I have this thing
sometimes, where I assume the worst will happen, even if it is less
likely to occur than something positive. This might classify me as
being a negative person. Contrary to the charges, I actually believe
myself to be a positive person, even in the face of unwavering
impossibility. Why is that you ask? Well let me explain.
I believe, deep down,
and I think as a desperate response to the condition of human
awareness, that everything will ultimately turn out all right. Even
if it didn't turn out as expected, we can persevere through our new
found realities and find a way to make it all worth while. Why would
we bother doing all that? Because well, what else are we going to
do? Get angry, get an ulcer, get cancer, and die in excruciating
horrible pain? NO WAY, that would be terrible.
Of course that's
pretty easy to say. It has occurred to me that there might be a
reason for why I always jump to the most negative scenario,
especially when faced with a particularly stressful or anger-inducing
circumstance where my ability to find a less catastrophic range of
possibilities has been compromised.
For one thing, I live
in America.
Well all right there's
more to that statement. I live in America, which is a christian
nation for the most part. And that's fine, I'm not here to attack
anybody, I would just like to point out the psychological phenomenon
that goes along with being raised christian in a christian nation.
This is that, as a wee little one who doesn't inherently know right
from wrong, good or evil, we learn about this old man in the sky who
is watching everything we do and think to judge whether we deserve
eternal hellfire or a big'ol spiritual hug.
I want to clarify that
this is a lesson and a culture that develops an emphasis on judgment
of your goodness, directly concerning you, and not the collective
community. Therefore, God is watching YOU. God is concerned about
YOU. Do YOU legitimately belong in this church? Are YOU worthy of
receiving God's grace? That's an awful lot of emphasis on YOU. If
you're interested in the alternative cultural or spiritual outlook,
look into a region called Asia.
So anyway.
Now I grew up in one
of the original thirteen colonies, and so in addition to living in
the United States, I also absorbed much of the
Puritan/Quaker/Mennonite kinds of ideologies which remain prevalent in
the area today. I always thought of it as a very closed,
tight-lipped sort of culture, where everyone is delicately
maneuvering around their various embarrassments, lest they be judged
by their neighbors or by God. This is opposed to say, the wild west
where everyone has a gun and loves shooting everything they see, even
if it's not moving. Well you know, you've got to make sure it's
dead.
All of this ultimately
shaped my personality of course. Since I was so special to deserve
such intense scrutiny from my God and my community, I took it to be
fairly universal. EVERYONE was ALWAYS looking at me, judging me, and
I'm the kind of person that really doesn't appreciate that sort of
attention and so from early on I began to neurotically analyze my
every move and thought lest I be judged. For example, I became a
terrible student. I couldn't ever just straight up test my
knowledge. I had to freak out about what would happen if I did
poorly, or even mediocre, which essentially thrust a tranquilizer
into my brain and I did even worse than I feared I would
do.
I can't place blame
solely on my culture though. I think a lot of it comes from
what you choose to surround yourself with too. The kinds of people
you talk to, or what you talk about,
the things you're drawn
to for entertainment or what you peripherally absorb day to day,
or what you choose to fret
about, though it may be beyond your control.
As we grow up, there
are things we learn that work for us and things that don't, and
that's really what continues to shape us into adulthood. You don't
want to get stuck blaming your lack of forward momentum on excuses
from the past. Those things are OVER! Thank god, right? The
present is the time to see what's here and what's on its way to you now, every day.
So I've grown up to be
very skilled at expecting the worst (which by the way requires a lot
of imagination which enhances cognitive function so it's not all
bad.) And I've found that this tends to make my life miserable on
certain occasions, like when I'm trying to act like an adult.
Particularly if I'm nervous about having to do something, the worst
case scenarios get out of control and I'm nearly crippled with
terror.
So I've implemented a
new game for myself. It's very simple, and it goes like this:
If you insist on going
down that road of all the virulent possibilities, then you have to
come back in the opposite direction. All the WAY in the opposite
direction. So, the more negative the scenario, the more positive the
other direction has to go. Likewise the more improbable the
negative, the more improbable the positive. Or, if you really see no
positive outcome, then there isn't a negative outcome either! It's a
game of imagination and probability and will grow your brain nice and
big.
Here's a pretty common
scenario. You need to give a public speech, be it for your job,
class, product promotion, whatever. You arrive appearing like this:
but are suddenly struck
with fear and doubt,
and perhaps imagine
this will happen:
So, either it does, and
you lose your job, your chance at a promotion, a grade, respect of
your comrades......
Well see that's no
good. So let's start over.
You're preparing to
give a speech and you're a
and despite your
nervousness, you are strong enough to muscle through it and shine.
And they're blown away!
They love you, they're so impressed! You got a job offer! You got
promoted! You got a book deal! Who knows! Holy cow!
Sometimes though,
you're just in a funk, and you're afraid just to be afraid. You
brain is bored, or you're feeling ultimately hopeless or whatever
self-destructive concoction your mind has come up with. This is when
you get the plague of what-ifs that begin to prevent you from doing
the things you want to do.
For example, you think,
“I'd like to go take a walk in the forest by myself and get some me
time and clear my thoughts BUT WHAT IF A MOUNTAIN LION ATTACKS ME and
rips out my throat and eats my intestines while I lie there watching
him and I defecate all over myself and then that's how they will find
me and that will be my legacy, that's how I'll be remembered because
I died in a horrible way.”
By the way, worrying
about everything causes the body to self-destruct, which is another
horrible way to die.
I mean in the clinical
sense.
But what-ifs can have
great outcomes too! What if you went for a walk in the forest
to have some you time and clear your thoughts but found that you
weren't alone at all? You encounter a family of mountain lions and
because of your innate sense with animals you can communicate with
them that you're friendly and they're friendly, and they invite you
over for some nice dead rabbit. You become great friends, you're the
godfather of their little mewling and send money when he has school
fundraisers, and visit over the holidays, and come out for their
community mountain lion barn raisings! …..I wonder what that
entails in mountain lion terms exactly.....
What if you're always
afraid of flying because you think there's a very real possibility
that the plane will crash? What if it's going down and you can't get
to the exit and you're burning alive and the prominent sound is the
desperate screams of the passengers and you lose your phone so in the
last precious few seconds of your life, which you would have used to
call your beloved to tell them that you love them, instead that
opportunity is robbed of you and you will die alone and in pain.
But what if you get on
the plane, even if you are afraid that it may crash, and by pure
coincidence you're seated next to your greatest living idol? The two
of you get to talking and you really hit it off. They are totally
intrigued by your personality and skills and invite you to work with
them on a project. You gain unseen success in your field, thanks to
their advice and your hard earned talents and devotion towards achievement. You become close friends and spend Christmases together, you
call each other for child rearing advice, and are life long
companions who reach the highest tier of your abilities and dreams.
Your life is made and after a long, successful, and happy life, you
die feeling fulfilled and accomplished.
They say that you're
defined by what you do, not what you think. Perhaps some of it comes
down to what you think, or maybe that's where it starts.
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