Richard Grannon's 30 Day Challenge & Summoning the Self teasers

ChantalCEM

Oh..Thx for the better version screen shot!

Deef

Okay.. catching up with sharing Day 5 & 6’s exercises below -

Day 5 Exercise : Authentic Self Blockers

List the external things that you think
stop you from being your authentic self and
giving up the addiction to a codependent response.

List the internal things that you think you stop you.

Day 6 Exercise: Controlling Inner Dialogue and Creating Affirmations

Create 3 affirmations that are around the belief
“it is ok for me to assert my boundaries” and
“it is good for me to choose to no longer be in abusive relationships”

The affirmations should be close to your current LIVED REALITY and not create a superego injunction of “bs!”

This means you can start with qualifiers like “I can learn over time to be more…”

Explore and experiment.

Here’s my day 6 sharing, not really following the exercise?

Deef

Day 7 Exercise: Create the intention that we can feel SAFE while asserting our boundaries.

Write at the top “My intention is to feel safe when I am saying no.”

List the contexts where and when you need to feel safe.

Brainstorm how you could begin to feel safe when asserting these boundaries.

How could you speak to yourself when trying to feel safe? (2:55 of the video for directions)

"It is my intention to
feel safe when i set my boundaries with X in trigger scenario Y and
I will tell my child ego state that its ok
whilst I do this
even if I feel “xyx feelings”
it will be uncomfortable but the discomfort is temporary."

mental gaslighting formula:

a) I will tell my child ego state that its ok

I (superego) will gaslight myself, over-riding my feelings of fear, anxiety, and shame. (terror of negative emotions repeat)

b) whilst I do this

refocusing on the intention, affirmation, permission, injunction (order from above)

c) even if I feel “xyx feelings”

Double down… Intention is to over-ride xyz feelings

d) it will be uncomfortable but the discomfort is temporary."

Keep focused on action and reframe, over-ride inner feelings. BUT totally overlook and under-estimate external & environmental factors of added stress, psychological attack or bullying?!????

I see how this could lead to stupid life decisions… like focusing on:

My discomfort is temporary so I will stick to asserting my boundaries and feeling safe now.

A boss or co-worker who has influence on your job security, imposes their personal stress onto you… you notice that it an obvious boundary violation… you feel unsafe at that moment, assert your boundaries… me me me me!!
and then you raise odds of getting fired…. or definitely sour the working relationship….

Granted that doesn’t equate to being a full blown pushover at work, as that also can raise odds of losing the job, or getting more work put on you for same pay (that’s like getting a pay cut)…

But… safety isn’t #1 priority in work… you’re a wage slave, and that $$$ is providing financial safety and stability in other areas of your life…. so suck it up and feel a bit unsafe in the short term, as a sacrifice and price you’re paying and investing towards a longer term goal…

Deef

Fascinating and timely with 30dc day 7 opinion piece from today’s paper.

Is safety code for not being wrong or doing the wrong thing??

Some of the power in being right rests in its ability to make us feel superior and, more insidiously, from the way it makes our worlds appear solid and unassailable. The only feeling that might be more intoxicating than being right is the feeling of superiority that comes from being right while someone else is wrong.

The specifics fall away and the stakes become clear:
If I am wrong, my world becomes threatening and unsafe. I imagine the same is true for them.

But feeling safe isn’t the same as being safe. Nor does it ever justify why we feel threatened in the first place. Americans of all types now appear to live in constant fear that someone is going to take something from them. Our jobs, our property, our security — whatever that means these days. But mostly, we are afraid that someone will invalidate the core beliefs that we rely on to help us make sense of the world.
…
Our destruction will come from those of us who are so damned right all the time. The ones who refuse to listen, who will never even bother to consider other people’s viewpoints and who will protect their worldview with their lives.
We must find a better path to safety.

Deef

Deef Day 7 Exercise: Create the intention that we can feel SAFE while asserting our boundaries.

ok.. just posted my version of day 7

Re: “1. My intention is to feel safe when I am saying no.”

I have struggled with safe, safety and safetyism fixations that’s out there.

So I’ll flip this, and say I am NOT going to stigmatize or exile fear, along with all the other survival instincts and drives (ie. libido & death drives).

When I step out and go against the norm (like this post) I do not ‘feel’ safe, nor do I expect to feel safe, as I’m way outside boundaries of the unspoken social consensus norm of this group.

