A
Work Book for Creating
an Effective Thinking Process
By
Michael Hammes, Ph.D.
Copyright
© 2012 Michael Hammes
Smashwords Edition
Smashwords Edition License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1. Lifestyle Assessment
Chapter 2. The Addiction Process
Chapter 3. The Flawed Thinking Process
Chapter 4. Creating an Effective Thinking Process
Lifestyle
Assessment
Suffering or Happiness: Which One Do You Want?
Take a few moments and think about the life experiences that you don’t want!
1. DO YOU WANT TO SPEND ANY PART OF YOUR LIFE IN JAIL OR PRISON?
2. DO YOU WANT TO GET INTO A BAD RELATIONSHIP?
3. DO YOU WANT TO BE HURT BY SOMEONE ELSE OR TO HURT SOMEONE ELSE?
4. DO YOU WANT OTHERS TO MANIPULATE OR EXPLOITE YOU?
5. DO YOU WANT TO GIVE UP YOUR FREEDOM TO SOMEONE ELSE?
6. DO YOU WANT YOUR FRIENDS MAKE BAD CHOICES FOR YOU?
7. DO YOU WANT TO LIVE A LIFE OF EXTREME LONELINESS?
8. DO YOU WANT TO BE DEPENDENT UPON OTHERS FOR YOUR HAPPINESS?
9. DO YOU WANT TO BE POOR?
10. DO YOU WANT TO EXPERIENCE A LIFE THAT’S FULL OF MISERY AND PAIN?
11. DO YOU WANT TO BECOME AN ADDICT?
12. DO YOU WANT TO BECOME MENTALLY OR EMOTIONALLY DISABLED?
13. DO YOU WANT TO DIE YOUNG?
Have you experienced
any of these?
If you have experienced any of these, do you want
to experience them again?
Your answer to the second question was "No." Right? Good choice. The question is: Why do so many people have these life experiences? The answer is: because they have a flawed thinking process that leads to bad decisions. The result is a lot of self-inflicted emotional misery, trouble, and unhappiness for themselves and for loved ones. Not a Good Thing! Right?
Bad decision-making gets you on the wrong path for living!
The main characteristic of being on the wrong path is not to recognize the consequences of bad decisions. Without reforming the decision making process, the only experience will be emotional misery and often additional legal problems. Not a Good Thing! Right?
You must realize that you can create a different path, a healthy lifestyle that allows you to create dreams and a healthy future. That’s right, but only if you learn a new thinking process that allows you to make good decisions. Would you want to learn this?
Identifying what we don’t want to experience will help us determine what we do want to experience and to create a strategy to achieve a fulfilling life. This gets us to the following questions.
•
What is important in life?
• What do you want out of life?
• How do you want to live life?
Are these important
questions?
Do you want bad things to happen?
Let’s look at what we want to experience. The experiences below are possible only if we have an effective thinking process that results in making good decisions.
I want to live a
quality life.
I want to live a long life.
I want to be
healthy.
I want to have loving relationships.
I want to
experience happiness.
I want to experience life satisfaction.
I
want to be at peace with myself.
I want to live a life that has
harmony.
I want to live without drugs.
I want to live without
violence.
Would you agree
that these are the important things in life?
Do you want to be
able to experience the above things?
We all want to experience these things, but our flawed thinking process creates bad decision-making and we never experience these. Not a Good Thing! Right?
THAT'S WHY WE ARE HERE! TO CREATE A THINKING PROCESS THAT WILL RESULT IN GOOD DECISION-MAKING
Describe Your Lifestyle!
Take a few moments
and list the bad decisions you have made.
What were the
consequences of making these bad decisions?
Why did you make
these decisions?
Would you make these decisions again?
How Much Risk Do You Take In Your Life?
Use the scoring system below to provide a score for each question.
Never (1) or Sometimes (2) or Once in Awhile (3) or A lot (4)
Do you take drugs?
Do you misuse alcohol?
Have you done dangerous things?
