Frustration, Reward & Safety

The following items are a recap of what was discussed in Chapter 5 & 6 of Shrink Yourself, which was entitled “Your Frustration/Reward Layer ” and “Your Safety Layer” – If you remember, I discovered I reward myself a lot with food: the end of a hard day, the end of a long week, fulfilling a need to be taken care of, when I’m stressed, sad, overwhelmed, angry, etc. So here is the recap:

Chapter 5

• I’ve learned that frustration with my life leads me to food as a reward.
• I’ve also learned that my frustration is based on a false sense of powerlessness, and that I
• have to recover my agency over my own life to master food.
• I’ll have to make whatever changes are necessary to improve my relationships.
• I’ll have to be the one who makes sure my legitimate needs get met, and my immature needs are given up.
• I’ll have to take responsibility for my unfulfilled potential.
• I’ll have to take charge of my stress, and improve the skills that make that possible.
• I must remember that I have two methods to recover my power over my own life:
  1. I can proactively deal with my life challenges and make my life work in the areas that were covered.
  2. I can avoid defeatism, adding to my false powerlessness, by not using obstacles and difficulties as justification to become a victim of my life, rather than the one in charge.

Chapter 6

• I’ll have to face my anxiety instead of eating to give myself the illusion of being safe or independent.
• I’ll have to do the grown-up work in the real world that could actually get me real safety and real independence.
• I’ll have to stop reinforcing my self-doubts by avoiding something important, the grown-up work.
• I’ll have to realize that my self-doubts make me more dependent, anxious, and sensitive to failing and embarrassment, and make me look for a hiding place.
• I’ll have to see how I eat more to feel safe, but it doesn’t make me safe, it just helps me avoid things and keeps me from recognizing the life decisions I’ve made that should be reviewed.
• I’ll see that there are better ways to deal with the challenges I’m hiding from other than using fat as a cover-up and excuse.
• I know that I have two methods to dismantle the false conclusion that I’m incapable of providing my own safety in life:
  1. I can use these insights to stop hiding so I can discover for myself that I’m not powerless.
  2. I can stop misinterpreting the dangers in my daily life in order to stop reinforcing my conclusion about powerlessness.

Talking Back to Harriet

We’ve been discussing Harriet, or Ethel, or whatever her name might be and how she speaks to us and how we need to talk back to her. Below are some of the things that Harriet may say about things you are thinking of trying…. I’m going to take this next section straight from Dr. Gould’s book…with my own thoughts in highlighted in bold.

1) First, when you think that having a dialogue with a loved one is going to help, Harriet will warn you to be careful. She’ll tell you that you might hear something about yourself that you can’t quite handle. What will you tell her?

2) When you attempt to give your loved ones space, she’ll tell you that if you don’t have a hold over them they’ll find someone else, or that by giving them space they’ll find others more interesting and will eventually abandon you. I think my daughter thinks this with her boyfriend.

3) When you entertain the idea that perhaps you’ve been expecting too much from your loved ones, she’ll tell you that by expecting less from people, you’ll allow yourself to become a doormat. You’ll be used because they know you’re not worth anything more.

4) When you try to accept that people in your life are going to have different opinions, she’ll tell you that if you have opposing opinions you’ll be cast aside. Your opinions don’t count after all. Harriet tells me, don't tell them what you think, “your opinions don’t matter anyway”.

5) When you try to lighten up and not take things so seriously, Harriet will tell you that if you don’t take your feelings seriously, people will not pay attention to them. She’ll encourage you to stay in an angry place where you feel lonely and disconnected.

6) When you try to stop being so stubborn and hard-headed, Harriet will tell you that you are compromising and that by giving in you are accepting that you’re flawed and imperfect. Obviously, imperfect is bad by her standards.

7) When you give up trying to control everything and everyone (your spouse, children and co-workers), Harriet will tell you that if you relinquish control, things will go wrong and you’ll be bad. I used to be here…thinking if I didn’t do it it wouldn’t get done. That was exhausting!

8) When you try to be sympathetic toward someone in your life who is under stress, Harriet will start to pout, saying, “What about me, where is my unconditional love and support?” When you’re starting to feel bad about not receiving that kind of support, she’ll convince you that you don’t have it because you don’t deserve it. Ok, this one resonated with me, I think I’ve heard myself say this.

