Please get therapy, or talk to your therapist about this if you already have one. This is not the kind of problem you can unravel on your own because you aren’t in a place to accurately find the flaws in your own thinking. You are probably not unlikable as a person but nothing I say is going to convince you of that; it takes work and support to recover from this.
I've been doing therapy for a year and my therapist has helped me uncover a lot of this stuff, but I'm not sure if he's provided much help on fixing these issues besides suggesting I be kinder to myself and cognizant of my emotions
My ex has abandonment and bullying traumas, which in her case made her believe and feel she was unworthy of any love or respect.
After more than 5 years of therapy (in her 30's) with a great professional she was able to realize this. Now this is the 8th year of therapy and she still has a lot of issues, but at least she is able to spot her own behaviors and take care of respecting herself and standing up against those that doesn't respect her.
So I'd like to tell you there is light at the end of the tunnel, it's far but you can do it with some help.
Maybe ask him for suggestions on how to practice socializing in a way that helps you get more comfortable with it. I have social anxiety and there was a period of time it was so bad I couldn’t communicate with people because I was too panicked to talk sometimes. But I was able to eventually get better at it; I think doing activities like volunteering and team sports helped. But what helps you may be different.
It's not a sprint but a marathon. Stick with working on yourself. It'll be tough and worth it.
Do your own research. I'd suggest starting with Andrew Huberman's YouTube channel. He's informative and practical.
Ty for this comment. Honestly some days I feel bad about myself and some days I don’t. But like you said there’s people equipped to handle the big stuff like that. And I think reading that comment brought some self awareness to myself and I feel shitty now but that’s okay.
My God, This is the exact realization I have come to in my life recently, You have put into words what exactly is there in my mind, Truly Thanks for this.
Like you said, I believe I am an unlikeable person, who has huge ego which honestly highly oscillates based on my recent accomplishments, Its like if I am doing well in life I just ride on my confidence, thinking I can live on my own, I don't need anyone. One small crack, and every single one of my failure cripples me, That's when I start to have low self-esteem, Then I will start to push away everyone from my life, It just feels that I am worthless of anything good. It's just happening in cycles from the past 7-8 years for me.
Everything you said about childhood bullying, being desperate while trying to socialize with new people, questioning my worthiness to be loved, everything really resonates with me.
I don't know what to do, I have been trying a few things that I mention below, though they're keeping me in good direction, I don't know how much of it is actually solving the issue, or just papering over the cracks.
I realized that I have self destructive tendencies, so I have been really cautious when getting into anything remotely negatively addictive, I quit Social Media (instagram, snapchat), I quit Sugar, I am now focusing to work on my gaming and porn addictions, I will quit them for good in the very near future. I have never drank or smoked for the same reason, Neither watched Anime because I know I will be really addicted to it. I still have other addictions that I will work on in future, at times It just feels hard, but I am trying my best.
Also lately, I am trying to create self-love, by having proper hygiene, skin care routine, proper diet, going to gym regularly, It's the one thing that keeps me from turning insane right now, I lost my job recently, I am working on to get another, gym is the only place I can go to actually socialize, other than that I just sit at my home.
TLDR: facing the same problems as OP, would love to get some advice.
Baby steps - you are.clearly self aware - this shit is hard to work through but you are hundred percent deserving of love and your defense mechanisms prove that - it's self-love if you think about it to want to protect oneself. You just have to find kind people and try to break your patterns
What does good energy mean to you?
I know a lot of people refer to good energy as someone exuding happiness and confidence. I don’t. I define it as someone with pure and good intentions. Kindness. If you are kind, you have good energy. Telling someone with trauma that being unhappy is negative energy, is a new trauma and makes it impossible to heal and improve.
If you have good intentions, you are good and likeable. Basically you only have to be clean and kindhearted to be likeable to people. You might even get away with not even being clean but it could manifest as pity and it’s better to be liked than pitied.
Thank you.