Do
you belong to a destructive gang?
Do you drive recklessly?
Do
you eat all the wrong foods?
Do you watch too much TV?
Do you
drive and not wear your seat belt?
Have you been violent?
Are
you acting out sexually?
Do you have difficulty in managing
money?
Add up all of the numbers and divide by 11. The number you get should be between 1 and 4. What is the number? The higher the number the more risky you are with your health and life, which means you’re making bad decisions! Not a Good Thing! Right?
What will happen if you continue your risky behavior? The answers include the following:
•
Much suffering
• Becoming an addict
• Ending up in
jail or prison
• Never having a good job
• End up dead
These are caused by
a flawed thinking process!
What grade would you give your self
for making bad decisions?
Not Very Risky (A) A Little Risky (B) Somewhat Risky (C) Very Risky (D)
A low grade indicates that you are making bad choices! Not A Good Thing! Right?
Let’s look at it another way. You’re an accountant and every month you must add up the amount of money you spent. If you have more bills and not enough money to pay them, then you have a problem. The money situation is out of balance because of mismanagement. You must be able to balance your spending in relation to how much money you earn. Think of your behaviors in the same way. If you engage in risky behaviors that compromise your health, then your life is out of balance and the result will be bad consequences. All because of a flawed thinking process.
Your Balance Sheet: Is Your Life Out of Balance?
Another way to examine how you are living your life is through a balance sheet. Create a list of unhealthy behaviors and healthy behaviors that are a part of your life.
How many items are listed under unhealthy and healthy behaviors?
Unhealthy behaviors are about reactive thinking caused by a flawed thinking process and the result is emotional misery. Ideally, you want to have more healthy behaviors because this means you have a good decision-making process and are concerned for your health and future.
Emotional Misery or Happiness: It is a Matter of Making Good Decisions!
What are the consequences of the following behaviors?
•
Drinking alcohol and driving
• Using other drugs
•
Smoking cigarettes
• Chewing smokeless tobacco
• Skipping
school
• Stealing
• Destroying property
• Causing
physical harm to someone
• Watching too much TV
• Not doing
well in school
• Selling drugs
• Unwanted pregnancy
•
Being lazy
• Getting a sexual transmitted disease
• Causing
harm to another
The answer to each of these is a lot of trouble and emotional suffering. Yes, some of these will provide a few moments of instant pleasure. However, this quickly turns to emotional suffering for the victim and for you, which is unhappiness. This can last a lifetime! Is this the future you want?
How does bad decision making impact your life?
What Does All of This Mean?
Many people are unaware they have a flawed thinking process that lacks logic and reason and results in making bad decisions. The motive behind such a thinking process is to experience a few moments of feeling good. Most people live their entire life this way. The life experience becomes a pain reduction process and the everyday experience is emotional misery. To cope we engage in mood altering experiences that often become our addictions. If we don’t change our ways, we will probably become an addict and then become a prisoner to our bad habits. The result is a destructive lifestyle that manufactures much emotional suffering!
Describe why you don’t want to live with a flawed thinking process.
The Addiction Process
Before we examine the process of changing our flawed thinking process, we need to discuss the following concepts.
•
Codependency
• The Addictive Personality
It is important to become familiar with these topics because they affect many people in a negative way and cause much suffering. They set the foundation for our flawed thinking process and destructive lifestyle. Remember the things we don't want to experience! Let’s get started!
Dependency That Becomes Codependency: How It Takes Away Your Life!
Have you ever heard of dependency? It is when you rely on other people, behaviors, or an object to make you feel good, to make you happy, or to make you feel loved. Some dependency is normal, but we are talking about extreme dependency that gets us hooked on pleasure seeking behavior. We do this because we really don't know who we are and we identify ourselves through others, objects or ideas. Our efforts become focused on finding something or someone to validate us because we are unable to validate ourselves. We become attached to things and people as a way to feel good. This over-attachment is known as co-dependency. Think of this as dependency taken to the extreme.
What things are you extremely dependent on?
