Day 403: Shedding the spikes

29052014

2011 - http://efana.deviantart.com/art/Spikes-30DC-258571057

After three days of accumulating self-judgement through various points, I came to a culmination point where I stopped and started to trace back those three days worth of chain reactions. After walking through each point in detail I realized that I had clenched myself into a state, where because I was afraid of judgement I took upon a defensive stance to protect myself from external judgement.

What I realized today as I was walking through these experiences was that the defensive state that had been triggered is a remnant of the armour I have built around myself throughout my life. Four years ago a person told me I reminded him of a porcupine, because it was as if I was putting up spikes and needles to fend off people. From his words I realized that I was in fact aggressively shutting everyone out and I have been walking through this porcupine identity ever since. Today as I thought of this concept of an armour I realized that in order to protect myself from external judgement and rejection I have tensed myself up, not realizing that the judgement is not in fact coming from outside of me but from within – and that the armour has not been keeping judgement out but rather functioned as a lid to keep it in.

According to current leading theories in development psychology when a child is born he/she doesn't yet have an inner “voice” to direct his/her behavior. This voice is in fact internalized from the voices, commands and guidance of the people who the child has in his/her environment when growing up. This development happens mostly within the first few years of a child's life, but major life events may also affect it later on.

The “inner voice” I have constructed – meaning the thoughts, sounds, images, beliefs and reactions that direct my behavior – has become one of judgement, guilt, shame, demands, perfectionism and cruelty. This has been the result of my family environment (where teaching a child was often done by pointing out what was wrong through one's own reaction of anger, frustration, weariness, irritation and/or aggression), school environment (where teaching was based on validation) and social environment (where kids exerted their mindfucks on each other with no support or interventions from adults).

My back, shoulders and neck have been very tense, stuck and painful for at least the past few years, and lately I have been focusing on figuring out the cause for the remaining areas of tension, which are mainly in the other side of my my upper back and both shoulders. I realized today that those are the last of my porcupine spikes – the armor I have not yet shed. They are held in place by my patterns of self-judgement, all the small points where I jab myself mentally and believe it. The key here to releasing the remnants of my spikes is to stop with each point of self-judgement I come across, to realize it is not valid and to correct my line of thinking – to rewrite the lines of code in my mind. For example, there have been several moments within the past few days where I have judged myself for waking up “too late”. This is where I need to walk through my definitions of “late” and “early” and to realize that my definitions, which I base my judgement on, are quite possibly not valid at all. These definitions, for example, come directly from my family without me really stopping to consider what I find most commonsensical, and the judgements are even spoken in my mind with the voice of my mother/father/sister. Thus, I need to evaluate my life and the reality on my own and redefine what is practical in my living.

Because my spiky defensiveness quite frightened me when I looked at my behavior, I went looking for softness today through swimming and meditation. It was interesting to see how after a tiring workout all of my muscles were really tender and soft, except for these tension areas in my back/shoulders. I realized that once I stop judging myself, the need to defend myself will also vanish. I just need to pick up the lid, set it aside, take the points out one at a time, discuss with them until I release them and repeat until I'm empty of all judgement. The spikes are not only pointing outwards, but also inwards.

Day 339: Balancing the social

24102013

I have recently been very busy with studying so I haven't had much time to spare for my daily writing, and the little time I would have had I have spent with some form of entertainment in order to “relax” or “unwind”. I have required “unwinding” because I've been stressed about failing my tests, and I have added on top of that stress by worrying about this pause from writing and by being distressed about some personal matters as well.

I haven't been too worried over any of this, but now it's turning into intense physical pain that I cannot ignore. During the weekend a couple of friends massaged my shoulders (they told me I was really stuck, which I was, but when I was stuck I was not in pain because I was so “crystallized” into my stance, like a fucking statue) and ever since I have been in pain constantly. My back has been in really poor condition because of studying positions where I have to hunch all the time and now the massage somehow released some physical points in my shoulders that I have previously “locked” underneath.

During the past couple of days (since the massage – thanks, guys, for probing around) I've been experiencing moments of depression. They stand out to me because I haven't felt depressed in a long time. They have occurred in moments where I have felt like I am “left outside” a group or a social activity, even though none of the moments have been such where I would have been refused access out of malice, but such where I have walked away voluntarily because it has been a practical choice.

This shows me how much the social life that I have built during these couple of months actually means to me: it has been immensely enjoyable and fun, there's been a sense of belonging and group spirit, I haven't had to be alone or secluded if I haven't wanted to. My life hasn't been this happily social yet independent in years (if ever) and I have simply been enjoying all of it, taking in the joys of being a social creature.

So now that the “high” is starting to wear off, I begin to fear losing it all. What if these people will abandon me? What if they start to resent me? What if I alienate my friends? What if I will lose all this “happiness”? Thus in moments of separation the fear is triggered - “what if I will never have it this good again” - and because my mind is used to such patterns since childhood, I start thinking of theories to support the negative outcome / worst-case scenario and I make myself depressed. In the beginning everyone has been kind of hyped about these social circles, but now that things are kinda stabilizing back to “normal” (people return to living their lives on their own terms, not sacrificing everything for the social activities) it's like there's a withdrawal that for me turns into heavy depression. And the answer to that is NOT to hang out with people more, no, but to look a what all this socializing has been “fulfilling” in me and what is missing when I'm not socializing.

Again (talking to myself), I do NOT mean that being social and having friends is a “bad” thing. I have made myself believe that solitude is a “good” thing because I have feared reaching out to people, and I have even demonized spending time with friends simply because I have been jealous, sad and depressed for not having that kind of a stable social environment myself. So what I'm dealing with here is the addiction and attachment to having company, so that I could bring myself out of the polarities (refusing all company – being dependent on company) and utilize the social aspect of life in a way that supports the well-being of all.

Will continue with SF.