You Hear What You Want To Hear
When you are feeling down, few things can be more frustrating than for someone to say, “I think your perspective is slanted somehow.” If you aren’t careful, you can end up becoming sort of attached to your sadness, as weird as that may sound. It becomes a possession that only you fully understand, and when people say, “I think you need to step back from this situation” or something akin to that, you can actually lash out at them. You are not as likely to hear anything helpful or constructive in what they are trying to say. What you hear are the words of people who are attacking you or people who are calling you crazy. And that feeds your sadness. It makes your possession bigger and fills your arms more.
The other interesting thing you experience when you are feeling down is that people seem to use words that really cut you to the core. They seem to know exactly what your hot buttons are, and they seem to push those buttons every day, all the time. Have you ever been through a phase like that?
When I left grad school and couldn’t seem to find a job, it seemed like everybody, in whatever they said, was looking down on me. I could almost see in their facial expressions how disappointed they were in my life’s progress. It seemed like with every word they were telling me how frustrating it was to see me wasting my life away.
Of course, nobody was really saying those things except for one person. Do you know who it was? It was me. But at the time, all I could identify was that those words and those feelings were coming out of the mouths of other people.
The really sad thing is that during that same time period, people were saying really nice things and I was seemingly unable to hear or see those words. I remember looking back on a blog post (I was on Livejournal at the time) where I had thought no one had commented. I had used that fact to feed my big sad teddy bear. Lo and behold, there were tons of nice comments there. Always had been. I just didn’t want to hear anything good. So I didn’t.
Are you going through a hard time right now? Do you feel like people are making it worse instead of better? Do you find yourself thinking all of the time, “Why can’t anyone cut me a break?”
Try to take a step back (and this is REALLY hard when you have dark sunglasses on) and see how you are describing yourself right now. Do you call yourself names that have to do with your weight? Do you feel like you’re not successful enough? Did you try something that didn’t work so now you are feeling like you are a failure? Analyze how you are talking to yourself. Analyze how you are feeling about yourself when you go into a conversation with another person. You may be surprised to find that what you think you are hearing from other people is really what your brain is saying about you. It’s really what your heart is saying about you.
It may be hard to let go of your sadness and your bad feelings, but as an interim step, allow yourself to hear good things about YOU. If someone pays you a compliment, let yourself hear it. Don’t let your own dark feelings or disbelief plug your ears.
Does that make sense?
Image Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/clover_1/3391477890/ via Creative Commons
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True story; I describe myself as the fat pasty guy; or the sorry ass fat guy or some other endearing terms. Is it true? Yes, but do I believe it? Hell no, I’m the coolest thing since sliced bread. Maybe it’s a defense mechanism to keep myself humble.
You want unforgivingly brutal? Hang around w/ my group of ‘pals,’ your fitness, your sexual preferences, your sexual prowess, your athletic ability, your choice of friends, your hair or lack thereof, will all be questioned. And if it wasn’t, then you would think they didn’t luv ya. Heaven forbid if you make the paper for some social faux pas.
I hear what you are saying though. I’m in sales and I get ‘humbled’ my share of times. It makes you question your efforts, your abilities, your confidence and then you wallow in it for awhile. But then the sun comes up again, and it’s ‘all good’ and I’m thankful for the opportunity to take matters into my own hands and change my circumstances.
You can’t control what people might say about you, but you sure can control how you react to it. That’s.a.fact.
PS – the pasty part was true, I’m not really fat, but I kind of am because my pants are tight as hell……….:). Just sayin’…………
@bdorman264 Yo so crack me up.
Self-deprecation can be a double-edged sword. A lot of people use that kind of humor, without realizing it, as a way to diffuse any possible pain that might come from hearing those words from someone else. I’ve actually said things about myself that hurt my own feelings, which gets really complicated!
Maybe guys are different, but I would bet every once in awhile, while your friends are joking, someone suddenly says something like, “OK, that’s going too far,” or something like that. Depending on your mood, you can take joking for what it is or you might let one of those harmless jabs pierce you – if it’s something your’e afraid might be true.
@bdorman264 by “Yo’ I meant “you.” Yo.
@margieclayman Yo
Of course it makes sense Margie, because we have all been there. And you are correct, we hear (and see) what we want when we are in the “pit of despair.”.
I think it is also hard for people to let go of their sadness because it becomes a “safe” haven, or at least feels like it temporarily. You know the drill, “If I screw up or don’t do well, no big deal because I wasn’t that good at it anyway”. It is very easy to get all wrapped up in ourselves and our sadness, and want to stay there.
And yes, it is all about being able to take that proverbial step back, change your perspective, open your eyes and ears and really take in what’s truly going on around you. This is also where our bffs come in.
But ultimately, we have to come to know and accept that we are not only worthy, but noble creatures, and that each of us matters.
Good post, of course.
Martina
@Martina McGowan That’s a great point, Martina. Sometimes our words and beliefs become like Linus’s blanket. “Well of course you’re saying I messed up. I knew I would mess up and I knew you would point it out, and here we are now.”
There are a lot of gurus who talk about the energy you send out. If you send out positive thoughts and positive energy, things are more likely to go well for you. If you send out a lot of negativity it just keeps snowballing. I’m not so much a fan of trying to assign electron-science to the idea, but I do think it tends to be true.
@margieclayman On many levels, including electrons, we get what we give. “tis true.
You sound like you’ve been talking to a mutual friend of ours 🙂 Realizing that much of what we take in is actually already in us is a powerful moment.
@mantywebdesigns I have a lot of brilliant friends 🙂
@margieclayman Well, you know what that must say about you.
Of course it makes sense, Margie. I think I tendto expect the best from myself, so when I don’t excel, I an self critical, so I am looking for criticism. Over time I ha ve adopted Ricky Nelson’s philosophy: ” You can’t please everyone, so you’ve got to please yourself”. It not only gives me perspective, but out means negativity comes from me only.
I think this was one of the hardest ideas for me to wrap my head around – I could only hear the external information coming at me – the criticism – the disgust – didn’t realize that I wouldn’t give it any room if it didn’t have a place to land – I deal with what you are describing every day, Margie. I have to notice where the comments find a home in my own relationship with me… I recently attended a conference with Jeannine Rothe – she had the entire audience role playing with that inner dialogue – where each of spoke the language of that inner dialogue for the person we were sitting next to – it was extremely powerful –
The only way we ultimately get power is to really own that critical, deteriorating, unloving voice and square off with it – posts like yours help us all to do that…:D
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