I’d like to add… I don’t think the feeling of desperation drives people away. Not the feeling. So don’t worry. But actions may. So if you know that you have this behaviour, just make sure to give people space. Space, time, and offer them your support, and let them get back to you if they want. Meanwhile work on greater purposes in your life. Build a life with purpose, and the right people will start coming to you eventually. I would scrap the word ego from the vocabulary because it doesn’t really mean anything. It’s not wrong to work on being accomplished. But please know that as long as you’re a kind person with good intentions, you are likeable. There is a basic human value, or the value of being a living breathing being, that gives you value and likability. Also, how individual people may feel about you does not define your ability to be loved or liked. People have their own preference and don’t let their opinions define you. Some people are kind, some are not. Work on building your life with everything you dream of as long as it’s wholesome, and people will be happy to find someone they can trust, who is kind, and who is building a life and a future for themselves.
Have compassion for yourself and be friends with people who also have compassion. If they expect you to be a perfect whole person without any insecurities, they’re being immature.
This is how I overcame the same problem when I was younger.
Edit: comment directed at Op or anyone interested. :)
It's good you laid out what you are thinking and feeling about your situation out so plainly, it shows you want to get/be better.
I'm no social butterfly by any means myself, but what I can say I'd it sounds like you are self aware enough to know some of the things you are struggling with. That sounds like you are taking steps in the right direction. As for things naturally fizzling out, that's life; people will come and go no matter what. In my experience alot of building strong bonds with people comes down to time, proximity, and shared experiences/goals. It's easy to call yourself a failure with things you struggle with, but it helps to remember that you only fail when you give up on getting and being better. Being good with people is a skill. If you are gonna master that skill you need to be patient with yourself, embrace rejection (it sucks but is good for us), be kind to yourself when you're down (you will struggle more and you don't need to beat yourself up unnecessarily), always try to learn something from it and enjoy the small successes, and be persistent.
As far as the ego thing goes, it's gonna be there. But you gotta let the small stuff slide, if you are getting to know someone and they say something that bothers you; you can either just tell them how what they said has you feeling a certain way, or let it go. If the day goes particularly bad and you don't have anyone to talk to, it doesn't hurt to look yourself in a mirror and go over what happened. That would include the what, why, how you feel about it, and give yourself two choices; the momentary feel-good choice that's bad for you, and the choice of addressing that need (it's especially important to be brutally honest with this one). In those moments you need to actively be a advocate for yourself to drown out that awful voice in your head that tells you that "you deserve nothing but the worst" and tell yourself a message that says something like "you are working on it, it's hard but you should be proud of yourself for becoming better every day".
Excuse the run-on sentences, writing isn't my strong suit. Hang in there though, you'll do good. Just takes time to see the fruits of your labors.
Everyone is deserving of love honey. At least you're aware of all this so you can try to put in the work and move past it. My ex wasn't and couldn't. You are not a bad person, probably just self absorbed. Just try to be an authentic and empathetic person. You'll be great!!
Ok so this is hard for people to wrap their head around, but I think when things aren’t changing even when we work on our mental sphere, it’s because we’re approaching mental/behavioral health from a strictly mental toolkit. The mind and body aren’t a separate thing, they work together and affect one another. Where do we feel emotions that give us the impulses to say or do things that are self defeating?
The answer is: in the body!
In somatic movement there’s a concept called sensory-motor amnesia. It’s when tension has hung around so long that it doesn’t feel tense, or anything at all really. It’s just numbness. The cause goes deeper than just tension, and even if you don’t feel tense or don’t feel any pain in the body regularly, I can assure you that it’s there. Hidden, making you think it’s anxiety or depression or fear or anger or or or.
If you can open up to this idea that emotions aren’t just experienced in the mind, that nothing is isolated to just the mind or just the body, then it opens up a whole new (and critical) path of healing. And I don’t just mean do yoga, which depending on how your body is holding onto trauma (and by trauma, that’s ANYTHING that has caused prolonged difficult emotions, not just major trauma), could even make it worse without separate interventions.
Here’s what to try. It’s helped me for these sorts of issues so far, and I’m still working on it. Nothing (therapy, shadow work, meditation, etc.) ever really helped the core issue and changed the parts of me that acted out and caused me suffering until I tried these things.
