Hi Mike,
A lot of us can relate to your problems so you're not alone on this forum. You sound quite depressed and negative, and my advice is to get some professional (conventional) help for that. In my opinion, you really need to get out of this negative mindset first and into a more positive attitude about life. I've struggled with manic depression for most of my adult life, as well as severe shyness (avoidant personality disorder) and self esteem problems. It was only after stabilizing my mood issues through professional help, that I was able to build confidence and self esteem. It's been almost 2 years since I was diagnosed, and slowly but steadily, with the help of medication, meditation and therapy, I've become stable, happy and I'm really enjoying my life. This has given me a lot of energy and motivation to work on my self esteem issues.
Can you tell us more about your self esteem problems? Is it related to interacting with other people? Can you give us some examples?
Hello Renze. Thanks for your reply.
First part of postTo adress some points. Short summary of my life. Nowadays I'm dealing with negativity and depresssion much better than in the past (I've made drastic improvements in the past 6 months) but I do get really bad episodes from time to time and that's what I was going through when I made this thread hence the really negative tone and such.
In regards to therapists. I did receive help from the NHS. It's the free service that they offer which includes CBT and cognitive restructuring. Because at that point (this was 2-3 months ago) I was so deep in my meditation practice and had read a lot of material on ACT therapy (which is basically mindfulness meditation with a therapy twist) I had ZERO buy in on any attempt to change my thinking. I though that changing my thinking is futile because we humans are programmed by evolution to be negative and to expect the worst, therfore fighting against millions upon millions of years of programming was futile and a waste of energy.
Second part of postThe main issue I have is social anxiety. Low self-esteem is felt around people sometimes (it used to be always and constant but that has changed/improved). For example, what puts me in a negative state is seeing someone who is very socially relaxed 100% of the time(or at least it looks that way)/jokes around with others/ very congruent social behavior (meaning his thoughts/feelings and actions are aligned) and comparing it with my own situation.
I have no consistency in feelings and emotions. They fluctuate. Some days I'm feeling 10/10. Easy smooth conversations. Lighthearted mood/playful joking around, very relaxed and fun. The next day I can't look people in the eye/mumble/feel and look awkward/can't make basic conversation to save my life. Another situation is when I go into "validation seeking trips" where I sub-communicate to others with the pretext (subconscious motivations) that I want to be validated (give me attention, react well, don't give bad reactions, be friendly, etc.). This looks weird. It creates anxiety because I have to perform. .
This frustrates me. It makes me sad that I have no control over this. It's like my emotions are a roller coaster and I'm just an observer. This frustrates me because I tie in my success in life (relationships/friends/being relaxed) with how I feel. A good feeling in my body helps me to be more social/relaxed and "successful". Success is the reactions of others, ultimately (something that took me a while to figure out). Bad reactions (bored looks, being ignored, not enough good reactions) is failure. I'm not being social and good enough.
Basically good emotions= I can act in a way that I want to act (friendly,joking, very smooth and easy conversation with no awkwardness, etc.). Bad emotions = I'm not in the mood so I can't really act how I want to act in a CONGRUENT WAY withouth appearing like I'm trying hard or being fake. People lose interest, I give the wrong imression, they judge me, maybe avoid me because they have the impression that I'm the quiet guy when I'm not feeling good. Third part of post.Meditation made this worse in many ways because of the East/West divide in how the mind and thoughts are seen. West way is change your thinking/change your emotions/control your life/ take responsibility/ be your own man/ YOU CAN BE ANYONE YOU ASPIRE/ CHANGE YOUR LIFE/ MOTIVATION etc. etc.
East way is be mindful/present to the moment/ don't fight against your situation/ what your resist persists/sit with what is and don't try to manipulate and control- IT IS FUTILE.
Two paths. Completely different approaches. They both fly into the face of each other.
This creates cognitive dissonance in my mind and this is painful. What should I do? What is the right way to live and to be? Is Western thinking wrong and misguided? Is Eastern philosophy the TRUE PATH? Those self-help books are telling me to change my thinking and ALL IS GONNA END UP OKAY. Yet, this is completely the opposite of meditation and what I'm doing in my life.
Is Western psychology worth the time? I don't know.
I spend most of my waking life trying to figure out the "right way" to look at things in life. The right perspective. Either the West or East.
Thanks for reading this ridiculously long post. Sorry for the rants and long posts.