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"You don't have to be mad at yourself for that any more"
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"What good does worrying about that part of your past do your current self?"
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"Come on, now. You know that's not true"
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"Don't reply to messages from your ex'
Thanks, I needed that.
I hear these and I’ve had some therapy but I don’t know how to believe the lines and not dwell.
Therapy isn't a single sentence, and we talked over these things for weeks for me to get to this place. It also had to come from me, one thing I talked about is that dwelling on misery/mistakes is, for me anyway, a guilty pleasure and a little addictive, so I had to be truly sick of living that way and genuinely want the change in my heart of hearts.
“You don’t have to be mad at yourself for that any more”
“What good does worrying about that part of your past do your current self?”
For these ones I don't really have control over that. My brain gets itself all worked up before I have any say in the matter.
These are some of the most common problems people seek therapy for, and there are several methods therapists teach to address these, such as meditation and mindfulness. It takes practice, but they have a lot of potential to help with intrusive, snowballing thoughts. You can practice anytime and mostly anywhere, but doing it is the hard part.
Do you happen to have a good source for learning these? I've looked into it in the past but everything I find about meditation and mindfulness is riddled with nonsense that doesn't make any sense to me.
Just a simple example I googled:
- Sit in a quiet, comfortable place.
- Set a short time limit if you’re a beginner (e.g., 5–10 minutes).
- Focus on your breath and notice bodily sensations.
- Gently return your focus to your breath when distractions occur.
With body sensations, you can focus on the taste in your mouth for a minute, then switch to sounds you hear, how your fingertips feel etc. I usually close my eyes to better focus on each sensation. Just relax and gently observe what you experience right now.
One common misconception about meditation is that meditation is and end goal, not a practice. That to meditate is to sit down and have your brain be quiet, and if you can't do that, your session was a failure.
But that's like saying weight lifting is about deadlifting your body weight, and any session you don't manage do that was a failure. That is something you might be able to do after years of training. But you start with the smaller weights, learning form and technique, setting reasonable goals, and find a practice that you can make a habit out of. Because a five minute walk every day beats a day at the gym/retreat once a year.
I agree 100%. It's a shame, because pretty much everyone would benefit from just trying to meditate once in a while.
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