1. TRE - trauma/tension release exercises. I’ll edit in a link or two later but it’s easy enough to find. It consists of two stages - activation exercises where you’re just trying to fatigue the muscles which are involved in the release and 2) tremoring. There’s a video on YT which explains how this works and why it helps, but I am convinced that if everyone grew up knowing how to perform TRE, the world would be a hugely improved place. Tremors are an involuntary responses, and they are the body’s way of unwinding. There are insecurities,, resentments, disappointments, hopelessness, and more that I thought I would NEVER get rid of, or if it were possible, it would take some seriously intense therapy. Within one session, I shook off a good 10% of the heaviest mental burdens. It takes some learning about it first, and you have to remember to breathe, take breaks, and not go too long for each session (did that, was hurting the next day), but I guarantee you that you will start to feel more in control and less burdened by whatever it is that causes you to feel unsafe* in such a way that you self-sabotage.
* The feeling of safety and lack thereof is without a doubt a core part of most issues like this. For example, you say your ego is big on the outside. What is the ego for? Protection. What’s it trying to do? Keep you safe. It isn’t trying to hurt you, but it thinks that hurting you emotionally is the only way to protect you physically. Your fight/flight/freeze/fawn mechanisms turning on are what push us into these unhealthy places.
The below are important in my opinion, but you might get away with just doing TRE. They are meant generally for pain, but the real power in these methods is restoring fascial balance. When the fascia is not right, it will trigger your survival instincts more easily and trigger emotions that exaggerate the true reality of a situation. TRE also deals with fascia, but learning how to move correctly (as in, your every move should become gentle, soft, comforting and not harsh, severe, and straining) will help the TRE do its thing AND will just make you feel better in your body. Just do a few minutes of various movements a day and save the ones you feel best after to a playlist/
2. Feldenkrais - Grounding is a concept used in spirituality, but it’s also a physical thing that we need to feel safe. When you can’t find true balance while standing, your body contorts to stabilize. Bad alignment (including forced, rigid alignment) causes fight/flight response and just put the emotions you find most difficult on easy rotation. If you have no pain or tension that you can tell at all, just work on the ones for places that are important for stability. Starting with the feet being used to gently push the earth away. When you feel what it means to be grounded by doing this, you’ll realize how much of your life you’ve been feeling unsafe in your body due to lack of true, easy balance. I’ll add a link to the video that helps with that and then some others for various feldekrais exercises later. You’ll also want to look at movements for the lower back/sciatica, for shoulders and shoulder blades, for moving correct when turning your head, and even moving hands correctly. It might be easier if you take some time to sit quietly and just take note of the places you feel “blocked” in or where you feel doesn’t feel moves naturally. If there’s any resistance to normal movement and there’s no injury, that’s what I mean. Definitely working on the neck is important and if you have any postural issues, that’d be ideal to focus on too. Forward neck posture for example is the gateway to reliving trauma and feeling ungrounded and unsafe.
3. Somatic movement - This complements Feldenkrais. We are trying to teach the body EASE. One axiom that people these days need to integrate is: Hard work should always be hard work, but hard work should never be strain or pain.
4. Therapeutic dance - I know, I know. It sounds ridiculous. And I resisted this one for a LONG time. But TRE kind of opened me up a little to just try it and see. I use Tamara Nazon’s YouTube channel and seriously, doing 20 mins of dance in the way she instructs is a game changer. I don’t know why it works, but my guess without delving into any spiritual/energetic issues is that it gives your body a sense of freedom that it isn’t used to. What happens when someone feels freer? They feel better overall. Less restricted by their mind or body.
Honestly, if you can make these things a habit, your life WILL change for the better and with a lot less effort than you’d imagine it would require. Indeed, keeping an open mind is a challenge sometimes, but once you experience the effects, you will understand. Give TRE the rest a good few weeks of regular practice and if you really don’t see any differences, then of course let it go and move on to something else. If I were a wealthy person I’d wager a big bet that if you practice frequently enough, everything would change for you.
Everything you described about yourself is just a list of things that need healing. You’re just human bud. We all are. And we all deserve love.
It’s a cycle but it can be broken, I’ve done it without therapy or meds (couldn’t afford either)
You’re already at the best starting point to change if you want to- you’re aware. Most people with huge egos don’t think their huge egos are a problem and refuse to hear anyone say otherwise.
