Judy2

i'm incredibly terrified of my own Depth, and my own Greatness.

i still believe it's true that my personal experience with dissociative states speaks to an awareness that all these psychological troubles relate to much deeper, more existential, metaphysical dimensions. and i think psychologists and therapists are not aware of this depth and literally don't believe me. i think they themselves are not aware of the degree to which dissociative states are structurally existential. the doctors i have worked with this year, at least, were very superficial in their psychological, and perhaps physiological contextualisation of these states. they are unaware of the real depth and the real significance, they are unaware that dissociative states introduce and shed light on a whole different dimension that transcends the purely psychological, revealing more existential structures and facets of the self and of experience. *i think for other people undergoing psychological healing, the same existential dimensions need to be active, too, for insights and shifts to occur. it's full BEING, full EXISTENCE, not just one-dimensional psychology. i assume that that's actively at play in other people undergoing psychological change, too. it almost has to be. All the same Being, all the same radical Aliveness. RADICAL. so i'm not special in that by any means. what might be unique about my journey is that i am approaching or underoing these shifts while having a more explicit metaphysical understanding (at least seemingly, at the level of thought-based constructs) than what i assume the average person does. not to sound egotistical, but i know that most people don't get all existential about their mental health - not as explicitly as i do (they might feel it, but probably not think it/notice it)....not sure if i'm making sense here or if it's understandable what i mean. and it's not to say i'm special or anything, i just know that my approach to mental illness and my journey of recovering from mental illness is quite unique. it always gets very messy when the metaphysical and the psychological intermingle and intersect. don't know if anyone understands what i'm trying to say here, but i suppose that's okay.

had a bit of a weird moment just now when i very briefly considered letting that other part of me speak up for a second. the part of me that wants to live, and that's been here all along, the part of me that does not doubt my permission to exist or eat or be or feel or heal. i considered briefly that that's the true me, and the other me was just a fake front and could easily be eradicated. i got a bit confused then, about who i am, if i am not the me that hates myself. then it scared me so much and it seemed like such a trippy change in perspectives that i dissociated for a few seconds and things got awkward. it turned existential again. real existential, experiential - not just psychological. only for a few seconds though...but i haven't had this happen to me in a bit (couple of weeks). very scary. very, very scary world indeed.

Body image i like the natural colour of my hair and the way it contrasts with, but also compliments my skin tone.

When I'm stressed about something, it feels as though my life literally depends on it. Forgetting about it and focussing on something else isn't so easy. But yeah, other than that, what you are saying makes sense:)

In the past two months, I have done extensive research into my topic - probably more than enough, and I could technically start writing now. I have already taken a good 200, maybe 300 pages worth of notes, and the end goal should be 40-50 pages....a coherently formulated 40-50 pages though, which is the main problem right now. There's just so much and I don't know how to organise my ideas or structure them. I've tried to come up with themed chapters and stuff like that, but overall it's still so much and I don't know if I can fit all the things I want to or should say into that structure. Technically, there is no right or wrong and there are literally infinite "right" ways to complete this task....but at the same time, I doubt whether the chapter headings I have selected can properly fit all the things I need to say, and if I say things in the right order.....and there are endless ways to do this, endless ways to arrange specific quotes in different orders...I can spend hours dragging bits of text up or down, but it's not like that would get me anywhere. For some reason, I find it really difficult to write in a structured way about a subject matter that could be analysed from a billion different angles, and there's also a hermeneutics so it does matter what I say first and what next, but in my head it's all a mess and this is so overwhelming.... and the problem is I understand what I want to say, I understand what the academic sources say on the topic (for the most part), but I just can't narrow things down enough to write a coherent essay that explains things in a linear order, because my understanding of the topic is so broad at this point that I see it from so many different angles. If I just write in a new document from scratch, that usually just gives me an extra twenty pages worth of notes that I will then have to copy and integrate into my long document, where I am repeating a lot of things unnecessarily. I have no idea how to solve this or how to make actual progress with the writing process. Another related aspect I am struggling with is the communication with my supervising professor. She is generally kind and open to any questions I have, but I feel like I am being annoying. I am also not sure how open I can be with her about the genuine psychological struggles that writing my thesis entails for me....you might say that writing a thesis is scary for everyone, but I think for me it's probably top-notch and enmeshed with an anxiety disorder and so on. I am not sure how to explain my insecurity surrounding the writing process without making her think I want special treatment or I am exaggerating....maybe I don't even have to explain this, but considering that I am weirdly insecure and making this a lot more complicated for myself than it needs to be, I feel like maybe it could help to talk to her about this. I would really appreciate your advice.

...felt hopeful this morning, but i am still struggling a bit and feeling scared and overall unsteady.

@Adrian colbythank you:)

@UlaxHey:) the phrases look really useful, i might even print out some of them and put them up on my wall for inspiration:) thank you so much! and i don't have a deadline yet, so it's all good

For someone who has been struggling with functional emotional regulation - are there any practical first steps that you can recommend taking, other than building basic emotional awareness and learning to label emotions as they pop up?