I feel cautious, uncertainty, a little fearful, tiny bit excited, and curious on whether this might land with a rare few. I often feel a wide mixture of emotions that could be deemed as ‘not safe’ if i had more of an obsession with safety.

Oh… and my current approach is from past mistakes, where fixating on certain personal agenda, caused me to fall on my face even worse. So my position of trying to cooperate with emotions comes from being humbled by trauma, along with tangible examples of getting shut down for sharing bits of trauma (which fits into the society’s norm of stigmatizing unfiltered emotions).

However feeling safe, grounded and calm in MY physical body. That’s something I actively take responsibility for, with conscious attention and care for my nervous system. But I do that with practices, lifestyle and awareness; not so much with instructions, stories, or soothing words.

I just don’t naturally think or process with language. Often when I’m feeling triggered, my language circuits shut down, so focusing on principles, the greater goal, and my role is more so how I navigate feelings in the unsafe basket.

I think I softened a good amount of it but also included some of me… so that’s adequate, I suppose…. people who don’t get it, will just pass over it… and who knows if it might land or connect w/ someone?

In a sense, I’m saying NO to this framing…. and setting a boundary in opposition to group norms and leader’s intention… shouldn’t that be a successful practice of his exercise…. his goal is to help people set boundaries in unsafe or uncertain environments and w/ others….
I’m asserting my differences, and risking social judgment or even potentially group exile… but I’m not doing it as a total asshole…

Bradford

Im finding that following on with your process to be both frustrating and illuminating. The frustration is coming from the over-focus on safety and fear thats being thrown about which is not healthy.

Wouldn’t it be better to help people toughen up, learn to deal with consequences and not be afraid of their feelings? To expose them more to reality?

The fawning around being late and posting puppy pictures was probably the high water mark for me.

It feels like Grannon is trying to wallpaper over the cracks to just deal with superficial issues which may be all that he and the rest of the codependents can handle.

Boundaries? Just say No and deal with the feelings? Is that it?

The crack Baby doesn’t need to be rescued like this.

Deef

Bradford The frustration is coming from
the over-focus on safety and fear thats being thrown about
which is not healthy.

Uhm…. I’d frame it slightly different… I agree with over-focus on safety & fear… the not healthy part, I’d label more as ignorance or.. the approach is incomplete…

Of which it’s a bit too much on intellectualizing… which isn’t totally bad, as the exercises are triggering emotional flashbacks and digging a bit deeper… it’s just I’d argue, the solutions are a bit too quick and simplistic… which is veering into self-gaslighting and continued fantasy type territory…

What’s missing?

expose them more to reality?

Yes… exposure therapy… but for this group, more precisely body based practices… and community interaction that’s more neutral instead of validating/encouraging (as that can fall into cover-up or rushing healing type energy)…

Actually… the 30dc is probably decent with exposure therapy to reliving flashbacks… but limited exposure to actual real life and real time sparring with conflict and difficult people… but how would you introduce that in the crappy endless wall kajibi forum format??

….. or you could just skip the emotional flashback exposure… and have people just do a shared task, or greater cause… then people can bond around a different type trauma or shared activity… but that’s also tricky to do w/ the current format… in the body keeps the score, he suggests things like theater, dance, gardening, yoga.. etc…

Very physical activities that by default encourage grounding presence, along with some sort of cooperation with others, so you’re also building timing and rhythm…

But… those physical activities can also be used for spiritual bypass.. or visceral bypass… used to just escape thinking through sensation flooding..

Boundaries? Just say No

This is the tricky thing with a sort of implicit assumption that boundaries = good… and some of these boundaries are just masked resentment… so boundaries = never again..

so it’s just a clever way of denial to avoid grief/despair/failure…
ergo raises odds of repetition compulsion.. but with some window dressing, or changing of characters….

But…. there are some signs that it could be somewhat helpful like this post from day 8 (a review day)

This person is probably experiencing a healing crisis, where the work re-opens up old wounds and it can seem like she’s going backwards…. but I’d argue the feelings coming up now, means her nervous system feels is safer to re-experience old emotions….