I’ve had a point of awareness this week about why I like to go out to eat so much. I love how I feel when the wait staff is taking my order. They are so happy to see me, they want to take care of me and make sure my needs are being met. This is deep. Evidently I’ve got an unmet need in me…

Self Doubts & the Armor We Wear

Definition of “doubt” – to lack confidence in: distrust, consider unlikely, to be uncertain;

Today you may come home from a long day at work, and open the door to a house that is in shambles or a husband on the computer or flipping through the channels on the TV asking what’s for dinner. The thought that passes through your mind is he doesn’t see I’m tired, he doesn’t love me enough to have dinner ready, I must not be loveable or worthy enough – by now you’ve opened the refrigerator, ate cheese, a cookie, crackers that were left on the counter, and poured yourself a glass of wine – he hurt your feelings, knowingly or unknowingly. Provoked Self-doubt.

You are in the kitchen at the end of the day, or sitting at a stop light during rush hour, or on a bench in the park on a beautiful sunny day and you begin to feel horrible about yourself, convicting yourself about being a bad parent, spouse or friend. – Unprovoked Self-doubt.

To deal with Self-doubt many of us wear ARMOR. Some of the common types of armor that people wear are the following: martyr, nurturer, perfectionist, loner, or clown. We wear this armor afraid that if our true self is revealed than we won’t be loved or accepted. It’s our protection from Self-doubt.

Meet Harriet – Your Self Critic. Use this name or any other name you want, but Harriet is that critical voice inside of you that influences your actions and beliefs about yourself. She never rests! Even though you’re an intelligent, self-contained, fully functioning woman, Harriet holds a lot of power. Sometimes her chatter stays in the background of your consciousness, like static, but other times it’s blaring like a sports announcer, really berating you. The assumption is that you know Harriet quite well, but have never figured out how to handle her, other than trying to avoid her verdicts. So to squelch the inner voice, maybe you put the “nurturer” armor on, and take care of everyone around you instead of yourself – or you eat the box of cookies at one sitting. Either way you’re now faced with guilt and the cycle begins again.

Harriet is a part of you, a part of your experiences so the goal is not to exhume her from your body like the Exorcist but for Harriet to move into your reality, not you move into hers. Where does Harriet exits? The past. Harriet takes clouded experiences from our past and makes them reality. Example: how many of us heard from our mothers as a child “clean your plate - there are starving people in Africa”. There is a portion of truth, however the truth that your clean plate is going to change Africa is not a reality. But as a child we believe it so a belief pattern is set. Now, if we don’t clean our plate, we feel guilty.

FOR DISCUSSION: what armor do you wear? What past experience still clouds your reality?

The Slipping Mood

Eleanor Roosevelt said “no one can make you feel inferior without your consent”.

So why do we always agree to let others make us feel this way. Last time the discussion was about that “critical voice” that we allow to speak harshly over our lives and unless we confront the overly harsh assessments, we actually believe them and soon stand accused and convicted without the benefit of an open trial.

If we are emotional eaters (raise your hand), then every time we determine we aren’t good enough, we become hungry. So here is a thought: the single biggest problem standing between you and a thin body has to do with your harsh view of yourself. If food becomes a major mood regulating mechanism, then we will find ourselves overeating every time our mood slips, every time we feel we don’t measure up, every time we think we or our lives aren’t good enough.

But let me say that the answer to this is not to keep “the mood from slipping”, because reality is reality – life happens, people reject, feelings get hurt, bad days are just around the corner and our expectations of what was supposed to happen don’t match the actual. And when life happens Self-Doubt raises its ugly head. Next time I’ll take from the book notes about self-doubt (provoked & unprovoked), the armor we wear and how to weaken the power of self doubts. Are you waiting with baited breath?

Hearing Voices - The Cost of Powerlessness

My hope is the second meeting of TIPS was successful today. These women are wonderful, uplifting, powerful, women. I am blessed to be allowed to be a part of their group albeit be it long distance. Now on to the book I'm reading.....

There are 2 types of power. The first depends on your role in life and your influence over others. The President has more influence than I do. But all of us have some power to influence the world. The second kind of power is power over yourself..."to let yourself be the author, the agent, the one in control of your own life." I like that idea! However, there are times we give away that power. "You have a strong critical voice inside you that tells you in dozens of different ways that you don't have the complete set of rights to be in control of your own life, and when you believe the voice, you lose your courage." I am my worst critic, my own worst enemy."