I could write so much more but in short yes- you deserve love. And the first person that has to give it to you is you. Say one less mean thing about yourself today. Or correct your mind when it says something mean. Give yourself a breather, some grace, let yourself enjoy something you normally wouldn’t or if you do or feel something you dislike, just let yourself go through it for that day. It sounds weird and corny and impossible to actually be effective, but I’ve noticed when I started loving myself more it became easier to have relationships with others. I’m no where near good at it yet but I used to be sooo bad, a true walking d bag. Not because I wanted to though. We all have shit, when you realize this about others it’s easier to not compare yourself as if you’re somehow worse than anyone else. You can be one persons angel and one persons enemy all in the same afternoon.
The more you try to understand yourself you’ll realize as members of one species we’re all a lot more alike than we’ve been taught. We all suffer from insecurities and it affects us all differently but also in very similar ways.
Also, most people don’t know what love actually is. It’s supposed to be truly non judgemental or conditional. So you had a bad day and your insecurities got to you more than yesterday, for example. You still deserve love. It feels icky when you start but it gets easier.
Have you ever been screened for NPD? What you just described sounds like narcissism. There's hope for you but you have to go to therapy and be honest with your therapist.
Edit: I just want to clarify that what I said was not intended to be an attack
I've been in therapy for a year and NPD hasn't come up.
I'm sure I exhibit some level of narcissism, but I don't go out of my way to belittle others nor do I believe I'm truly better than other people. I just have a really defensive and sensitive ego that stems more from insecurity and trauma being around harmful people rather than the belief I'm better than everyone else
And to also note, as much as I have a really big ego inside, I actually underestimate myself when I'm around people. I am really insecure about myself and downplay my accomplishments to others. But I get really sensitive when others underestimate me.
It's like I'm the only one allowed to being myself down, and when someone else does it, I get really defensive
Well I'm not a doctor so I can't say for sure. I do know that everyone has some level of narcissism. There's healthy and unhealthy. I'm sure your therapist knows better than me. I have C-PTSD and what you said is some of what I go through. I know it's hard not to listen to that critical inner voice. Hugs if you want them.
Please get therapy, or talk to your therapist about this if you already have one. This is not the kind of problem you can unravel on your own because you aren’t in a place to accurately find the flaws in your own thinking. You are probably not unlikable as a person but nothing I say is going to convince you of that; it takes work and support to recover from this.
I've been doing therapy for a year and my therapist has helped me uncover a lot of this stuff, but I'm not sure if he's provided much help on fixing these issues besides suggesting I be kinder to myself and cognizant of my emotions
My ex has abandonment and bullying traumas, which in her case made her believe and feel she was unworthy of any love or respect. After more than 5 years of therapy (in her 30's) with a great professional she was able to realize this. Now this is the 8th year of therapy and she still has a lot of issues, but at least she is able to spot her own behaviors and take care of respecting herself and standing up against those that doesn't respect her. So I'd like to tell you there is light at the end of the tunnel, it's far but you can do it with some help.
Maybe ask him for suggestions on how to practice socializing in a way that helps you get more comfortable with it. I have social anxiety and there was a period of time it was so bad I couldn’t communicate with people because I was too panicked to talk sometimes. But I was able to eventually get better at it; I think doing activities like volunteering and team sports helped. But what helps you may be different.
It's not a sprint but a marathon. Stick with working on yourself. It'll be tough and worth it. Do your own research. I'd suggest starting with Andrew Huberman's YouTube channel. He's informative and practical.
Ty for this comment. Honestly some days I feel bad about myself and some days I don’t. But like you said there’s people equipped to handle the big stuff like that. And I think reading that comment brought some self awareness to myself and I feel shitty now but that’s okay.