Once codependency takes control of our lives, we often become like vacuum cleaners gone wild, drawing to themselves not just another person, but also chemicals, usually alcohol and other drugs, or things such as money, food, sex, and gambling or even work. They struggle relentlessly to fill the intense sense of emptiness within themselves (Hemfelt, Minirth & Meier, 1989). In essence, they do not love who they are, and they do not have a positive self-definition. In fact, they are full of self-hatred, confusion, and shame and this gets worse with time. This is Not A Good Thing.
In its broadest sense, codependency is an addiction to people, behaviors, or things. Codependency is the fallacy of trying to control interior feelings by controlling people, things, and events that are all in the physical reality. To the codependent, control or the lack of it is central to every aspect of life (Hemfelt, Minirth, & Meier, 1989).
Furthermore, many of a codependent’s compulsions and addictions, such as alcoholism, drug abuse, and eating disorders, are also life threatening. Rage and physical abuse can endanger the lives of innocents (Hemfelt, Minirth & Meier, 1989). These behaviors create much emotional suffering and are the result of a flawed thinking process. Someone with a good thinking process will not make decisions that cause emotional suffering.
The Ten Traits of a Codependent (Hemfelt, Minirth & Meier, 1989)
1. The codependent is driven by one or more compulsions.
2. The codependent is bound and often tormented by the way things were in the dysfunctional family of origin.
3. The codependent's self-esteem (and frequently, maturity) is very low.
4. A codependent is certain his or her happiness hinges on others.
5. Conversely, a codependent feels inordinately responsible for others.
6. The codependent's relationship with a spouse or significant other is marred by a damaging unstable lack of balance between dependence and independence.
7. The codependent is a master of denial and repression.
8. The codependent worries about things he or she can't change and may well try to change them.
9. A codependent's life is punctuated by extremes.
10. A codependent is constantly looking for the something that is missing or lacking in life.
Do you experience any of these? If so, talk to a professional counselor; they can help you.
Your Life and Codependency!
Codependency becomes worse with time and happiness becomes a fading dream regardless of how the individual attempts to manipulate people and objects. It can even result in death, because our physical health will deteriorate as the immune system becomes severely impacted and because our emotional system is not effectively working, permitting illnesses that would otherwise not be a problem. It can also result in suicide!
Other Characteristics of Codependency (Hemfelt, Minirth & Meier, 1989)
1. Live by denial.
2. Full of anger, most of it is hidden and unsuspected.
3. Get love confused with intensity and romantic feelings.
4. Must manipulate or control others.
5. They have no boundaries.
6. Full of self hate.
7. Always have a feeling of chronic emptiness.
8. They repress their feelings and actually become numb.
9. The emotional pain inside continues to fester and grow.
10. They look for a fix to alleviate the emotional pressure.
11. Tremendous emotional pressure that eventually explodes.
12. Greatest fear is abandonment and rejection.
13. In the advanced stages, a common symptom is relationship addiction. They must have a relationship; the relationship is like a drink is to an alcoholic.
14. In the advanced stages, addictions develop along with compulsive behaviors.
These characteristics represent a destructive lifestyle out of control and the only experience is emotional suffering. Do you want this?
Please realize that we all have some dependencies, however, when we take them to the extreme, they will control our lives and will force us to make bad decisions. It becomes a disease against the self. We actually become dependent upon others for our right to exist. Happiness is sacrificed! This Is A Terrible Way To Live. Right?
The point is that you do not have to. You can choose to participate in counseling if you feel you may be overly dependent on others or on destructive behaviors. Please realize that if you are making bad decisions, you can learn to make good decisions. Don’t let your pride get in the way of getting help.
Why is Co-Dependency Such a Bad Thing?
Do you think you could have some tendencies to be codependent? Guess what? We all have some, but when they begin to dominant our everyday lives we will then have a flawed thinking process that will result in a destructive lifestyle! Take time to examine your habits and if you think you may have dependencies, seriously consider getting professional help!