But even with this reveal, I’m skeptical of comments being a bit too much of closing space or smothering type territory…. telling her ‘please DO NOT FEEL defeated’ isn’t even code, it’s an injunction to NOT FEEL certain emotions… then the reinforcer of ‘I LIKE TO … light’… is code for.. I can’t hold space for your heavy dark emotions (and mine too)…

I also don’t like You’re not alone. granted it’s not as bad, but you can relay that without saying it.. as saying it, has an over-riding type feel to it… there’s an implicit dig, of wanting the other person to agree to it…

If I were to go there, I’d rather go more neutral and ask.. something like how’s the sadness? or other type of questions or statements with message of “Let’s explore and hangout in this space”… which relays I’m here with you… instead of saying it… which I’d argue is often more performative, or for personal benefit… not for the other…

and to update for day 8.. here’s the instructions:

Day 8 Exercises
Take stock, digest, if you can see even a small improvement please share it with the group.

I was thinking of reflecting back to my intro, I think I mentioned 2 current interest of:
1) Bring Back Shame, and 2) taking on and calling out Safetyism.

I could share a progress report on those 2, of which I could merge safetyism into shaming shame… as safety, empathy, fixes are all ways to cover-up and mask negative emotions… (shaming shame)…

But writing a post that might better connect with others, along with not being too harsh on the prior exercises… that’s gonna be a bit tricky… or take a bit more thought….

Deef

My day 8 entry I just posted….

is it too much a shame bomb?

A little progress report from my introduction post
——–
Re: - … some seeds that have already caught my attention:
1) Bring Back Shame 2) taking on and calling out Safetyism.
———-
I can now link and simplify these 2 aspects into shaming shame

Not a new observation, but trying to get closer to the unfiltered reality of what’s going on:

American society is a shame-based culture, but …shame remains hidden. Since there is shame about shame, it remains under taboo. ….The taboo on shame is so strict …that we behave as if shame does not exist (Gershen Kaufman 1989).

So back to shaming shame. If shame is the master emotion as implied by earlier pioneers like Freud, Goffman and Elias, and more recent work I like by sociologist Thomas Scheff.

Then what’s the main way to respond to terror of negative emotions?? With SHAME!
(there is also guilt, but that’s an avoid in a behavior emotional bypass strategy)

But calling it shame would be too honest and open. So modern society has relabelled shame with other pointers. Like vulnerability, empathy, care, setting boundaries, safety, encouragement, being positive, never give up hope, love and light, or whatever common euphemism/slogan, etc.

Any mechanism to block, slow, relabel, suffocate, smother, judge, distant, distract, delay, rush, distort, depress, change, etc. of an authentic unfiltered raw expression of emotion. Likely uses some derivative of shaming.

And the common negative emotions that are shamed and exiled are: Fear, Anger and Grief.
Or simply put in children pointers - Scared, Mad, and Sad

Express or act out too much of any of these big 3, others will quickly shame (distort, deny, destroy, soften) their authentic expressions one way or another.
(I’m shaming myself right now, trying to share this with softened language, but also precise and staying true to the message.)

So….. Bringing Back Shame will be difficult, especially in modern society that actively shames shame. Possibly it’s been over-stepped by cancel culture, excess safetyism, and cry-bully weaponized victim cards.

A possible next step exploration is to venture into comedians and the jester/magician archetype, to see how humor can be used to more consciously use shame for deeper humanity and the good of society. And also as a defense against slander, humiliation and social banishment often used by manipulative bullies.

I’ll end with this quote:

Emotions are usually contagious because most of us have built up an enormous backlog of uncried cries, unlaughed laughs, and so on. The more backlog lying in wait, the more intimidating the prospect of feeling and expressing emotion. Perhaps that explains how little crying there is these days at funerals, and how so much quarreling, depression and alienation occur in conjunction with a death in the family
– Thomas Scheff “Suppression of Emotion: A Danger to Modern Societies?”

and I added these 2 visuals in the comments shortly after my original post:

Deef

Deef My day 8 entry I just posted….

A few people bit, this one challenged/queried my argument:

Hello, sharing my thoughts/questions on what you shared:

The shame we feel can be a lie.
I think any decent therapist will invite a patient to explore their shame, not protect the client from it, but invite awareness and exploration.
Some of our shame seems tied more to cultural norms, family systems, social status quo and religion than to our own internal value system.
So when I hear “shaming shame” I actually think, yes let’s shame shame. I guess I sort of see shame as mostly worthless. And it seems to inhibit the authentic expression of emotion.
My take has a great deal to do with the fact that I lived with a self-loathing, ashamed person for a long time, and I can’t see what good it did him. Somehow shame became a weapon against me, a manipulation towards me to cover his shame.

Does shame really change anyone’s values?
I’m curious how it helps the individual. I’d enjoy your take.

