The Mythology of Self-Worth (Part 3)
A page in the diary "Accept, Adapt and Appreciate: How?"
Written by nw4m Jul 17 2008 01:29 PM
I Never Do Anything Right (Chp 3,Pg 61)
Understanding the cause of your depression and suicidal thoughts
(summary heading by nw4m)
…Ignorance of rational ways to alleviate one’s emotional pain is not the only handicap we find among depressed and suicidal people. These lost souls often do not even realise what their problem is. They mistakenly think a negative event is the problem. Yet, most of the time, their main problem is that they feel bad.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying these people don’t have vexatious problems to deal with in their lives. What I’m saying is that a person considers suicide mostly because he feels bad, not because something bad has happened in his life.
Suicidal clients often are exasperated by my ‘insensitivity’ when I suggest they’re mistaken about the cause of their depression.
I usually coax them into seeing their confusion by asking, ‘If you were completely happy, would you still want to kill yourself?’ They usually answer, ‘Why no, of course not. Why would I want to kill myself if I were happy?’
Having won this admission, I say something like, ‘You see, your problem is not that your spouse has been unfaithful, your problem is how bad you feel. Furthermore, your extreme anger and depression are the result of focusing on your spouse’s behaviour rather than your view of that behaviour.’
I then go on to say, ‘If you think about this, you will find reason for some optimism. Of course, you can’t change the fact your spouse has cheated on you. You can, however, modify your bad feelings. That’s not to say you can make yourself feel happy about what has happened.
You can’t realistically feel happy about negative events; but you can reduce your anguish and depression to simple sadness – an emotion that won’t cripple your life or lead you to suicide.’
Mary, a clearly depressed client, resisted this claim. She adamantly refused to admit she could change her feelings. She clung fiercely to the idea that only death could end her agony. I agreed with Mary that death would end her suffering.
I said, ‘I have to agree with you – death would end your pain; nonetheless, let’s set that solution aside for the moment. After all, you’ll always have suicide as an option. First, let’s look at some other options. Surely death isn’t the only way a person can ease bad feelings. I tell you what, let’s make a list of actions, including suicide, that you might experiment with. Just for the heck of it, let’s see if we can come up with a list of ten.’
The whole point of the exercise inheres in this question: Where does one place suicide on the list? I ask the client to decide. After a moment’s reflection, a client realises suicide must be put last. If placed in position three, it would obliterate options four to ten.
If an especially distraught client resists the obvious and wants to put suicide in fourth place, I prod him or her by saying something like, Gee what if number five is the method that works for you? Suppose number five is a system that would enable you to overcome your depression and live a relatively happy life?
nw4m: The author then offers the following guidelines for identifying and filtering out harmful exaggerations in one’s self-talk. He then suggests that we go over them, underline all the words that are exaggerations and replace them with more accurate sentences that won’t confuse or upset the emotional part of your brain.
If you feel depressed, look for these kinds of exaggerations:
1. How awful that this happened to me. Life is horribly unfair.
2. I never do anything right. I always screw up.
3. I’ll never have a happy life. Nothing will ever work out for me.
If you feel anxious, look for these kinds of exaggerations:
1. What if X happens? How horrible. I couldn’t stand it.
2. I can’t deal with this. This is killing me.
3. Everything is falling apart in my life.
If you feel angry, look for these kinds of exaggerations:
1. What X did to me was unspeakably horrible.
2. X must be the most ungrateful and vile person alive.
3. X always does that. X never shows me any consideration.