perjantai 21. kesäkuuta 2013

Days 261-262: Pushing myself to be social


20-22062013



Today I realized that the awareness of the possibilities of the situation I am in does not mean that I'd have to seize each and every one of them. I have lately felt that I am somehow supposed to be socializing all the time with the people I come across and so I have been feeling guilty if I haven't, pushing myself more and more to open up next time.

I have been pretty worn out for the past few days because of health conditions and haven't felt like doing much simply because there isn't much I could do in these circumstances. Today I took a boat trip to a neighboring island and sat at the rear enjoying the ride with a few people sitting close by. Because I was at a talking distance to the others I felt like I “should be” talking to others, taking the opportunity now that there were people around me. But I was worn out, I just wanted to bask in the scarce sunlight and enjoy the sea, I didn't really want to talk to anyone. So I had another look at my situation. I made myself aware of all the opportunities present: I could talk to person A; I could talk to persons B and C; I could change my position to talk to the people inside the hull; I could focus on the activity at hand (riding a boat); I could focus on the environment (the sea); I could focus on my sensations. Once I had made myself aware of all these possibilities that I saw to be present, I realized that I was not obligated to choose the social dimension, and that the social dimension was just one of the dimensions present. I then made a decision to exclude the social dimension (for the time being) and take advantage of the possibilities of the physical environment – and so I had a very enjoyable boat ride during which I focused on myself, physical sensations and movement. It was an experience that was not social, but that doesn't make it any less valuable.



I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to feel obligated to be social.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe and perceive that in order to make a moment worthwhile I need to utilize its social dimension, not realizing that the social dimension is just one dimension of an experience and NOT more valuable, meaningful or worthwhile than all the other dimensions of an experience.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to create a belief that the social dimension is more important than the other dimensions of an experience.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to drive myself to be social out of fear of missing out on something valuable/meaningful/worthwhile.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear missing out on socializing because as a child when I was bullied by being excluded from my group of friends I defined socializing as something “inaccessible” and “valuable” that I craved for and felt wronged for being denied access to.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear that I will be excluded from the social dimension of an experience and that I will be helpless to do anything about it.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to try to prevent being excluded from socializing by initiating contact with others before they turn against me.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear social situations because I fear that people will group up against me.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to react with fear to situations where there are people around me being social because I perceive their bonding to be something that excludes me from socializing.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to exclude myself from being social by perceiving and believing the bonding of others to be an act that excludes me when in fact this exclusion only exists as long as I believe in it and submit to it.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear approaching people who are socializing with each other because I believe I will be excluded as a punishment for intervening with their “special moment”.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe socializing to be a “special moment” between selected parties which no one else should interrupt.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to not see, realize and understand that a social situation comprises of all those physically present, not just those who have directly addressed/recognized each other, and that in a social situation all movement and interaction is “allowed” and all limitations are imagined.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe and perceive that if I do not participate in socializing early enough others will define each other as “a group” and me as “an outsider”.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to approach people out of the fear of being left outside of a group.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to not realize that the concept of a “group” that forms as a consequence of social bonding is in fact imaginary as it draws boundaries and lines that do not exist in the physical reality.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to not realize that the concept of forming a “group” through social bonding at its core supports inequality because it inherently excludes some people and “permits entry” to others.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear being seen as an outsider because I have experienced myself to have been limited through this definition.

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I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to push myself to be social even though I have not asked myself why I resist being social – why there needs to be pushing in the first place.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to force myself to socialize without being aware of why I'm doing it.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to push myself to socialize because I have tried to achieve an ideal where I would not be “an outsider”.

  • I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to create an ideal scenario where everybody would like me because I have feared the opposite of being liked, and I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that I can only achieve this by being social with everyone - by presenting a likable appearance of myself to others before others conjure their own opinion of me without my participation.
  • I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear that others will form an unfair and untrue opinion of me based on what they perceive me to be without giving me a chance to show who I am - not realizing that by living within and as this fear and acting according to it (by either isolating myself or pushing myself to socialize) I am in fact showing myself as my fears and insecurities through my actions.
  • I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to not realize that if I become "an outsider" (not participating in a group) I may have contributed to this outcome in some way.


I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to push myself to socialize because I have thought that “I should socialize” without asking myself why and without being aware of the search for the ideal that drives me.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to not realize that I have (often) motivated myself to socialize through fear of being left outside the group and becoming “the outsider”.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to feel guilty if I “miss” an opportunity to be social and blame myself for “failing” - not realizing that setting myself impossible standards and punishing myself for not achieving them is deliberate self-sabotage.

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I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself as a child to react to my friends excluding me from the group by creating a dramatic mind-image of the situation where all others had turned their backs on me and I was standing alone.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself as a child to look at this mind-image and feel ashamed for being the lonely one as I had defined [being in a group] a “good thing” and [being outside a group] a “bad thing”.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe this definition I have learned as a child and live according to it unaware during my adult years.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to define being alone as a negative thing and to give it a negatively charged name (“being the outsider”) when in fact being alone is a state of equal value to being in a group, and that the only difference between them is the different set of possibilities they offer.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself as a child to define [being in a group] a positive thing because being with my friends allowed me to enjoy the social dimension of life in a safe, familiar and comfortable way.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself as a child to react with fear when my friends excluded me from the group because I had never socialized outside of that safe, familiar and comfortable setting and lacked the mental tools (self-confidence and courage) to find social fulfillment by actively creating myself new circumstances to do that in (i.e. by finding new friends).

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I have also gone to the other extreme and isolated myself from people into solitude out of spite. This, however, is a whole subject of its own and I will not write about it this time around.

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When and as I see myself reacting with fear to seeing other people socializing with each other – I stop, I breathe and I realize that I am not excluded from the social situation because I am in the same physical space with the other people and thus have every opportunity to join into the socializing. I realize that my perception of the situation is not in accordance with the physical reality, and thus I focus on breathing, return my awareness to my physical body and, once I stand as my physical body, I move my focus to the space around me in order to become aware of the possibilities of the circumstances I am in.

When and as I see myself thinking “I should be socializing” or asking myself “should I be more social?” - I stop, I breathe and I remind myself that there is nothing I “should be” doing ever anywhere, and that the use of this word indicates judgement towards who I am in that moment. I realize that if the situation allows I have the opportunity to be social, yet not the obligation to. I breathe and return my awareness to myself as a physical being within a space and I assess my opportunities within that space. I take note of any signs of resistance towards socializing and dissolve them with self-forgiveness and breathing. If this does not help, I make a commitment to open up the point in writing. Otherwise I proceed to making a self-honest decision about whether or not I will take the opportunity to socialize.

I commit myself to investigate the process of “bonding” while forming a group within and as the realization that forming a “special” bond to one being automatically excludes all others and sets one to a higher position in contrast to others, and that the process of “bonding” thus creates and upholds inequality.

I commit myself to NOT participate in group activities in such ways that would exclude those currently outside the group, for example by restricting the possibility of others to join in to the group activity.

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