Totally ignore me if I’m way off from helpful.

Also, I’m curious how the free expression of emotion relates to what I’m interpreting as your pro-shame stance. I didn’t quite make the connection I think you were getting at. Sorry I can be slow. Are you saying don’t shame shame because it is a legit emotion that needs unpacking, so therefore unpack it?

And if so, maybe we agree because you’re saying don’t cover it. Let the person own it?

But how can society use shame to help these already deeply ashamed people embrace shame?

Or, how do we have the ability to move someone towards healthy v toxic shame?

My reply:

I’m still early in my argument to unshame shame. It’s likely an impossible task, but this territory is part of my start of 2022 for whatever reason.

Maybe a slightly better reframe might be to destigmatize shame?? Though pro-shame also works, but I think that’d be a harder sell.

Shame is a master emotion with many uses, using it just to shame shame, feels like such a waste.
Shame is like an emotional & social glue but it also can do the opposite, break people apart.

Let’s go with a personal angle… if someone is shameless, there’s no self-awareness to how they’re seen by other people and how their behavior fits within social norms. So it’s only a matter of time before they lose all their friends, work, and eventually get thrown in jail.

Now the ideal (from honor/shame traditional cultures) is to counterbalance shame with honor. So excess shame awareness can be redirect towards living a life of honor, but not just for you, but also your relationships, family, community, society, country.
And as one builds their character, social reputation, and cultivates honor points around their peers. That social credit/capital they’ve built, creates feelings of social belonging, trust and safety… So then they’re no longer crippled by shame.

But that angle is comparing cultures, and western culture is more guilt/order structured, though now we’re in this micro-aggression/victimhood experiment.

re: Are you saying don’t shame shame because it is a legit emotion that needs unpacking, so therefore unpack it?

Shame is the emotion of unpacking…. and it’s a master emotion, so it also has like a meta capacity… shame allows covering up of emotions but also shame allows unpacking and exposing of emotions..
Shame might be essential for emotional work, both increasing awareness of emotions and also decreasing/slowing/limiting awareness and feelings of emotions.

It is like a literal emotional regulator… it can allow full flow of emotions, and it can fully stop and block flow…

However, if one over-uses shame to block emotional flow. Then they get emotionally clogged up. And that’s where the problems come with emotional constipation.

Emotional constipation leads to maladaptive ways to regulate emotions. Like emotions bleed out and blow up with very vivid emotional flashbacks reliving memories, and then those emotions bleed onto others, who shame the person back to block the invasion.

Or skilled abusers can learn how to 1) provoke a shame wound in their target to create an opening, and 2) then use them as a scapegoat to dump and transfer some of their toxic emotions into them.

So…. maybe my argument is to destigmatize shame, which allows one to keep the regulatory functions of emotional flow. That way one can unpack, explore and feel emotions in the comfort of safe peers or on their own, but also block or limit the awareness of and expression of emotions in the presence of potential abusers or toxic people.

If we shame shame, then the tendency is to be in a default autopilot like state of limiting and blocking emotional flow. Which then leads to surprise outbursts of emotional flashbacks, and it also raises odds of an abuser sensing out your shame oversensitivity, unprocessed emotional baggage and using you as a scapegoat.

Deef

Look who jumped in with a sako asko visual that wasn’t part of my collection…. added bonus!

ChantalCEM

Deef
😇😎

Deef

Update of past 2 days, I’ll have to catch up or skip a few days…

Day 9 Exercise: Identify what happens when you say NO

Who, where and when is the structure and then what happens to you

“When I say no to my father at his house (who, where and when) this is what happens internally (what).”

Seeming to continue on pattern of emphasizing importance of saying no and setting boundaries. It’s not a bad focus, but I wonder if it’s overlooking boundary awareness or lack of it? So people can easily project and blame outwards with boundaries and saying no, falling into trap of becoming an asshole.

Day 10 Exercise on “The Guilt Mines”

Please identify the emotion/ somatic feeling in the body that triggers the fawning, codependent response.

Use the emotional literacy exercise if you need to.

Please list the emotions and share with the group.

Quick scan of forums had some pretty good posts, people doing emotional literacy and mapping out their emotional reactions. I think the video still frames this around saying no. Of which I still it over-simplifies things. Standing up to a narcissist or emotional bully, they can easily just ignore, totally dismiss, or morally outrage bind other people who set boundaries. That’s more realistic situation..