Now let's examine the addictive personality because codependency gives birth to the addictive personality.
The Addictive Personality: What Is It?
We all have a very strong desire to feel happy, to experience a sense of happiness, fulfillment, and contentment. To experience these desires is to feel the greatest natural high life can offer. However, it is neither normal nor possible to experience this every moment. When it leaves us, we feel sadness and even experience a slight sense of mourning (Nakken, 1996). This is part of the natural process of everyday living, and it is a process we can control, if we can create an effective thinking process.
Addictions can be viewed as an attempt to control uncontrollable processes. This perception of control gives the addict the false feeling they can generate a high by using a substance, or an event to manufacture a mood change. It does generate a high, but it is an artificial high that is short lived. Addiction, on its most basic level, is an attempt to control and fulfill the desire for happiness, peace and fulfillment. Mr. Craig Nakken (1996) goes on to describe other characteristics about the addictive personality.
1. Addiction becomes an attempt to make emotional sense out of life.
2. Addicts believe on an emotional level that they are being fulfilled.
3. Addiction becomes a lifestyle, in which the person loses control of the use of objects and events.
4. Addicts keep delaying life issues as a way of nurturing them self.
5. Addiction is an emotional relationship with an object or event through which addicts try to meet their needs for emotional intimacy.
6. The longer an addictive illness progresses, the less a person feels the ability to have meaningful relationships with others.
7. Addiction makes life very lonely and isolated, which creates more of a need for the addict to act out.
8. The practicing addict comes to trust the addiction process.
9. Addiction is a relationship problem as the object comes first and people second.
10. Addiction is a process of buying into false and empty promises for pain relief, emotional security, fulfillment, and the false sense of intimacy with the world.
Addictions are about fooling yourself, and when you compromise your self-definition (your integrity) by choosing to self medicate, than you are fooling yourself. When we fool ourselves we will become an addict and life becomes filled with emotional misery. Addictions are also death oriented and they may lead to a premature death. Not A Good Thing. Right?
DON'T FOOL YOURSELF BECAUSE YOU BECOME THE FOOL!
Addictions are really symptoms of dependency that have evolved from our family systems during childhood. The depth of the underlying dependency problem is directly related to the severity of the dysfunction of the family. Remember when we discussed codependency? Severe dependency problems will pervade every aspect of our lives because the pain inside of us is stronger and more frightening. Furthermore, it takes stronger defenses to deny that pain, try to hide it from others, and the result is much emotional suffering.
Describe how problems of dependency can affect all aspects of your life.
Key Ingredient of an Addiction: Denial
Denial is the main ingredient that keeps people in the addictive lifestyle. Denial is about lying to oneself, and to others because it keeps one from seeing the pain and suffering they are experiencing and inflicting on others. The individual will see what they want to see because logic and reason are not part of the thinking process.
Here are some examples of the power of denial.
•
I don’t have a problem
• I hurt others…it is not a
problem
• I sell drugs…it is no big deal
• I take
drugs….it is no big deal
• I steal….it is no big deal
•
I can quit anytime......
A person believes this because they live in denial. They do not understand the motive for their actions nor do they see the consequences to themselves and to the victim. This is the power of denial!
Denial keeps us from realizing or understanding the consequences of our decisions.
Identify bad
decisions people like you often make.
Now identify the bad
consequences of the above decisions.
What happens when a person
lives in denial?
Addictions Usually Come In Clusters. Rarely, will a person only have one addiction. If a person is addicted to alcohol, they are probably addicted to cigarettes and maybe pepsi, or coca cola, or gambling or some other behavior. Do you know of someone who quit smoking only to gain 50 pounds? They just switched to a new addiction. Remember, when someone has an addiction, it means all kinds of things are missing in their developmental picture. It means they did not grow up in a nurturing environment, but rather a fearful, unloving environment, which is toxic to our development. Remember living in denial prevents us from ever learning from our mistakes. Denial keeps us from ever feeling better (Friel & Friel, 1988).
