on putting yourself out there and positive thinking

[bhn]

"You need to put yourself out there !" has to be the one piece of advice offered more often than anything else, and it just doesn't work. It may work for a while, like a diet, but in the long run you're likely to come full circle and find yourself right back where you started.

I'm talking here about people with life long issues, that is. Even though, come to think about it, once you've experienced isolation and anxiety, there may be no way to fully erase that and move on.

You may be able to roll with the crowds for a while and it's tempting to believe that those people will be there if anything goes wrong. However, in my experience, and from what i've seen on the forums, that's rather unlikely. You may be friends with someone for quite a while and then something happens, your disposition changes and they're gone.

Self affirmations and forced positive thinking aren't that great a tool either for someone suffering from anything more serious than a mild case of the blues. There was an article somewhere, I believe NYT, called "the power of negative thinking", suggesting that telling yourself how adequate your are over and over might backfire and actually strengthen your subconscious feelings of inadequacies.

On the same note, someone observed that we can't control our mind from the level of ordinary consciousness -we need to move one level up in awareness, and that's pretty much how meditation works.

Any thoughts, experiences..?

 

[MarionBerry]

Self affirmations and forced positive thinking aren't that great a tool either for someone suffering from anything more serious than a mild case of the blues. There was an article somewhere, I believe NYT, called "the power of negative thinking", suggesting that telling yourself how adequate your are over and over might backfire and actually strengthen your subconscious feelings of inadequacies.

I think you're right about this. When I started therapy it was all about self-affirmations, trying to think about shiny happy butterflies, and gradual exposure. It did nothing for me and made me feel worse that my thought patterns weren't changing. After my experiences, I advocate a combination of meds and therapy. It seems to be helping me, at least.

 

[MNM322]

I agree, I get so sick of hearing that! I drives me nuts. I don't initate chats with people much but when I do, it barely goes anywhere... I try... and it doesn't work. When I go out and meet new groups of people and such, and they talk to me first...I am ok talking back to them but again, never really goes anywhere. Its not like putting ourself out there instantly rids us of our annoying thoughts that haunt us in social situations.

Also yes, I have done positive thinking, it helps to a point but then something bad happens in life... and it all goes out the window and I am back to square one. I am willing to bet most of these people who say to do these things, have issues themselves.

 

[Chess]

I think it's good advice, but what it doesn't address (like most platitudes) is the root of the problem: why the person isn't putting themselves out there in the first place. It would be good in conjunction with other things, I guess.

 

[monkeyman]

Interesting thoughts bhn. I agree with you that changing is not easy to do. Especially for people with life long issues. It sounds to me like you have actually made an effort to put yourself out there sometimes and make changes. I think that is great and anyone who does that should be proud of any time that they put themselves out there or face their fears of any kind.

One thing I would add for you to think about is that things aren't always necessarily black and white. Just because a person sometimes ends up having some setbacks or things go really poorly does not mean they have not grown or changed themselves for the positive in some ways. It sucks at those times when things don't go well with friends or someone loses a friend. But it does not mean a person shouldn't continue to try and put themselves out there again, and make a new friend or find a different group or crowd to roll with that is a better fit.

And no matter how great you are at something or how much you want to change you will fail and have setbacks. It's during those setbacks when you have set your goal a little too high or when your goals aren't similar as your friends that you actually learn and have the opportunity to grow the most. To learn how to do something differently or decide what is most important in your life to you. Changing can be hard. But I do believe we can grow and change if we focus on and enjoy the positive improvements we make and brush off the temporary setbacks or times things do not go well.

But I couldn't agree more how difficult it can be sometimes when you try to put yourself out there and people are not friendly or even jerks. Change is one of those things in life that we all resist but I think we have to try and adapt to changes that happen to us and make positive changes we want for ourselves.

 

[coyote]

"We cannot become what we want to be by remaining what we are."

change is difficult

the alternative is to NOT change

do you want to stay the same way forever?