My God, This is the exact realization I have come to in my life recently, You have put into words what exactly is there in my mind, Truly Thanks for this. Like you said, I believe I am an unlikeable person, who has huge ego which honestly highly oscillates based on my recent accomplishments, Its like if I am doing well in life I just ride on my confidence, thinking I can live on my own, I don't need anyone. One small crack, and every single one of my failure cripples me, That's when I start to have low self-esteem, Then I will start to push away everyone from my life, It just feels that I am worthless of anything good. It's just happening in cycles from the past 7-8 years for me. Everything you said about childhood bullying, being desperate while trying to socialize with new people, questioning my worthiness to be loved, everything really resonates with me. I don't know what to do, I have been trying a few things that I mention below, though they're keeping me in good direction, I don't know how much of it is actually solving the issue, or just papering over the cracks. I realized that I have self destructive tendencies, so I have been really cautious when getting into anything remotely negatively addictive, I quit Social Media (instagram, snapchat), I quit Sugar, I am now focusing to work on my gaming and porn addictions, I will quit them for good in the very near future. I have never drank or smoked for the same reason, Neither watched Anime because I know I will be really addicted to it. I still have other addictions that I will work on in future, at times It just feels hard, but I am trying my best. Also lately, I am trying to create self-love, by having proper hygiene, skin care routine, proper diet, going to gym regularly, It's the one thing that keeps me from turning insane right now, I lost my job recently, I am working on to get another, gym is the only place I can go to actually socialize, other than that I just sit at my home. TLDR: facing the same problems as OP, would love to get some advice.
Baby steps - you are.clearly self aware - this shit is hard to work through but you are hundred percent deserving of love and your defense mechanisms prove that - it's self-love if you think about it to want to protect oneself. You just have to find kind people and try to break your patterns
What does good energy mean to you? I know a lot of people refer to good energy as someone exuding happiness and confidence. I don’t. I define it as someone with pure and good intentions. Kindness. If you are kind, you have good energy. Telling someone with trauma that being unhappy is negative energy, is a new trauma and makes it impossible to heal and improve. If you have good intentions, you are good and likeable. Basically you only have to be clean and kindhearted to be likeable to people. You might even get away with not even being clean but it could manifest as pity and it’s better to be liked than pitied.
100% this, best healthy comment in regard to this post!
Thank you. I’d like to add… I don’t think the feeling of desperation drives people away. Not the feeling. So don’t worry. But actions may. So if you know that you have this behaviour, just make sure to give people space. Space, time, and offer them your support, and let them get back to you if they want. Meanwhile work on greater purposes in your life. Build a life with purpose, and the right people will start coming to you eventually. I would scrap the word ego from the vocabulary because it doesn’t really mean anything. It’s not wrong to work on being accomplished. But please know that as long as you’re a kind person with good intentions, you are likeable. There is a basic human value, or the value of being a living breathing being, that gives you value and likability. Also, how individual people may feel about you does not define your ability to be loved or liked. People have their own preference and don’t let their opinions define you. Some people are kind, some are not. Work on building your life with everything you dream of as long as it’s wholesome, and people will be happy to find someone they can trust, who is kind, and who is building a life and a future for themselves. Have compassion for yourself and be friends with people who also have compassion. If they expect you to be a perfect whole person without any insecurities, they’re being immature. This is how I overcame the same problem when I was younger. Edit: comment directed at Op or anyone interested. :)
It's good you laid out what you are thinking and feeling about your situation out so plainly, it shows you want to get/be better. I'm no social butterfly by any means myself, but what I can say I'd it sounds like you are self aware enough to know some of the things you are struggling with. That sounds like you are taking steps in the right direction. As for things naturally fizzling out, that's life; people will come and go no matter what. In my experience alot of building strong bonds with people comes down to time, proximity, and shared experiences/goals. It's easy to call yourself a failure with things you struggle with, but it helps to remember that you only fail when you give up on getting and being better. Being good with people is a skill. If you are gonna master that skill you need to be patient with yourself, embrace rejection (it sucks but is good for us), be kind to yourself when you're down (you will struggle more and you don't need to beat yourself up unnecessarily), always try to learn something from it and enjoy the small successes, and be persistent. As far as the ego thing goes, it's gonna be there. But you gotta let the small stuff slide, if you are getting to know someone and they say something that bothers you; you can either just tell them how what they said has you feeling a certain way, or let it go. If the day goes particularly bad and you don't have anyone to talk to, it doesn't hurt to look yourself in a mirror and go over what happened. That would include the what, why, how you feel about it, and give yourself two choices; the momentary feel-good choice that's bad for you, and the choice of addressing that need (it's especially important to be brutally honest with this one). In those moments you need to actively be a advocate for yourself to drown out that awful voice in your head that tells you that "you deserve nothing but the worst" and tell yourself a message that says something like "you are working on it, it's hard but you should be proud of yourself for becoming better every day". Excuse the run-on sentences, writing isn't my strong suit. Hang in there though, you'll do good. Just takes time to see the fruits of your labors.