EMOTIONAL/PSYCHOLOGICAL SYMPTOMS OF ADULT CHILDREN AND COMMON ADDICTIONS (Friel & Friel, 1988).
Adult children have grown up in an alcoholic family or in an emotionally repressive family, and often have the following symptoms.
•
DEPRESSION
• ANXIETY/PANIC ATTACKS
• SUICIDE OR SUICIDAL
THOUGHTS
• OBSESSIONS AND COMPULSIONS
• CHEMICAL
ADDICTIONS
• LOW SELF ESTEEM
• PERSONALITY DISORDERS
•
PHOBIAS
• HYSTERIA
• SUSPICIOUSNESS
• INTIMACY
PROBLEM
• DIFFICULTY CONCENTRATING
• EXCESSIVE ANGER
•
LOW FRUSTRATION TOLERANCE
• PASSIVE/AGGRESSIVE PERSONALITY
•
EXTREME DEPENDENCY
• INABILITY TO BE INTERDEPENDENT
•
INABILITY TO PLAY OR HAVE FUN
• INABILITY TO BE ASSERTIVE
•
PEOPLE PLEASING
• APPROVAL SEEKING
• IDENTITY CONFUSION
PHYSICAL SYMPTOMS (Friel & Friel, 1988)
•
CHEMICAL DEPENDENCY
• ACCIDENT PRONENESS
• CHRONIC PAIN
SYNDROME
• EATING DISORDERS
• TENSION AND MIGRAINE
HEADACHES
• RESPIRATORY PROBLEMS
• CONSTIPATION/DIARRHEA
•
SLEEP DISORDERS
• MUSCLE TENSION
• JOINT DISORDER
COMMON ADDICTIONS (Friel & Friel, 1988)
•
ALCOHOL || JOGGING
• PRESCRIPTION DRUGS || READING
•
NONPRESCRIPTION DRUGS || SPEED/DANGER
• ILLEGAL DRUGS ||
NICOTINE
• FOOD || CAFFEINE
• TELEVISION || RELATIONSHIPS
•
SEX || POWER
• WORK || SLEEP
• SPENDING GAMBLING
•
STRESS CULTS
Do you know of
anyone who has any of these addictions?
Could you develop any of
these addictions?
What kind of life would you experience if you
developed these addictions?
INDICATORS OF BEING AN ADDICT (Friel & Friel, 1988)
•
PREOCCUPATION WITH THE ADDICTIVE AGENT
• INCREASED TOLERANCE FOR
THE ADDICTIVE AGENT
• LOSS OF CONTROL
• WITHDRAWAL
•
SNEAKING
• DENIAL
• PERSONALITY CHANGES AND MOOD SWINGS
•
BLAMING
• BLACKOUTS
• PHYSICAL SYMPTOMS
• RIGID
ATTITUDES
• LOSS OF PERSONAL VALUES
• DISABILITY AND OR
DEATH
Anyone who has any of these symptoms, but does not admit it, is living in denial and is codependent. Ever hear any of the following? Someone you know has a drug problem and you inform them that they do. They respond by stating:
No I don’t, I can quit anytime.
I know someone who is addicted to alcohol but states: I am not an alcoholic because I only drink beer.
This is called “denial”. This is a flawed thinking process, and eventually the addiction will get worse. They may have many of the indicators listed on the previous page but do not realize it. See how denial works?
SOCIAL/EMOTIONAL FACTORS IN ADDICTIONS
•
Temporary anxiety reduction
• Temporary stress reduction
•
Temporary feelings of power and well being
• Avoidance of true
feelings
• Avoidance of crucial life problems and developmental
tasks
• Avoidance of intimacy
Because of the very nature of the addictive process, these benefits above are not long lasting. After the short-term benefits wear off, the individual is left with tremendous psychological feelings as: guilt, and shame along with feelings of worthlessness, anxiety, frustration, and despair. In essence, it has a harmful impact on one's self-definition. Put simply, these addictive agents serve to quickly and temporarily fill in developmental gaps. Addictions prevent us from ever filing in developmental gaps permanently (Nakken, 1996).
