Walking home today, hungover from the Gooey xmas meetup last night, I’ve felt dreadful the whole day. It started to get really difficult about halfway home, I guess my meds had run out (I’d only brought with me the ones with the sudden cut-off).
I was on my road, after climbing the gradually inclining hill, finally on the straight path and near my house.
I’d been in my head, deeply and darkly, for a little bit. And I’d just had that pesky thought flash that asks, what are your worse memories? — and so opens the gates of self-loathing, disgust, and judgment. Pictures of things I’d much rather forget.
Coupling that was a closed loop of criticising myself, fishing through my memories of the night before for ways I fucked up, looking for something to hate myself over.
This was especially difficult to witness happening, considering, from my explorations into memories, I’ve recently had first-hand experience of how the memories you revisit most are the ones you get to keep.
And then, suddenly, I remembered that actually:
- I quite like who I am; and
- I don’t need to be internally berating myself
That thought triggered a huge mental shift, covering the entire web of both my active and subconscious thoughts.
Refreshed
It was as though a light switch had just been flicked, and the room I was standing in wasn’t dark and filled with spiky unavoidable objects anymore. Instead, my room was now peaceful, balanced, spacious, and illuminated.
My posture changed, my back straightening and my gait gaining an air of self-confidence that almost masked my hangover.
But most interestingly, this mental refresh purged the old thoughts entirely, they had lost all of their allure. I wasn’t interested in re-hashing & re-enforcing internal negativity, it was boring now, it felt fruitless. And besides, in my new mood, the things I was judging myself so harshly over didn’t seem bad at all. So those poisonous thoughts just evaporated.
And I can remember other times, in similar self-defeating mindsets, when I’ve done this very same thing: reminded myself I didn’t actually need to be in such an anxious state.
And therein lies the current insight: It’s a manual process. When you catch sight of yourself in one of those darker moods, you have to make a conscious effort to shift your self-perception.
But it also makes sense that the negative moods happen subconsciously. I’ve spent so many years cementing that action, where I basically call myself an idiot or a failure, and look for ways to confirm it.
And I’ve had far too many people push me into that state too, telling me that I’m worthless and deserve to feel like a bad person, reinforcing this action of negative self-talk.
[everyone is influenced to dislike themselves, e.g., advertising]
The culmination of all this is that, looking back honestly, I have dedicated hours, days, weeks to validating the idea that I should hate myself.
Conclusion
Thoughts lead to actions; actions become habits; habits become part of your identity.
If you berate yourself often, then eventually it becomes habitual, and who you are becomes a person who berates themselves.
Maybe it’s time to break that pattern.
Maybe it’s time to do something new.
Maybe it’s time to accept yourself.