Mindfulness

[manuel_moe_g]

I seem to have gained the ability to not be brutal to myself. Like, in my own head.

Excellent!

Do you find there are three parts of your brain to reckon with? I have stopped being brutal to myself in my conscious brain, getting better at stopping being brutal to myself in my unconscious brain, but my very deep inner nature in my brain is still to be brutal to myself.

What do you think?

[Beany Boo]

Great question.

Feeling states burst through whether logic can handle them or not. I got into the habit a while back of saying, ‘this is just happening, there’s no point explaining it’ when feeling states started to overwhelm the logic centre. It meant I spent a split second trying to understand and then just accepted it was happening just because.

Now I suspect that when I got overwhelmed as a small child my parent’s reaction was involuntary brutality/cruelty. That quality became part of my life-long learnt reaction. Effectively my brain would tell me, ‘you’re being overwhelmed right now and because of that, you deserve cruelty’. Hence my regular overreaction which I unconsciously trained myself to have in silence or privately..

Somehow, in the flotsam and jetsam of evidence of late, I’ve discovered this habitual infantile brutality being elicited and the big change, stopped accepting it as natural.

[manuel_moe_g]

Now I suspect that when I got overwhelmed as a small child my parent’s reaction was involuntary brutality/cruelty.

You never deserved it, you deserved so much better as a small child, and you definitely didn't deserve it to be installed as your personal mental operating system.

You are a hell of a person, take very good care of yourself, Beany

[Beany Boo]

Thanks MM

I feel seen.

I should add, even a slight reduction in my self-administered brutality has yielded some curious and salutary experiences.

[rivergirl]

I couldn't agree more with MM, Beany!

[Beany Boo]

Thanks rg

[Beany Boo]

I feel quite strong and weak at the same time. I can’t quite frame that as vulnerability today, but I think it might be.

I really want something to happen, and don’t know what the something is.

All I can see to do is what the Japanese call, ‘read the air’.

Gently, softly with curiosity. Making a profoundly subtle shift in a world begging me to give up on it completely.

[Mental Fairy]

Very much resonate with this last post Beany.

The weakness is in my physical body, the strength is behind the thoughts that are not all positive.

I looked up the Japanese expression you noted and find this very interesting. Thank you for that little insight.

Recently i have been struggling with eye contact more than normal. I can't seem to look up when out in public. I look away from people immediately. I don't want to be seen, i just want to complete a task and reclouse back to my cave. I have been left feeling confusing anger since my last therapy session for some reason.

[Beany Boo]

Thanks MF

[Beany Boo]

I feel like I might have set up several relationships to bear fruit of late. Nothing like a normal human but still more so than I am accustomed to.

Seriously though, I hope I don’t implode or rattle to pieces. It would be nice to just breathe freely amongst the general public for a single cycle.