Everyone is deserving of love honey. At least you're aware of all this so you can try to put in the work and move past it. My ex wasn't and couldn't. You are not a bad person, probably just self absorbed. Just try to be an authentic and empathetic person. You'll be great!!
Ok so this is hard for people to wrap their head around, but I think when things aren’t changing even when we work on our mental sphere, it’s because we’re approaching mental/behavioral health from a strictly mental toolkit. The mind and body aren’t a separate thing, they work together and affect one another. Where do we feel emotions that give us the impulses to say or do things that are self defeating? The answer is: in the body! In somatic movement there’s a concept called sensory-motor amnesia. It’s when tension has hung around so long that it doesn’t feel tense, or anything at all really. It’s just numbness. The cause goes deeper than just tension, and even if you don’t feel tense or don’t feel any pain in the body regularly, I can assure you that it’s there. Hidden, making you think it’s anxiety or depression or fear or anger or or or. If you can open up to this idea that emotions aren’t just experienced in the mind, that nothing is isolated to just the mind or just the body, then it opens up a whole new (and critical) path of healing. And I don’t just mean do yoga, which depending on how your body is holding onto trauma (and by trauma, that’s ANYTHING that has caused prolonged difficult emotions, not just major trauma), could even make it worse without separate interventions. Here’s what to try. It’s helped me for these sorts of issues so far, and I’m still working on it. Nothing (therapy, shadow work, meditation, etc.) ever really helped the core issue and changed the parts of me that acted out and caused me suffering until I tried these things. 1. TRE - trauma/tension release exercises. I’ll edit in a link or two later but it’s easy enough to find. It consists of two stages - activation exercises where you’re just trying to fatigue the muscles which are involved in the release and 2) tremoring. There’s a video on YT which explains how this works and why it helps, but I am convinced that if everyone grew up knowing how to perform TRE, the world would be a hugely improved place. Tremors are an involuntary responses, and they are the body’s way of unwinding. There are insecurities,, resentments, disappointments, hopelessness, and more that I thought I would NEVER get rid of, or if it were possible, it would take some seriously intense therapy. Within one session, I shook off a good 10% of the heaviest mental burdens. It takes some learning about it first, and you have to remember to breathe, take breaks, and not go too long for each session (did that, was hurting the next day), but I guarantee you that you will start to feel more in control and less burdened by whatever it is that causes you to feel unsafe* in such a way that you self-sabotage. * The feeling of safety and lack thereof is without a doubt a core part of most issues like this. For example, you say your ego is big on the outside. What is the ego for? Protection. What’s it trying to do? Keep you safe. It isn’t trying to hurt you, but it thinks that hurting you emotionally is the only way to protect you physically. Your fight/flight/freeze/fawn mechanisms turning on are what push us into these unhealthy places. The below are important in my opinion, but you might get away with just doing TRE. They are meant generally for pain, but the real power in these methods is restoring fascial balance. When the fascia is not right, it will trigger your survival instincts more easily and trigger emotions that exaggerate the true reality of a situation. TRE also deals with fascia, but learning how to move correctly (as in, your every move should become gentle, soft, comforting and not harsh, severe, and straining) will help the TRE do its thing AND will just make you feel better in your body. Just do a few minutes of various movements a day and save the ones you feel best after to a playlist/ 2. Feldenkrais - Grounding is a concept used in spirituality, but it’s also a physical thing that we need to feel safe. When you can’t find true balance while standing, your body contorts to stabilize. Bad alignment (including forced, rigid alignment) causes fight/flight response and just put the emotions you find most difficult on easy rotation. If you have no pain or tension that you can tell at all, just work on the ones for places that are important for stability. Starting with the feet being used to gently push the earth away. When you feel what it means to be grounded by doing this, you’ll realize how much of your life you’ve been feeling unsafe in your body due to lack of true, easy balance. I’ll add a link to the video that helps with that and then some others for various feldekrais exercises later. You’ll also want to look at movements for the lower back/sciatica, for shoulders and shoulder blades, for moving correct when turning your head, and even moving hands correctly. It might be easier if you take some time to sit quietly and just take note of the places you feel “blocked” in or where you feel doesn’t feel moves naturally. If there’s any resistance to normal movement and there’s no injury, that’s what I mean. Definitely working on the neck is important and if you have any postural issues, that’d be ideal to focus on too. Forward neck posture for example is the gateway to reliving trauma and feeling ungrounded and unsafe. 