Stop Angry Obsessing; Start Acting Effectively

Cindy was up again at 2 AM, infuriated at her mother and her older sister.  They were so mean and cruel.  What they’d said and done hurt so much.  It was like she was a child again, subjected to their verbal beatings.  The more she thought of what they had done, the angrier she became.  She couldn’t stop her racing mind from obsessing on what they’d said. She linked the episode yesterday afternoon to the thousands of times she’d felt the same pain and frustration.  She wanted to beat them, even kill them, or never see them again.  But they were her family and she thought she couldn’t talk back or leave them.  She felt frustrated and stuck.

As the rage took her over, guilt and shame started growing.  How could she feel that hateful about her family?  Maybe they really were trying to help her?  The more she tried to get back to sleep, the more she jumped back and forth between rage and guilt.  She hadn’t seemed to make any progress in becoming a better, more spiritual person.

Cindy is stuck in “The Emotional Motivation Cycle.” The episode yesterday was like the key that started her emotional motivational engine.  And the more she thought about it, the faster ands hotter the engine went.

This cycle can be triggered by external events like Cindy’s mother and sister attacking her, or by thoughts and memories of previous episodes of harassment, blame or put-downs.  Once triggered the cycle repeats and builds in intensity and speed until we are taken over by it.  At 2 AM, in a half-sleep state we are most vulnerable to simply watching it run, as if on its own, and take over our minds and bodies.

Stages of typical cycles are:

1. Hurt, Pain --> Frustration --> Anger --> Self-Bullying (Blame, shame guilt) --> Frustration -->
2. Fear --> Run, Freeze --> Self-Bullying (Blame, shame guilt) --> Frustration --> Anger, Fear -->

Of course, the crucial question for each of us is, “What are the repeating stages in our cycle?”  We probably know exactly which thoughts, memories and words will follow in which sequence because we’ve done it to ourselves so many times.

Notice the stage in which we indulge in self-bullying: negative self-talk, blame, shame and guilt; loss of confidence and self-esteem; even suicidal thoughts.

What’s the Purpose of the Cycle? The purpose of the cycle is not really to make us feel angry and bad, even though it inevitably does.  The purpose is to motivate ourselves to make effective action.  Feeling is a tool; make us feel bad enough and we’ll finally break out of the iceberg that traps us and do something so they can’t hurt us again.

The purpose might seem to be to change the behavior of the bullies, but I think a better way of thinking about it is that its purpose is to goad us so that we simply won’t have bullies and their harassment, abuse, nastiness and bullying on our “Isle of Song.”

We may or may not be able to change their behavior.  We must accept that they have free will and they may not stop their toxic behavior.  All we can do is have effective consequences for their behavior and not put ourselves in harm’s way.  If they won’t change, we can’t allow them on our Isle of Song.  We won’t accept their control of us even or especially when they’re righteous.  We won’t be slaves, scapegoats or whipping boys/girls.

The major downsides to the Emotional Motivation Cycle method of self-motivation are that:

1. It can make us too depressed to act.  We make ourselves feel like we did when we were children; all our strength, energy, adult wisdom, determination and skill are sucked out of us, and we feel helpless and hopeless again, like we did when we were children.
2. If we wait until we’re enraged, we’ll explode and do something ineffective that we’ll regret.  We’ll go too far and then repeat the cycle with emphasis on the self-flagellation.  Or our oppressors will change the subject and use our over-reaction to attack us on a different front.

Two responses, often championed in self-help literature, do not work:

1. Stop thinking about it.  However, ignoring the insistent call of our spirit is not effective, and who would want it to be?  Our spirit wants us to do something effective; to stop bullying on our Isle of Song.  Nothing less will satisfy our spirit.  Why should we settle for less?
2. Become more spiritual, understanding, forgiving – act like the Golden Rule requires.  The assumption here is that our unconditional love and perfection will convert bullies and they’ll stop abusing us.  Or we’ll get into heaven faster. That’s simply not true for real-world bullies.  Our spirit knows that also; that’s why it won’t stop bringing us back to the problem.

Instead, I recommend:

1. At 2 AM, wake up so we can be mentally, emotionally and spiritually strong, not weak.  Get out of bed, eat a little chocolate, shower if you need and plan what to do to act effectively.
2. Connect with our spirit’s call and pledge to answer it.
3. Connect with our spirit’s strength, courage and determination.
4. Then we can coach that inner voice to help us by giving us the necessary strength, courage and determination, and by helping create an effective plan.

