when my feelings feel like reality
I know I have my feelings about things sometimes. In fact they can
color my whole sense of reality - and they can be beautiful moments
or conversely I can get stuck in place about
the misery I'm feeling. But I know from the work I've done with my therapist
that I have to question my state of mind - and say things to myself
'ok I am indeed dissapointed about something, but it is not the whole
of my reality" - It's like if I am in a classroom and I can't see the chalkboard -
it's a good idea to move my chair. I don't have anything to do today - and so
the free time is an invitation towards 'stinkin' thinking' - So I'll go pick up
my laundry and fold it - and then I'll ask Father Balthazar if I can take him
out for coffee - or perhaps I'll just take a ride - I know he's studying for exams.
Replies
Reminds me of the old saying, "An idle mind is the devil's playground...:-)
I hear you!
Some days are like this--we just feel anxious and a little off--then some days are so great-we have to swing with them both, right?????
one of my breakthrough therapy exercises was, "sorting feelings from facts." facts don't change and i can feel more than one way about a single fact. feelings drift and shift like the clouds marching across the sky. a dragon can shift into a castle with the greatest of ease.
decades after i was introduced to these exercises, i still do the exercises anew any time i catch myself drifting into questioner's befuddlement.
I remember a few years ago I was in the hospital for 3 weeks in a depression and the shrink I had then got me to write in a journal daily and days later reread what I'd written
I was always a little surprised or at least didn't remember my past thoughts and perceptions
'What a difference a day makes'
I remember my AA sponsor told me good things come out of bad situations but you might now see it at the time. He was always right about that and his point was we tend to focus on the bad instead of looking for the miracle that usually comes out of it, or is a direct result of it.
God Bless
Thanks so much Arfie, Jan and Bob!