Thoughts on Chronic Shame it hasn't been much of an explicit concern of mine these past few weeks - there wasn't even much of a sense of a dilemma or a sense of needing to make a difficult decision regarding this particular issue, my focus was elsewhere - but i suppose it has been working in the background, and this morning it sort of popped up to the surface and has become explicit: i think i am ready to drop that whole discourse of me needing or wanting to be ashamed of myself, having to hide, having to apologise for my existence, my personality, my body. in 10 years, this has never led anywhere, has never led where i had hoped it would. so i'll just drop it now. i'm sure there'll be moments when i'll have some difficulty putting this into practice, but the shift in my general attitude is there now? i think? i don't know, i'm scared. but i suppose this is the only way.

@CARDOZZOyeah:)

@CARDOZZOBachelor's degree lol

Hi:) quick update. i spoke with my professor yesterday. she was really nice and encouraging and told me that it sounds like i've thought things through very thoroughly. my thesis claim stands (thank God!), but now i'm left with the task of deciding on a structure and it's creating a lot of anxiety and rumination. i could either go Intro Novel 1 - theme a - theme b - theme c Novel 2 - theme a - theme b - theme c Conclusion Or Intro Theme A - Novel 1 - Novel 2 Theme B - Novel 1 - Novel 2 Theme C - Novel 1 - Novel 2 Conclusion ....roughly like that. i don't like how i'm supposed to make a decision here, especially because there isn't a right or wrong way to do this. my brain would like it very much if i could figure out that one way of structuring my text is "wrong" and the other is "right" and all i have to do is figure out which is which. but that's not the case...they could both work out just fine...so i could just pick either...but i can't because i'm still anxious and overthinking this to the t.

so for example a thing that can cause me stress or anxiety is when my neighbours are being too noisy to the degree that i can't have peace and quiet in my apartment. i think it's not as simple as saying "okay so just stop creating the anxiety for yourself" ...is it? the part of me (me as God) that is creating all that external noise won't leave me alone, either. i can't just will it to do so. if i could i would do so instantaneously. ... not trying to debunk this at all, just trying to understand it or experience this with the help of an example:)

so am i the one "doing" my emotions? or is it like my emotions are happening to me and i can't control them? i thought it was the latter and i just have to learn to accept that, maybe work on changing my thoughts/focus/bodily reaction/actions as to tone down the intensity of the emotion. that is quite the paradigm shift for me, but it sounds like it's the kind of thing i should try and inquire into. knowing and understanding this won't necessarily eliminate all anxiety though, will it?

@Leo Gura Hi Leo:) thanks for the new episode! if you don't mind, i have got a question. it's nothing exclusive to this episode, but there've also been many instances in the past in which you referred to your hands as a spiritual anchor, and that looking at your hands can help you get in touch with a God-realised state. i have sort of experienced the spiritual power of this practice myself, but on top of that, i also have experienced an additional context that makes me conflicted or confused about this practice. now, the thing i find curious about this is that medical professionals list "your hands looking strange/foreign" as a central criterion for depersonalisation and dissociation. i was taught that this type of thing usually happens as a survival mechanism in moments of intense stress (like a plane crash, for example). i myself have experienced dissociation in the form of depersonalisation and derealisation, with one side-effect being that my hands look really strange to me (or my face looking weird in the mirror), and have perceived it as both spiritual and also as stressful and scary to the point that i had a panic attack. i have also seen another woman dissociate to the point that she was in a spasm on the ground, which looked sort of like an epileptic shock. generally speaking, medical professionals in the psychiatric field warn of dissociation as it can become a bad habit. they say that once that door is opened, it can happen all the time as a dysfunctional coping mechanism that blocks access to emotions, and conceive of it as "problem behaviour" that can inhibit therapy. it can also go hand in hand with a sense of overwhelment, emotional repression, and infantile regression, of not wanting to take responsibility...so almost the opposite of what true spirituality is about. i myself do have a slightly more nuanced perspective on this, as i also know about spirituality and moments of ego death where the sense of the separate self is dissolved. so it's confusing to say why something so negative (a stress reaction and abdication of responsibility...the ego going into hiding out of a sense of sheer overwhelment) and something so positive (realising God and Truth) both make it so that the hands look that foreign and strange, if not to say "estranged". whichever direction you take this in (i think both are legitimate), i find it curious that it's the hands that hold such power as an anchor. i wonder if you have a theory on why that is.

5 years ago, when i was in a somewhat similar situation of needing to weight-restore (albeit from a much lower weight), it resulted in me becoming really big and ugly, and then that resulted in five years of self-hatred, self-isolation, hiding my body, being unable to go outside, being unable to visit my hometown, staying in all day long and only being able to go outside with long clothes on, or really late in the evenings when the streets were empty. it involved a lot of suffering and self-hatred and isn't something i want to relive. so it makes absolute sense that i am scared now. ...wrote an email to another local counselling service specialised in eating disorders...because i really am scared and worried, specifically because my hunger cues are so messed up and i don't know where it will take me if i acknowledge them. i'm at a healthy BMI, i shouldn't be this hungry. it absolutely terrifies me.