The goal is to stop quieting the "critical voice" with food or any other behavior and instead become independent. That "critical voice" inside me has for too long attempted to control my life. I've quenched it momentarily by stuffing myself with food. Thinking "I control what I eat" when in reality, it is still controlling me.

Awareness:

• If I eat to avoid self-acusations rather than confront them, I may never get a chance to reform and remodel my conscience.
• I'm understanding that it's me that makes me feel powerless. Only I can give away my power.
• I've also learned that there is a part of me that measures myself by impossible standards, making me temporily powerless, it is my overly harsh conscience, that critical voice."

Goal this week: This week when I hear that "critical voice", I'm going to write down what emotion I've felt, what triggered it and what was my response: eat, cower, sleep????

Feelings and Predictions

A couple of thoughts from Chapter 2 - "Feelings are the doorway you need to pass through.....so that you can draw on your interior wisdom." and "Most often we misinterpret our feelings in a way that confirms that we're not as worthy as we'd like to be, that makes us believe we're more powerles than we actually are." - It's the interpretation that makes the feeling so intense.

With this comes "catastrophe predictions" - interpreting things in a way that paints a very vivid potrait of how terrible things are going to turn out. - Doomsday - reflecting on the worst - some things I say "what does it matter", "nothings ever going to change anyway", "oh well", "I might as well..." - I've allowed myself to arrive at powerless conclusions.

"My feelings are not there to make me miserable. Rather emotions provide me with information about my interior life. Wrapped inside my feelings are messages I need to hear. Because of my catastrophe predictions attached to my emotions, I fear staying with my feelings long enough to hear myself." (Changed to 1st person)

I had lunch with a friend today - it was interesting I heard her say over and over "I'm just done with it, I'm over it." And she told me how she has made multiple cakes this week. The emotions of her life have been playing havoc with her as well. So it's not just me. actually, that is comforting to know I'm not alone.

Session 1

"People say that motivation doesn't last. Well, neither does bathing - that's why we recommend it daily" ~ Zig Ziglar

In previous reading, I've understood myself to be an emotional eater, looked at the differences between phantom hunger and physical hunger, saw that there is a gap between powerlessness and the uncontrollable urge to eat (though it be small), but that gap allows me time to make a change and that I'll need to rid myself of denial in order to do the work that will free me from food addiction and misguided motivations.

EXERCISE: Next to each of the eating habits there is an "I" statement. If you can say the statement out loud and feel as if you're telling the truth, then you know that habit is not a problem. If you feel like your lying, write that one in your notebook to work on later.

Habit #1: Listen to your body. "I stop eating when I'm full and only eat when I am hungry." Not all the time but mostly
Habit #2: Manage your hunger. "I feed myself properly through the day so I don't lose control." During the week I'm pretty good that this, weekends - no, although I've gotten into the bad habit of not eating breakfast - no good, I know
Habit #3: Bounce Bank. "If I've made a poor food choice, I don't use that as an excuse to eat everything in site." this is true
Habit #4: Keep your weight in mind. "I keep my weight in mind when I make food choices." this is true
Habit #5: Avoid Junk Food. "I mostly avoid junk food." I avoid it but want it constantly
Habit #6: Exercise Enough. "I exercise enough to stay healthy." this is true
Habit #7: Control your portions. "I know how to properly control the amount of food I eat." I do have difficulties with this sometimes
Habit #8: Prevent Binges. "I know when I'm about to binge and can stop myself." I usually know after the fact
Habit #9: Savor your food. "I eat good food in a slow way so that I enjoy it." usually eat too fast
Habit #10: Choose a Balanced Diet. "I make sure I eat a healthy, balanced diet that keeps me feeling good both physically and mentally." yes, this is true

Chapter 2 said the following: if you didn't have your weight to think about you might have to think about what's really bothering you, and that's very frightening. WHOA!

AWARENESS: It's interesting, because as I'm reading this book, I'm seeing more destructive patterns than I'd like to see. Example: someone said something to me that hurt my feelings - if I told you, you'd say "what?" anyway - I didn't respond, just said fine, left and headed straight for Starbucks. Sometimes transformation sucks! I hate seeing things in myself that are less than.