But the covert empath cry bullies do the same thing but more hidden. They act like they have hearing problems, of which they might have basic comprehension issues. So setting boundaries, often equates to being unheard and ignored. Escalating boundaries then can lead to a stand off of who’s the bigger victim and the greatest victim’s needs get met, while lesser victims get ignored.

That’s my observation of what the unspoken rules of the social game are.

Playing victim and/or being the most morally outraged, the people who do that the best.. or the fastest… or the most convincingly… they get away with so much more.

Deef

Day 11 Exercise - Granting ourselves the permission to be happy

Make a mess, freestyle it, mindmaps, scrawling, lists… whatever you want into the topic.

What does happiness mean? List the words associated to this idea of “happiness”

Do I have the permission to do that?
Where do I and dont I permit myself to be happy (now we’ve established and fleshed out what that means)

Notice your somatic state and your emotions - be sensitive to any resistance you feel around the issue.
Notice if you hit an unconscious ROAD BLOCK internally.

If you do feel a roadblock please make it clear what it is in your notes.

Option 1. if you do hit a roadblock, please continue to make notes around it for the next few days and see if you can “wiggle it free”. Take your time with it.
Your objective is to become congruent and to grant yourself the permission to be happy.

Option 2. If you really cannot move it please seek the help of one of our coaches, Terry and Anna are available for one to one coaching or a counsellor.

My version, as he said freestyle was okay, and if I’m breaking the exercise rules, isn’t that me setting boundaries through action??? And it verifies my argument that giving permission, doing affirmations or setting boundaries somehow can magically create happiness… wtf??

I posted this rather early in day 11, so a few more comments than normal.. but I think no one commented on my add on excerpt from the RG video.. of which day 12 also shared another kill-joy from him, that he didn’t pre-warn the group it was going to be hard. So it’s kinda unusual, that he’s knowingly guiding people into flashbacks, and knowingly knows the exercises might not be enough for some people, and he’s been pointing towards therapy or coaching for strong traumas.

this response shows someone who didn’t really get my message, and reflects back injunctions

@Visceral Gravitas
I like what you are saying so much. (except the initial questions)
Maybe, and that is true for me, the move into ‘being part of something bigger’ is happening
by STOP navigating anything (drop it). Outside of yourself.
The deep, sweet longing of being part of something bigger is giving the courage.

This is primo injunctions, gaslighting and emotional smothering… total boundary violation…

1- except is a corrective judgment
2- true for me, is a dismissive code to say, I’m finding belonging here, wtf is wrong with you??
3- STOP & drop it - is a redirect towards excessive self-centered focus… she’s blaming me and injunction for me to blame myself. (Oh without any evidence or argument, other than it’s true for her)
4- … is giving courage - is a redefinition and somewhat squashing of my pointer of part of something bigger, but the deep, sweet longing that’s a weird reframe… .. maybe he/she was annoyed at my critique of saccharine social media and toxic positivity..

So…. how do any of the prior days exercises fit in here?? Do I simply say NO, and that magically blocks this boundary violation?? or do I erase it, or not read it? or give myself permission to feel happy?? brainwash myself with affirmation that I don’t need to listen to others?? (but that blocks building a working relationship w/ people)..

Day 12 will be a zoom meeting Sunday at 1pm EST… will be interesting to see how that goes…

Day 12 (Rest) Exercises
Rest and Digest: go over your notes, any questions or feedback you have share with the group.

The details for todays Live Q and A are in the posts for Day 11

Deef

I thought this was a fascinating post for Day 11…. an exercise to explore happiness, and ‘grant permission’ which supposedly magically does something….

but instead gets this type of sharing??

So happiness… or lowering your guard.. hypervigilance… feeling safe… that might be a trigger for some c-ptsd survivors…. guiding people into an exercise to give permission to feel safe, happy, saying no… can have the exact opposite effect… if one of their core survival strategies is to block those feelings or options…

And it’s such a waste, some people have sad baby right there on the surface to work with and explore… but therapists, coaches, wounded healers, support groups…. totally suck at holding space for despair, grief, depression, suicidal ideation, raw hopelessness, etc…

that’s just so unfortunate… oh.. and those who can’t help but stay in that hopeless despair type of space, often get scapegoated and socially over-run by those more sugary toxic positive empath types… who actively bully in the many realms of mental health communities…. tsk tsk…

Deef

Day 12 is rest day, but also free share day… so I took this on… an indirect call out to this bleeding of neediness on everyone…. fucking codependents love to enable weakness onto others…. while the fake codependents who are more counter-dependent, love to dump and project their toxic weakness onto others…..
icky!!! 🤮🤬🤐

and the attached visual I drew up earlier:

I guess this is my version of saying NO to the social norm group think ???
Though it’s also a pretty big plea for making some space for sad baby!??