i'm really scared that i'll never stop gaining weight, and that i'll soon be really fat and ugly and i'll have to hate myself. i don't trust my body, and i guess my body doesn't trust me either. it's telling me i'm hungry at really odd times - i don't understand this and i am incredibly scared.

i think healthy routines ultimately save a lot of time, energy, and will-power. once they're set up, you no longer have to spend so much energy on second-guessing yourself, questioning, overthinking, or making decisions all the time, and it frees up a lot of mental space to focus on important or new things that are coming up. which is why i am trying to set up as many healthy routines as i possibly can right now (although i am trying not to overdo it, either, as that is a trap in and of itself).

it's kind of creepy to think about how much of an open system a body is. not separate. fully enmeshed with its environment. stuff goes in and out all the time, and the body morphs and changes. noise goes in, ideas go in... none of that really is "myself" or "my own", when it's all equally owned by the environments that have shaped and created me. at the same time, i know it's a huge pattern for me to hate this fact, to hate how susceptible i am to external stimuli (noise, emotional interpersonal dynamics)...they cut right through me, every time. and then i wish to cope with that either by restricting the consumption of food that i can control, or by literally cutting my own skin to visualise what is happening all the time anyway, but no one sees it. i feel so vulnerable. and vulnerability is just fact, there's really nothing i can do about it. it's natural that, if i'm a part of this world, i have to interact with it. but something about it seems so horrible and i want to withdraw and run away and hide and find a safe place, but there is no safe place, absolutely nowhere... and they keep cutting through me. so funnily enough, me being infinitely vulnerable, not separate,... is fact, either way. systemically speaking. but then the system itself has created the me that now really wants to be separate and really despises the factual vulnerability here, tries to control what goes in and out, tries so, so hard to clearly delineate her boundaries when in fact she can't, because she has no boundaries...now that's a bit strangeloopy. i wish i had boundaries.

right now it seems like an impossible task to achieve a healthy relationship with food. the balance between making my body and mind think i'm restricting vs overeating (just to know that i don't have to be restricting anymore?) is quite delicate...and whenever there is such delicate of a balance between two extremes that needs to be achieved, i wonder if someone as unstable and unsteady as myself is even capable of that. ...so i'm kinda worried where things will take me, if there'll inevitably always be either a "too little" or "too much" for me...if it's even possible for me to strike the right balance. i don't know. i'm trying my best to work on it at the moment. especially since the same emotional triggers that would typically lead me to undereat (conflict, noise, feeling misunderstood, feeling inferior/ugly,...) are still around, and i don't quite know how to deal with them.

that's good to hear:) i think it's totally fine that this sort of thing is work in progress, and there can be ongoing improvements.

Clothes i enjoy wearing dresses i want to feel comfortable wearing a swimsuit or a bikini i want to feel comfortable walking around in gym shorts and a sports bra i am sensitive to the colours that i am wearing wearing a nice outfit can have a very uplifting effect on my mood Creating a healthy sense of self ...reflecting on the above made me think: Creating a healthy sense of self might be related to asking questions like: what do i enjoy doing? what feels good? how do i feel? with borderline personality disorder, a huge struggle is that we are not able to access our emotions so easily. for me, this takes on the form of not knowing how i feel (unless i feel fear - which makes it sort of easy, so maybe that's why i feel so much fear - because at least i know what it is that i feel then...), or asking myself how i "should" feel. i was told that regaining access to emotions also helps re-build a sense of self, if that makes sense. Creating a healthy sense of self-esteem or self-worth ...that's the other thing i have been reflecting on. almost started a thread asking about this. for me it's not only a question in the field of mental health, but even more so a spiritual quest, trying to figure out what constitutes self-worth. what is a good source of self-worth? what should be the source of my self-esteem, if apparently it's not good for it to be my appearance, or my academic performance, and so on. i figured that maybe it's less about the source of self-esteem, and more about the how, about distributing your sense of self and self-worth across different pillars, such that if one collapses, the others still stand? such that there's more of an attitude of detachment (composure, serenity), even as you build your self-esteem around certain things. ... not sure. maybe i will still make a post asking about this. or maybe i'll keep figuring this out by myself. Today had a successful conversation with a counsellor at university and it looks like someone will be there to support me in the weeks to come - which is a huge relief pushed myself and worked on my thesis (proud of me!) went for a walk in flip-flops and a flowy dress, which felt nice had my hair up in a ponytail with a fluffy white ribbon, which felt nice. my hair has reached just the right length for that type of hairstyle now. before, it was either too long and heavy, or too short. made sure to be a little more aware of my tummy throughout the day, as to alleviate digestive discomfort.

i actually managed to get back into working on my BA thesis today. almost did a solid 3 hours??? ("good job" to myself!) anyway, my realistic goal for the week is 2 hours a day of focussed, undistracted work to get back into thinking about my topic, organising my sources, and so on... these past few weeks i have noticed that there have been way too many things going on all at once, so i'm trying to reduce that a bit now. otherwise, my brain has a hard time focussing and settling with the specific topics i should prioritise for now. for this reason, i suppose it would make sense to post a little less on here, at least in the weeks to come - unless of course i feel like i need some help tackling a specific issue or question, or feel a desire to note down and share insights/progress/struggles...you know the drill by now:)