Battling My Own Mind

My first practical experiences with cognitive restructuring were in college when I suffered with an eating disorder.  I didn't have much luck with counselling (I found the counsellors mostly wanted to talk about themselves) but I did find a book that made sense to me and gave me the tools to heal myself called The Deadly Diet: Recovering from Anorexia and Bulimia .  The book is heavily based in cognitive and rational emotive therapy, and was my first experience in slowing down and paying attention to my negative thought patterns and how they manifested illness and depression in my life. Dr. Sandbek, the author, has the reader label the negative messages we say to ourselves as The Voice and encourages personification of that voice.

At that time it was very helpful for me to attribute the negative thoughts to something outside myself, so I could do battle with them.  I literally imagined the little devil on my shoulder, whispering into my ear.  Then I could face that little devil down and tell him how wrong his statements were.  If I needed help, I could imagine the little angel on the other shoulder providing reinforcements and telling the devil and his awfulisms to get lost.  It worked.  I could pin the negative messages I was sending myself on that little beast and make room for a more reasonable and healthy voice to take his place.

For the next 20 years I kidded myself into thinking I was paying attention to my inner voice and knew what was going on inside my head.  However, the reality is I stopped hearing it long ago when I stopped doing the real work listening needed.  Our subconscious minds can be very tricky and self sabotaging, and given an inch of free subconscious space they will take a mile and run.  I realize I have been trash-talking myself right into the toilet.

Once again I am definitely starting to see how my inner thoughts have a very direct impact on the quality of my life.  So much so that I have, at times, become almost paranoid to think!  There is so much going on in there, I just don't have the time or energy to do battle like I really need to!  And the problem is, there really is no way to shut your own mind down or walk away from it.  You either muster up the energy for the battle or you let that voice beat you down.

If something bad happens during my day I immediately notice when I have a negative reaction and start to pay attention to my thoughts.  However, sometimes I just don't want to talk myself out of it; we all know that sometimes we relish feeling bad and want to wallow in it a little.  Other times, when I am just not in the mood or too tired (the worst time is when I am lying in bed not sleeping) I feel like it would be easier to just think about nothing than have to do all the work of inserting positive affirmations.  Of course that doesn't work, and then everytime my mind starts up again I get mad at myself and do more trash talking.

The only option is to replace those thoughts by conscious effort with the positive affirmations I need to hear.

One thing is certain: cognitive restructuring my be simple, but it sure isn't easy.  It takes heaps of conscious effort and energy.  It takes total commitment; this isn't something you can do part time and hope that it will work.  It takes a doing battle with the inner voice that has been bringing you down.

How well it works remains to be seen for me.  I know it helped me cure myself of an eating disorder 20 years ago.  Can it really improve the quality of my life now?  Stay tuned.