But what if the bullies won’t like us or will think badly of us? Who cares what jerks and sociopaths think – just stop them from abusing and harming us?  We don’t owe toxic parents or relatives anything, even if they fed us when we were children.  Good behavior is the price for admission to our Isle; blood, especially bad blood, doesn’t get them on our Isle.  Maybe we can even measure our success by how unhappy they are?

Often, the desire to protect our children from obvious, blatant rotten behavior motivates us to break the cycle and stop the abuse.

We can train ourselves to respond to our spirit when the situation is merely an irritation or frustration.  We can develop good habits that function naturally, automatically, easily.  The more we start listening to our inner voice, the more we’ll respond effectively in the moment of an assault or at the first self-hating thought.

You’ll find many examples of these responses in “How to Stop Bullies in Their Tracks,” available fastest from this web site.

Since all tactics depend on the situation, expert coaching by phone or Skype helps.  We can design a plan that fits you and your situation.  And build your will and skill to carry it out effectively.

Self-Bullying Perfectionism Can Ruin Your Life

Self-bullying perfectionism can suck the joy out of success and ruin our lives.  It’s one of the worst forms of negative self-talk. We know that harassing, abusive, inner voice that focuses only on what we didn’t do perfectly according to some old standard that was shoved down our throats when we were children.  It has the most horrible, bullying tone when it picks on our emotions, spirit and flesh.  It’s all-or-none when it reminds us of the 1% we didn’t do perfectly according to our parents’ standards for us.  It’s full of should ‘a, could ‘a, would ‘a.

It makes us 100% responsible for every problem; it points out how we never do enough, give enough, say enough.  It’s demeaning, smug and sarcastic.  It stacks up every mistake we ever made or failure we ever had.  Of course it knows every hot button and self-hatred trigger we have.  It can generate blame, shame and guilt in an instant.

The effects of perfectionistic self-flagellation are obvious – increased anxiety, stress and depression; a sense of failure even in the midst of success and happiness; a foreboding about the future that leads to desperation and panic; insecurity, self-doubt, lack of confidence and low self-esteem.  Especially debilitating is the internal argument with the side that puts us down relentlessly and the side that tries to defend us – usually weaker and defensive, especially when we’re tired or getting sick or alone and lonely.

Perfectionism guarantees inner emptiness, pain and self-loathing.  No matter how much we succeed, no matter how much we’re praised, it’s never enough to heal our inner wounds.  That inner voice always reminds us that we’re imposters, failures who’ll be unmasked eventually.  We’re like hamsters spinning our wheels; afraid that if we slow down, disaster awaits losers like us.

Nit-picking perfectionism turned outward can help us succeed by harassment, bullying and abuse of others.  But turned inward, it’s an incapacitating method of judging our self-worth.

Whether people in our childhoods were simply mean, nasty and rotten; whether they thought they had to protect us from the character flaws they saw in us; whether that was the only way they knew how to express love and caring, or how to motivate us doesn’t matter much now that we’re adults.

Once we’ve overcome the internal war over perfectionism and how to motivate ourselves, we can decide what we think about them and how we want to interact with them now, if at all.  We set the standards of acceptable behavior and how people talk with each other – about what and when.  We’re in charge of our adult personal spaces.

The real work is not about forgiveness; it’s about taking charge of our lives according to our own standards.

Those relentless, childhood put-downs and bullying by our parents, siblings, classmates or other people led us to split into two warring sides.  One side took on the perfectionistic, self-bully voice; we continue beating ourselves down long after we’ve left those people or even after they’re dead.  The other side argued and defended us against the attacks.  It champions our success and tries to affirm our strength and a wonderful future that’s possible.  It often asserted itself by making us mutiny against what those tormentors told us to do; whether that’s really good for us or not.

In my experience, there are many paths to overcome self-bullying perfectionism, but they all lead to a similar goal.  The goal is to heal the wound of the original split, end the war and create one centered, adult part that coaches us to choose the future we want to create and to pursue it with determination, courage, perseverance and grit.

When we accomplish this, our paths open up.  Our internal self-talk stops being negative and becomes encouraging and strengthening.  We develop realistic goals and expectations.  We motivate ourselves by desire for the future we want instead of by avoiding the pain of old wounds lacerated.  We decide what’s good enough.  We and can enjoy our success and happiness.