Love, peace and understanding...

[watherby]

Hi,
'social phobia' means that we do not LIKE people, but our aim is to be with them as we feel that we need them. This is funny enough. So what we are actually afraid of? I think I know the answer for that question. It is love and acceptance. If someone 've told me that he/she loves me the first thought that would come up to my mind is "How can that be?! It is impossible!" and the next thoughts would increase my fear, like "What will he/she think when he/she will really get to know me. I am so pathetic". Now. Why can't we accept love? I'll tell for myself: I imagine the 'outside world' as brutal and dangerous place where anyone can judge me, hurt me etc. I imagine myself as black hole, no love. What would happen to me if I would accept love? I would disappear. Isn't it scary?! Now I have myself and in the minute I will be gone. That is unacceptable. The thing I do is feed myself with the possibility of letting go myself and I struggle all the time. I actually believe I can run my world without any love or I live on fear - the fear of this world is smaller than the one of loosing myself. I always want to be above anyone, I can't let anyone in as he would be an enemy on my ground and could destroy me using... love. We are all created from love and for love, yet we cannot accept it as, of course, we know better what is good for us. So called 'social phobia' is no different than anything else in this world, it just depends what you are attached to. Like all people on this planet we are attached to ourselves, we are on our own, we 'do what we want' (suffer and want to own - it may be not clear but it is true).

 

[Psychedelicious]

Socially phobia doesn't mean that we do not like people, although that can be very true. It is mostly just fear of judgements. I don't really understand your post? I am not afraid of love and acceptance, I am afraid of the judgement that comes with it. Of course I want love and acceptance, that is what we long for. I can accept love, it is all I truely want.
Without love and without people what is a person? Not very much. You cannot live your whole life with no emotions or no people ever around. You would be totally flat. Love is good. You're setting it all out like it is some "evil" thing. Not wanting something and not being able to believe something are two very different thing. Just because you don't believe you are loved, does not mean that you don't want to be.

 

[faithnomore]

What you want, and what you actually have are 2 different things.

I want love, i dont have love.

I'm stuck.

 

[watherby]

Socially phobia doesn't mean that we do not like people, although that can be very true. It is mostly just fear of judgements. I don't really understand your post? I am not afraid of love and acceptance, I am afraid of the judgement that comes with it. Of course I want love and acceptance, that is what we long for. I can accept love, it is all I truely want.
Without love and without people what is a person? Not very much. You cannot live your whole life with no emotions or no people ever around. You would be totally flat. Love is good. You're setting it all out like it is some "evil" thing. Not wanting something and not being able to believe something are two very different thing. Just because you don't believe you are loved, does not mean that you don't want to be.

Ok, you want love but you are more afraid of other things (judgment etc.) But it is still your choice. If you want to love you need to let go fear. Why wouldn't you? Because it is uncertain. You are actually afraid of the moment in between - where there is no fear, no love, no ego. You do not believe that you can be loved so you stick with fear. So do I. What is judgment anyway - it is something that can hurt you, why? because you do not accept yourself but there are structures inside yourself that protect you from your own disapproval, but when someone else judges you using the judgments that you actually use towards yourself you cannot hide them from yourself anymore. It hurts. All the things that you do not accept, do not forgive are time bombs that just has to explode. This is how it all works - what you have inside manifests outside as it is YOUR world. And the same thing with me.

 

[Psychedelicious]

I seriously don't understand what you're trying to say. Afraid of what is inbetween? huh? If there is no anything, why would you be afraid of it? And if it was my "choice" persay, then why would it be conflict if I can choose whatever I want? It's not that easy.

 

[watherby]

I seriously don't understand what you're trying to say. Afraid of what is inbetween? huh? If there is no anything, why would you be afraid of it? And if it was my "choice" persay, then why would it be conflict if I can choose whatever I want? It's not that easy.

Please stand in front of a mirror and say: "you are beautiful, I love you, please forgive me, thank you". What do you feel - (before, in the middle, after)?

 

[Walk]

This post reminds me of something I discovered a few months ago.

Even when I felt most isolated from society, from friends, from love... looking back, I was actually pushing away loving people from my life, unknowingly.

