failure to continue; because that's who we believe we are: failures. And it's true for me, I fear effort unless there is a guarantee of success. "I am efficient", I'm not going to "waste" any effort if it doesn't get me what I demand. "It's the outcome that counts", I tell myself, "not the effort to keep trying so I can eventually learn how to succeed. Only immediate gratification will do. I want help NOW! And I want it given, not requiring any effort on my part. No suffering! No pain, emotional or otherwise."
Does that sound anyway familiar to anyone but me?]
By the way, to me "Sobriety" means "Not drunk", not "not any".
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