Thank you
@Kobranek for your thoughtful reply.
Self destructive ways are rooted in fear while self love transcends fear.
I think this is true in many ways for myself personally. I was conditioned through fear and as a result apply some of the same frameworks on myself that perpetuate it. I think that another root of being self-destructive may also be conditioning, and yet another is just being geared towards self-destructive things. I don't necessarily think that someone who rides their motorcycle extremely fast, or that does something really dangerous like base-jumping or free diving are necessarily self-destructive. Some of these people find a thrill in the rush, and for some, the rush comes from risking their life. It's kind of like they move into their fear of the dangerous thing and they end up moving towards something self-destructive out of self-love and passion.
Becoming comfortable with being vulnerable and seeing it as a strength and not a weakness.
I sometimes wonder if I've lost some strength with this. I may just be in a new point in my process that entails me keeping more to myself as I've figured out a lot and am aware of some of the work I need to do.
Seeing past toxicity in whatever form through compassion and empathy. I personally despise toxic positivity because of the need to shut uncomfortable feelings out which usually manifests in other ways. Surrounding myself with good company is hard to come by these days since everyone is stressed out and hard to be present. I am affected by their vibes but try and use the ones who really trigger me as an opportunity to learn more about myself. Why does that particular person really get to me.
Have you heard of the book Spiritual Bypassing? It brings up themes related to your statement. People will feign positivity in order to avoid or bypass negative emotions which, regardless of the scope of emotions one is able to feel, need to be processed for us to live as whole connected beings. This actually also applies to what the author calls blind compassion. Sometimes one needs to put their foot down. I've found it hard to connect as well. Aside from, yet connected to, what I've stated in this thread about what I deal with, I'm a deep thinker almost all the time, and I feel bad, but I'm also easily bored (as mentioned), and tend to get bored in a lot of discourse.
When things start to feel off I evaluate whether I'm really taking good care of myself through the big three: diet, sleep, and exercise in that order. My body and mind can only function sustainably with starting off with a good breakfast. My power breakfast of choice is 2 hard boiled eggs, a pack of plain oatmeal, a yogurt, and snacking on fruit in the morning. Then progressing to a hearty lunch and dinner. I gauge when I start to get hungry and will snack as needed in between meals. Trying to get a good 6-8 hours of sleep each night and napping as needed to not throw off my sleep cycle. Then getting a good pump in mostly through cardio. I love to run. It hadn't always been that way I had to start off small but can now eat 5ks for breakfast 4-5x/ wk at the most or 2-3×/wk at the least. Dabbled in trail running as that is a huge endorphin release that challenges and callouses the mind. Didn't help I got David Goggins in my head with his can't hurt me book. I do think Goggins is a sufferer as well based on his internal struggles that he shares. Interesting how my mental health suffers when I'm not keeping to my running routine, I do notice a difference. Now that I'm explaining this I feel exercise may be at the top of the list since my sleep quality and appetite are not what they are when getting a good sweat session in.
I also cover a lot of these bases. I workout almost everyday (at the very least I squat everyday). Mainly calisthenics and powerlifting. There's nothing like lifting heavy as one of the first things in the morning to help get my mind right. I typically eat 2 eggs with a banana and spinach smoothie. I'm a staple eater so eat a balanced diet through eating the same things over and over, which seems to do my well for my health and my bank account.
Also think that Goggins is either running from something or processing something (though he could also fit into the latter type of self-desctructive that I described above).
Sleep is where things fall apart for me. I've had sleep problems consistently even as a child and I need to make the time for a sleep study. I think this is one of the main reasons I struggle so deeply. I try to get a solid 7 hours, but rarely do, often waking up in the middle of the night, sometimes sweating profusely. I actually have anxiety about going to sleep because I tend to have many uncomfortable dreams and always wake up very depressed. It's a tough way to start the day. One thing that helps, and that I should allow more, is a little bit of changa or DMT in the morning, often before getting out of bed.
My hobbies have really kept me grounded and give me peace of mind by giving me a medium to focus my over active mind and a means to retreat into something that helps me feel better. Fishing, mountain biking, target shooting, golf, off roading, hiking, working on my truck, smoalking moar dmt....
My job has given me a purpose to strive for something bigger than myself as a public servant eventhough I have run myself into the ground from striving to over achieve in a competitive world made up of A type personalities that really trigger me. Being a thorn in coworkers butts does fancy my tickle though.
I've been too rigid, a mental health struggle, to give myself to my hobbies. I'm working on it though.
When I get to guide full time I will feel similarly about my work. I've run myself to the ground as well, and have been dealing with a lot of burnout for about a year or two. And unfortunately won't get any sort of reprieve for a while. I don't currently see the light at the end of the tunnel, but am moving through all the same.
I really feel for you having to go through an abusive father, Void. It makes me feel like I may have dodged a bullet with that experience. I just leaned about eight years ago that the man who I thought was my biological father who passed away from alcoholism was not really my father. One day I go to work and open an email that my long lost brother tracked me down to let me know that I have a completely different dad that we share that my mom lied to me my whole life and would've held onto that lie to this day if not for my brother reaching out to reconnect. It turns out my brother is a recovering alcoholic who remembered me as a baby and was not at peace with me not knowing of him. Once we reconnect I made contact with my biological father who from the very beginning was a piece of work who wants nothing to do with me today after calling him out for wanting to reconnect with my mom and acted like I owe him something. Since then my brother has been distant and has shown little interest especially with me opening up about my love for plant medicine. Oh yeah I have another brother who wants nothing to do with me since my mom was the mistress to their parents splitting up.
Whoa! That's intense! I can only imagine what that is like to experience. It also reminds me of a story my tattoo artist recently told me about his absent father. He now has siblings he didn't even know about, some of which want nothing to do with him because of minutia of the overall situation.
In my experience, it really programs one in a screwed up way. I've said so many times before "the first things one learns are usually the last things that one questions," and this includes things that we don't even notice in our own thinking and subconscious because they are so native to our psychological and cognitive systems. My dad, while having his own trauma (that wasn't addressed), he really did a lot of damage to my mom and sister as well. He's kind of a nightmare. And now, at this point in my life, I am high roading him as he tries to re-establish a relationship with me. I'm doing this out of compassion, though I am still dealing with damage that has only seemed to increase in surfacing as I move through my mid-thirties.
However, while I struggle regularly, and feel damaged, and not where I feel like I'd like to be in life, I'm not sure I'd change anything, because otherwise we wouldn't be having this conversation. My trials and how I've risen over them and in spite of them have developed my character to be something that many appreciate and with that is helping me to learn to appreciate myself.
It's a double-edge in being a gift and a curse imo.
Sending love.
One love