I remember guys trying to get me to play sports with them and to hang out with them while I was in high school, and I denied all of them 8O . It didn't happen very often, mind you, but it did happen about 4-5 times during my teens. And I denied them all because I thought "they're not gonna like me anyway" or "they're not gonna like me once they see how lame I am". Or some other useless negative thought that later on seems totally overblown and pathetic.

MAN do I wish I could've had someone tell me then what I know now.....

 

[watherby]

MAN do I wish I could've had someone tell me then what I know now.....

You are still here. It does not matter when you know something - just use it when you get it - it is never too late. We, as people, actually don't know a damn thing. We just pretend that we do. We have to. We have to support our ego even though it is just a tiny piece of real 'ourselves' and living in this ego, we cannot see the big picture and the choice that we have. we can't let it go as is too dangerous for the ego. Ego fears the most that it will disappear.
These words won't change anything. Everything has it's own pace that no one can change. It is good for us - knowing that we do not need to worry - whatever we do we are going to this love that we are afraid of, but which we want so badly.

 

[Psychedelicious]

Please stand in front of a mirror and say: "you are beautiful, I love you, please forgive me, thank you". What do you feel - (before, in the middle, after)?

I just feel ridiculous throughtout the whole thing.

 

[watherby]

Please stand in front of a mirror and say: "you are beautiful, I love you, please forgive me, thank you". What do you feel - (before, in the middle, after)?

I just feel ridiculous throughtout the whole thing.

'Ridiculous' is a word that can hide many things. But if you feel like that It means that you actually do not want to say those words to yourself (waste of time, people do not behave like that , etc.). But the main reason is that you do not believe in those words. I felt like that the first time i did the 'trick with the mirror'. Just think how many times a day you disapprove yourself (not just verbally - energetically) and probably you do believe that you deserve this disapproval.
You are free - you can believe what you want.
Why it is hard to change yourself? There is a risk that from our perspective is unacceptable: The possibility of loosing ego/ yourself, everything. And actually this is going to happen - you cannot change and stay the same at the same time, not if you think you ARE all that, that you want to change.
So what now. We are at the situation. Incapable of believing in love and giving ourselves to it. Why? We think we are. We think we own something and that we can run our worlds on our own. Which is, empirically, false as everyone who thought like that so far died or will die (that means EVERY SINGLE PERSON). We cannot exist without love.
What am I to do now? NOW as I can see and be only in this so called 'now'. I can reverse what I was doing so far. I can start to appreciate myself, start to forgive, allow myself to be happy. That is frightening as I can no more pretend that I am strong or am able to ever be happy on my own. This is the time to believe. Believe in love. Take small steps - believing is sometimes hard, start with 'the mirror trick' for ex. - do it every morning even if you think it does not work. It is, as love just waits for you calmly. You can do what you want, but you will shortly see that all you want is love (you probably already know that). It is waiting.

 

[Marie_knowsbest]

This post reminds me of something I discovered a few months ago.

Even when I felt most isolated from society, from friends, from love... looking back, I was actually pushing away loving people from my life, unknowingly.

I remember guys trying to get me to play sports with them and to hang out with them while I was in high school, and I denied all of them 8O . It didn't happen very often, mind you, but it did happen about 4-5 times during my teens. And I denied them all because I thought "they're not gonna like me anyway" or "they're not gonna like me once they see how lame I am". Or some other useless negative thought that later on seems totally overblown and pathetic.

MAN do I wish I could've had someone tell me then what I know now.....

but you know. alot of people never actualy work that out!! i like weatherbys philosophy, although granted, it is very hard to understand but i think its how your typing it, because ur very general with your words.

The truth is. that although sometimes it feels we have no control over anything in the outside world, we actualy have 50% control of what is going on around us. how we percieve events and how we react to them is our control.

What i find with alot of social phobic people, is although i understand perfectly well what its all about and the reasons why they find every social tasks difficult (although half this site will swear blind that im full of shit lol). what i find with social phobic people is that they dont understand the rule of what u give out comes back in, they also dont understand 'the game' in which all of us as people play, which is the u scratch my back and ill scratch urs game. human beings...are users. people have family. they maybe have a few best friends. but everyone else in convieniant, like people who buddy up at work because then they have someone to walk into town with and buy lunch with, its not something planned, it just goes like that, or atleast thats how it starts. maybe u become close, woteva, maybe ya dont. social phobics generally miss the pleasure of that relationship structure, because they are too busy hoping for more, and because it litteraly is a convienience thing, you end up hurting urselfs.

