Ten commandments for overcoming SA/SP

[relaxed_attention]

(I read this.)

1. Thou Shalt Not Let the Evaluation of Others Drag Thee Down.
2. Thou Shalt Not Be Perfect.
3. Thou Shalt Learn To Argue With Faulty Logic.
4. Thou Shalt Know Thyself and Appreciate Thy Gifts.
5. Thou Shalt Learn to Relaxxxxx.
6. Thou Shalt Learn the Art of Conversing.
7. Thou Shalt Rehearse, Rehearse, Rehearse.
8. Thou Shalt Expose Thyself (no trenchcoats need apply).
9. Thou Shalt Be Assertive.
10. Thou Shalt Roam the Social Wilderness.

As Eleanor Roosevelt wrote in You Learn by Living (1960), "You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.'...You must do the thing you think you cannot do.

Then, and only then, can you do what Tom Robbins urges in Even Cowgirls Get the Blues: "Be your own master!...Rescue yourself!...And Free the Heart!"

 

[sabbath92001]

Hi relaxed_attention,

Cool list, except commandment number 3 is tricky. In CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy) we learn that we have irrational thoughts and feelings all the time. CBT and your commandment say we should correct these irrational thoughts and feelings. But when I tried that I just kept getting worse. When I learned about ACT (acceptance and commitment therapy), I learned it's better to just notice or even to thank your brain and body for these irrational thoughts and feelings. Boy, what a difference, instead of wasting my time, and getting more anxious by trying to correct my crazy thoughts and feelings, I just observe them.

I like your Eleanor Roosevelt quote too.