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Void's Paranoia and Neuroses Thread

blig-blug said:
By this exercise I also realize how, paradoxically, being too harsh on oneself in this way is paradoxically similar to having an inflated idea of one's own importance. For my actions to be THAT terrible, they need to be extremely important. And the truth is, they don't matter that much either way. Only to me. It's in my mind, one way or the other.
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Most people tend to care only about themselves. Interactions that leave a lasting effect on us might be very minor to others.
And for us, they leave this lasting effect precisely because we are too invested in ourselves. Ego games, it seems, have no end.
We are given the same advice throughout the ages: 'Let it go' or 'Let it be.' Yet, no one truly wants to follow it. I find myself in the same predicament.
🙏
 
I don't agree that it's always the case that internalized harshness and deprication automatically and paradoxically extend to ego. I can see how it does, but i don't find it ubiquitous. Its similar to when people say that depression is inherently egoic. Sometimes, other things that have nothing to do with an individual can impact and depress thr individual.

The term vicarious trauma comes to mind.

One love
 
Voidmatrix said:
I don't agree that it's always the case that internalized harshness and deprication automatically and paradoxically extend to ego. I can see how it does, but i don't find it ubiquitous. Its similar to when people say that depression is inherently egoic. Sometimes, other things that have nothing to do with an individual can impact and depress thr individual.
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I feel that all concepts, both good and bad, extend the ego. However, the ego isn't a problem, actually.
Rather, we need to develop a healthy one to be able to advance on this evolutionary ladder.
Positive inner talk and the fostering of benign mental attitudes are significant topics in both religion and psychology.
To work with difficult inner states, one should have a certain level of clarity and fortitude. Be a warrior, basically.
🙏
 
Voidmatrix said:
Hmm, another interesting one.
I don't think strength is absolute. I'm also talking about a perspective, not anything objective. Its how I feel.

In some senses, certainly it is a strength!
However, did you find my use of "masking" confusing? Was the way I meant it, of the various ways it could be meant, ambiguous?
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The problem is not your use of the term "masking".
The problem is that I’m struggling to find a suitable language game or an acceptable definition for it.
That’s why I’m asking all these questions.
I simply don’t have a clear answer.
If you asked me directly, it would be very hard for me to pinpoint the right language game for it.

For me, "masking" has a negative connotation.
Although that cannot be strictly true, since it’s a mechanism and mechanisms themselves are neutral with regard to positive or negative categories.
That means it’s a kind of fallacy on my part.

Showing strength in a situation of weakness is still not just showing strength.
And that’s a paradox.
As long as one says, "I feel weak, but I try to be strong" and takes that as strength, it remains paradoxical.

But in the end, all of this might be irrelevant.
Because what matters is: what is the outcome?
Is it defense? Support? Spreading positivity?
In that case, I don’t really associate it with "masking".

If it’s about destroying or spreading negativity, then that’s when "masking" comes to mind.

What’s funny here is that the snake bites its own tail, creating a kind of recursion.

I don’t have an answer to this problem.
But maybe it really doesn’t matter whether one masks, chooses, or integrates something,
as long as it doesn’t negatively affect others.

“Hopefully, my light and dark sides don’t negatively affect anyone without reason.”
 
Voidmatrix said:
Oh hey! Do you implicitly assume most people hate you too?!?
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I tend to assume they find me annoying or unlikable, so elevating it to over the top hatred does the trick for me to have a chuckle and realize I'm going too far and it doesn't matter that much anyways.

But yes, in my case it's based on childhood experiences, as I often didn't fit well, and annoyed other people by being over enthusiastic with topics I found interesting and they didn't. I have improved at it over the last years. Mostly by training myself to care less about the question of how I'm perceived in general. I still have to improve on it, though.

Is your case similar?
 
For masking, I mean just hiding my state of being in one way or another (it's funny, I'm doing it at the center today). It's neither good or bad in and of itself. That is a contextual matter.

blig-blug said:
Is your case similar?
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Yup! I grew with too many mixed signals to find trust.

One love
 
Voidmatrix said:
I don't agree that it's always the case that internalized harshness and deprication automatically and paradoxically extend to ego.
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I wouldn't say it extends to it, but in my experience of my own mind (the only one I have access to) I see how they both go together. After all, if I didn't care about "my image of who I am", this problem wouldn't happen. To me, arrogance and self-debasement are two branches of the same tree. Not because one is actually the other (even though it can sometimes happen), but because both stem from having an image of what "I am", and then either priding myself on it or rejecting it.
 
Voidmatrix said:
Since we're talking about me being hard on myself, I have another one that dawned on me yesterday.

Neuroses:
Since I was a little boy, I've felt weak and inferior to others. I try to mask it. I mask it well. I mask most things well. Sometimes even with myself.

About 8 years ago I tore something in my back performing a 445lb deadlift using the belt (that I never used and was on too tight) weighing 145lbs and tore something in my low back and hips (glute, psoas, ql most likely). I've never seen the doctor. I rarely take anything to help with the constant pain and discomfort. It has made labor work very hard. But I always tend to think that it must not be that bad, I have to toughen up and suck it up...

Well, yesterday, I realized that technically, I've been dealing with chronic pain...

One love
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I broke both my legs in a car accident when I was 15. I talk about chronic pain...chronically
 
blig-blug said:
I wouldn't say it extends to it, but in my experience of my own mind (the only one I have access to) I see how they both go together. After all, if I didn't care about "my image of who I am", this problem wouldn't happen. To me, arrogance and self-debasement are two branches of the same tree.
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I think that there is a difference when what causes the distress comes from a place on more focus on the feelings and state of another more than oneself.

One love
 
I gotta say, I'm pretty damn thankful for all of you and this site and this community. I've whined quite a bit (I know I'm being harsh, it's not whining, it's exploring and being vulnerable, I know, I know, I'm being coy), and have expected to get "checked" on some of my shit, or have some of the more negative thought items confirmed, but I tend to get the opposite, usually in the form of compassion and confirmation in positive ways. And I've shared some loaded stuff.

Thank you for helping me learn to fill the void with what it's missing and learning to fill for himself.

One love
 
Neuroses:

I'm going to be brief with this funny one. The only introduction is that I've spoken at length about my struggles allowing myself into the psychedelic space.

1. I'm hard on myself for not doing DMT. And for not going further.
2. I'm hard on myself for doing DMT.

Please bear in mind, this is a dark humor thread. Feel free to laugh at me because this shit is ridiculous, or as Camus would say, absurd.

:ROFLMAO:

One love
 
Voidmatrix said:
Do you have the same experience with DMT?
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I want to do medicine, but I also don't. It's an ego destructor, in a sense.
So part of me longs for surrender and transcendence, while the other says screw it all. There is no consistency.
Neuroses come and go, and I am here to watch them play. Medicine doesn't care about us as individuals, either.
There's a higher evolutionary plan that unfolds behind the scenes. What it's all about beyond waking up to life, I don't know.
I'm in a pretty dark spot in my work at the moment. I'd say one needs a solid practice outside of medicine
to govern it all in a somewhat sane direction. That's about it. So, yeah, it's all pretty normal 🤣
 
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