If you are an addict or have destructive behaviors, you can still change by getting help. Don’t hesitate to get help! There are support groups in your community or call the county health office to schedule an out- patient counseling session to get started. It is a matter of life. Take it seriously!
Describe the
process of how an individual becomes an addict.
Why does denial
often lead to an addiction?
Describe how the addiction process can
produce unhappiness.
Summary
The addictive personality is a by-product of codependency. The life of the addict becomes a vicious cycle of pain and a short period of pain relief. However, the pain returns and they must repeat the behavior. Eventually, the person can no longer control their addictive behavior, and the addictive personality takes total control of the individual's thinking process and life. Soon the person's life is on emotional overload and the person will begin to break down. With time they will experience such symptoms as: severe depression and anxiety. Some will even commit suicide. The addictive process will manufacture bad decision making, and the result will be continuous emotional misery and pain.
What do you want to do with your life?
Are you beginning to recognize how a flawed thinking process can result in pain, suffering and addictive behavior? All of which lead to pain and misery that we could live without. Behaviors that become an addiction will destroy your dreams, and make everyday a dreadful experience.
How Healthy Do You Want To Be?
Not Very Healthy || Kind of Healthy || Healthy || Very Healthy
Let's examine the specific components that create a flawed thinking process that cause bad decision-making that compromise our health and potential.
The Flawed Thinking Process
Each day we get up and try to experience less emotional suffering and experience more happiness. Most people experience more emotional suffering because of having to make decisions with a flawed thinking process. The result is a lot of excessive emotional misery, which people manage by using destructive coping behaviors for a mood alteration. The overall result at the end of the day and the end of the week is more emotional suffering and less happiness. Not a Good Way to Live!
The following diagram displays the components that cause a flawed thinking process that manufactures bad decision making that results in emotional misery and unhappiness.
The Flawed Thinking Process
Flawed Self Definition (Integrity) (Dignity) + Flawed Emotional System + Flawed Mindset = Bad Decision Making
Let’s begin with a Flawed Self-Definition: A flawed self-definition is not being able to see yourself as a valuable person. Instead we see ourselves as being flawed and defective, and this is painful. We compare our self to others and always come in last and this is painful. We then become dependent upon others to validate ourselves because we are unable to love our self. In addition, we search for something that will provide a mood alteration because it is painful to have a flawed self-definition. This is why we use drugs, do daring things to get attention, get involved in dangerous gang activity, steal, cheat, miss, and drop out of school, and cause pain to others. These behaviors only add more emotional suffering and also lead to a destructive lifestyle. In essence, you will experience life as an empty experience, and then look for some self-medication, or self-destructive coping behavior to feel alive. This gets us on the path of suffering and this is a long way from happiness. Remember, if we really love our self, we don’t do bad things that create emotional pain and suffering. Living with a flawed self-definition includes the following symptoms.
1. Probably make poor choices.
2. We will do things as stealing, hurting others, destroy property, all to get recognized and feel important.
3. We often select destructive coping behaviors, like taking drugs, stealing, and committing other crimes.
4. We will be less caring, and sensitive to the needs and concerns of others.
5. We will always look for others, or an object, or an event to make us feel happy.
6. We may become people pleasers.
7. We may develop addictive behaviors.
Below is a list of questions that identify some behaviors that are influenced by a flawed self-definition. Do any of these pertain to you?
1. How do you dress?
2. Why do you dress that way?
3. Do you have many tattoos?
4. Why do you have multiple tattoos?
5. Who do you hang around with?
6. Why do you hang around with them?
7. Have you engaged in destructive behaviors?
8. Why have you engaged in destructive behaviors?
9. Do others make your choices for you?
10. Why do others make your choices for you?
11. Do you rely on bad experiences to make you feel better?
These questions will shed some light on the image that you portray and why. Is this the image you want? A good way to think about this is to ask the following questions:
•
Are you doing things to please others?