the what u give out comes back to you rule, is all about people treat u how u treat others. if you dont talk to people, people wont talk to you. period. how many people starting a new job have had people introduce emselfs, saying 'hi r u new?' (bit of chit chat) uve replied yeh.. and social phobia kicks in and you sort of aviod contact..and ur reluctnant to approach them at anytime for similair chit chat? then you find after awhile, people have asked u if ur new etc, but people dont talk to you anymore? its because:

1) if you avoid them, or only aswer back one word answers, ur saying to them i dont want to talk.
2) not initiating chit chat with them tells them you dont want to know more about them, ur not bothered. so they in turn think fair enough. and dont bother either.

this is why social phobia is difficult. becuase its a vicious circle. because although you long for love, your actualy sending out the totally oppisite message, that you dont.

It is so important to work on your self esteem when having social phobia, self esteem helps u to learn what YOU want, rather than what you think yu should want. and then allows you to make convienient relationships and meaningful ones, and know the difference.

i know this is not quite what u were on about weatherby, but i thought i would add to it anyways.

 

[Walk]

Marie_knowsbest, I agree.

It's just that I'm venting my emotions or more specifically, my frustration that I still somewhat hold from my high school/early teen years. Looking back, I did have plenty windows of opportunity. The best thing now is to learn from those mistakes and not repeat them. Make them useful, in a way.

 

[boro]

I see where your coming from Weatherby. Speaking of control, fear i think is not only a mechanism for preventing 'bad things' from happening but also a control mechaninsm - that is if we act on fear and dont speak up for the 50 millionth time we can control our situation, we know what happens when we do this, which is absolutely nothing no embarresment but no friendship either. THen some of us like me will say "well thats not my REAL self, things will be different in a few years time" which stabilises our ego but really stops us from going into the great unknown which is where youll find love. But really its all about ego, if u can let go of that then thats the battle almost won imho.

Now for the mirror thing. Funny, i tried it and i felt a bit like an egotistical wanker but i suppose loving yourself is key as well but i dont know that even if i did love myself id be able to do it sincerely.

 

[watherby]

I see where your coming from Weatherby. Speaking of control, fear i think is not only a mechanism for preventing 'bad things' from happening but also a control mechaninsm - that is if we act on fear and dont speak up for the 50 millionth time we can control our situation, we know what happens when we do this, which is absolutely nothing no embarresment but no friendship either. THen some of us like me will say "well thats not my REAL self, things will be different in a few years time" which stabilises our ego but really stops us from going into the great unknown which is where youll find love. But really its all about ego, if u can let go of that then thats the battle almost won imho.

Now for the mirror thing. Funny, i tried it and i felt a bit like an egotistical wanker but i suppose loving yourself is key as well but i dont know that even if i did love myself id be able to do it sincerely.

Yes! Fear is a mechanism preventing from bad things - through enforced control, what means enclosing yourself in 'known', secure area. But, there is a big gap in this. 'Known' and 'secure' area means that there is no more fear in there, true? Actually, no. Now you are afraid of loosing this area, that means you are afraid of love as it definitely can strip you from this armor and cannot be considered 'secure'. You are stuck between 'what you are' and 'what you want'.

What you are anyway? You are what you think you are - that means you are a free will - you are virtually everything. It does not feel like that, does it? It is because you try to hold on to some part of everything, separate it and call it 'I'. You can do this - you are free. This part will be 'visible' for you as long as you want.

What you want? Love? What does it mean? You are here - artificially separated and suddenly you feel bad - you need something called 'love'? You need someone to tell you that what you have done is OK. You are afraid (for the first time) of, let's call it 'the divine'. As you are not the only one that decided to separate, you expect the other (people) to tell you that 'what you are doing is OK'. No one will tell you that. No one knows what is good or bad - there was no such thing before. But when 'love' touches you, you feel that your 'secure area' is no longer secure. If you are to let the love come in you need to accept the fact that there is no 'secure area', no 'I'. That frightens you - will love destroy me or will love release me from this cage? Is it worth to try it out?

I think free mind cannot exist as separate as it wouldn't be free (It would virtually be free as it can change the way it perceives itself at any given moment, but it wouldn't be free in it's own perception).