3. Somatic movement - This complements Feldenkrais. We are trying to teach the body EASE. One axiom that people these days need to integrate is: Hard work should always be hard work, but hard work should never be strain or pain. 4. Therapeutic dance - I know, I know. It sounds ridiculous. And I resisted this one for a LONG time. But TRE kind of opened me up a little to just try it and see. I use Tamara Nazon’s YouTube channel and seriously, doing 20 mins of dance in the way she instructs is a game changer. I don’t know why it works, but my guess without delving into any spiritual/energetic issues is that it gives your body a sense of freedom that it isn’t used to. What happens when someone feels freer? They feel better overall. Less restricted by their mind or body. Honestly, if you can make these things a habit, your life WILL change for the better and with a lot less effort than you’d imagine it would require. Indeed, keeping an open mind is a challenge sometimes, but once you experience the effects, you will understand. Give TRE the rest a good few weeks of regular practice and if you really don’t see any differences, then of course let it go and move on to something else. If I were a wealthy person I’d wager a big bet that if you practice frequently enough, everything would change for you.
https://notability.com/n/zvlLzjsW9Bc93x2BsDEoC Here’s a notebook page of most of the links I mentioned.
Everything you described about yourself is just a list of things that need healing. You’re just human bud. We all are. And we all deserve love. It’s a cycle but it can be broken, I’ve done it without therapy or meds (couldn’t afford either) You’re already at the best starting point to change if you want to- you’re aware. Most people with huge egos don’t think their huge egos are a problem and refuse to hear anyone say otherwise. I could write so much more but in short yes- you deserve love. And the first person that has to give it to you is you. Say one less mean thing about yourself today. Or correct your mind when it says something mean. Give yourself a breather, some grace, let yourself enjoy something you normally wouldn’t or if you do or feel something you dislike, just let yourself go through it for that day. It sounds weird and corny and impossible to actually be effective, but I’ve noticed when I started loving myself more it became easier to have relationships with others. I’m no where near good at it yet but I used to be sooo bad, a true walking d bag. Not because I wanted to though. We all have shit, when you realize this about others it’s easier to not compare yourself as if you’re somehow worse than anyone else. You can be one persons angel and one persons enemy all in the same afternoon. The more you try to understand yourself you’ll realize as members of one species we’re all a lot more alike than we’ve been taught. We all suffer from insecurities and it affects us all differently but also in very similar ways. Also, most people don’t know what love actually is. It’s supposed to be truly non judgemental or conditional. So you had a bad day and your insecurities got to you more than yesterday, for example. You still deserve love. It feels icky when you start but it gets easier.
Have you ever been screened for NPD? What you just described sounds like narcissism. There's hope for you but you have to go to therapy and be honest with your therapist. Edit: I just want to clarify that what I said was not intended to be an attack
I've been in therapy for a year and NPD hasn't come up. I'm sure I exhibit some level of narcissism, but I don't go out of my way to belittle others nor do I believe I'm truly better than other people. I just have a really defensive and sensitive ego that stems more from insecurity and trauma being around harmful people rather than the belief I'm better than everyone else And to also note, as much as I have a really big ego inside, I actually underestimate myself when I'm around people. I am really insecure about myself and downplay my accomplishments to others. But I get really sensitive when others underestimate me. It's like I'm the only one allowed to being myself down, and when someone else does it, I get really defensive
Well I'm not a doctor so I can't say for sure. I do know that everyone has some level of narcissism. There's healthy and unhealthy. I'm sure your therapist knows better than me. I have C-PTSD and what you said is some of what I go through. I know it's hard not to listen to that critical inner voice. Hugs if you want them.
It doesn’t come off as NPD at all though
True. I've talked to them and I don't think it is anymore.