• Are you doing things
to get approval?
• Are you doing things to get attention?
•
Are you doing things because someone else told you to do it?
If you say "yes" to any of these, the reason may be a flawed self-definition, and because you are dependent upon others to create a false identity or image. Not A Good Thing! Right?
A flawed self-definition also has an influence on how we react to the experience of rejection and failure. Consider the following experiences:
Let’s say you are trying out for the soccer team and you are not very good and get cut from the team or you remain on the team but never play…
Let’s say you are planning to ask someone special out for a date and you get the courage to ask and he or she says no….
You take a test in math but you just don't understand the material and get a bad grade.......
These are examples of failure and rejection and everyone has these experiences and it hurts. Because we have a flawed thinking process we begin to focus on our perceived inadequacies, which are thoughts that include the following:
1. I am not smart enough.
2. Not tall enough.
3. There must be something wrong with me.
4. I am not good looking.
5. I am not good at sports.
6. I am not the right color.
7. No one loves me.
8. No one thinks I am important.
9. No one cares about me.
10. No one likes me.
11. I always fail at what ever I do.
12. I can’t do anything right.
Can you think of an
experience when you had these thoughts?
How often do you
experience any of these?
Never (1) Sometimes (2) Quite Often (3) Very Often (4)
If we constantly have these thoughts we will become what we think! We must STOP thinking these thoughts! This only reinforces our already existing flawed self-definition. In fact, it will make it worse. This reaction to failure and rejection often becomes a learned response that may stay with us through out our life. Not a good thing! When we have a flawed thinking process and experience failure, we often create the following feelings.
Negative Feelings
•
fear and shame
• rage and being afraid
• jealousy and
loneliness
• self pity and being sad
• being inferior and
feeling hurt
• feeling insecure
These reflect suffering and it hurts. How often have you experienced these?
Never (1) Sometimes (2) Quite Often (3) Very Often (4)
Which of the negative feelings above have you experienced most often?
These negative feelings are very powerful, and they often stay with us and produce the following conclusions:
•
A feeling of hopelessness.
• A feeling of self
condemnation.
• A feeling of powerlessness.
• Believing we
are a victim.
• Believing that everyone is against me.
•
Wanting others to make me happy.
How often have you experienced any of these conclusions?
Never (1) Sometimes (2) Quite Often (3) Very Often (4)
This adds up to self inflicted painful feelings about ourselves and we experience this as emotional misery. To cope we search for some behavior that will make us feel better, but we never examine the consequences of our decisions. Often, this leads to more trouble.
The thought process looks like this.
Failure = Perceived Inadequacies = Bad Feelings = Bad Conclusions = Emotional Misery
Remember the discussion about codependency. We may become codependent and then develop an addictive personality.
A flawed thinking process will also reinforce our existing flawed self-definition. Instead of living with self confidence and high expectations, we become consumed with low expectations, and live with a lack of confidence. However, some people become the over achievers because their accomplishments get them noticed, accepted, and provides some degree of validation. Unknowingly, often these accomplishments are attempts to fill their inner emptiness caused by the lack of love from childhood, but this is not possible.
A flawed self-definition will also manifest as having ineffective boundaries. Some will live with fragile boundaries, and have difficulty in saying no because they have an intense need to be validated, and accepted by others because they are unable to love themselves. This often results in being used and manipulated, and anger will be the experienced. Others will have rigid boundaries, and believe they have everything figured out as they have all the answers. They become the self righteous, opinionated, and act as judge and executioner. They see what they want to see and not what is. Anyone who enters this environment will have to give up their control.
A flawed self-definition will also be the cause of character flaws that interfere with our decision-making process. For instance, often our weaknesses are generally strengths overdone. It is wonderful to be trusting, but it becomes a problem when one will trust too much. It is a wonderful to love, but this becomes a problem when one loves too much. These are character flaws that influence our decision-making process that often result in a lot of emotional suffering.