Deef

bleh…. the zoom meeting is a webinar format… pure broadcast with no interaction of other people or even a chat window…

This might be somewhat dull… even less interaction than YT lives or IG lives….
…….
gacckk… he’s just reading the questions in the questions in the forum in real time… no back and forth… so who knows if he’s answering the issue right.. nor any questioning back….

this is hard to track…
…..
and now starting to feel like a youtube live…. questions get him started, then he goes off on his own segue and rant on moral relativism currently…
…..
he’s now moving into live questions from zoom… he only covered a handful from the forums sequentially… so those who wrote in late… they’re overlooked…
and the flow of these live questions… are sorta disjointed… hard to track…
and I have no idea how many other attendees are on live right now…
….
Okay.. he said there’s 46 questions in que..
but then tells people to try to ask questions that are community focused… instead of too personally focused…

BUT.. that directive is after the fact… people can’t go back and restate their question… as there’s 46 in front of new ones…

Also people haven’t been focused on community spirit with the focus of the 30dc exercises, overly self-centered…
…..
final stretch…. now starting to skip/summarize questions… but over all very sloppy interaction…. tsk tsk..

Deef

Day 13 Exercise: “Putting Myself First”

Why is it absolutely necessary and for the highest good of all concerned for me to put myself first?

List 5 Scenarios where it is absolutely necessary for you to put yourself first. (Identify the context.)

Wow… what a loaded presumption?? absolutely necessary and highest good of all concerned?
I’ll have to ponder on this angle…. where did it come from? who else advocates this type of thing?? I’m pretty sure even founding fathers of America didn’t go this far…

ok.. checked the declaration of independence states this:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,
that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

But there’s other versions of human rights out there, that’s the American flavor…

But Life, Liberty & Pursuit of Happiness, doesn’t seem to go as far as putting oneself first for highest good of all?? those two things don’t seem to be an equivalent. If everyone starts with this excessively ego-centric view, then I can easily see the demise of community, society and country.

oh.. and the pointer of putting myself first is sort of a misnomer… I could easily argue, when do you NOT put yourself first?? or more specifically how many people can over-ride their survival instincts and genuinely and totally put someone else first??? Maybe parents get a taste of that, during the baby years… or when people join a larger cause or team, they can put their collective self first instead of their individual self..

But even then…. you’re still putting some type of self first…. Why would a MY self first be equated to the highest good or greater good??

oh.. and who’s the one putting myself first??? the super-ego manager part? I’d be curious if that’s proven with actual behavioral patterns? I’d wager that the shadow and id impulses are what’s putting things in one’s attention first… so what’s prioritized is largely already out of one’s conscious control and will….

Just writing out a bunch of things to say how one will put themselves first… is a nice story… speculation… what does it really do in the big picture??? maybe it could offer some ideas in advance? otherwise I’m skeptical….

I’ll chew on this a bit more overnight…
……
OHH….. initial insight….

Putting myself first… is the job of my survival instincts, intuition and conscience… it is NOT the job of the super-ego.. or higher brain functions…. though maybe it could be argued that intellect is sorta needed to navigate economic landscape and longer term goals… but even then, in the long term, it’s best to invest in relationships and other people, which is putting yourself second in the short term, so that others can put you first when you’re less able or down and out in the future….

Granted…I’ll agree that it’s probably not a good idea to put yourself last…. but I’d be skeptical if that’s even possible..
maybe for wounded codependents it’s more about forgetting oneself…. instead of putting oneself first or second or last… there’s no place for the self to be part of the equation…. so that’s self abandonment is a better description of the problem.. and one better solution would be to stop abandoning (and exiling) one’s self….

Deef

Deef Day 13 Exercise: “Putting Myself First”

I rewatched the video and he had a portion encouraging frustration… so this is my share… did I go too far?

and attached visual of CBT common cognitive distortions

It’s a somewhat more direct critique…but also indirect referencing CBT….
will it get me into trouble?

and added a 2nd visual, new discovery from goggle..

Deef

Deef did I go too far?

Hmm….. I think my post got deleted, as I can’t find it…

but there was no message explaining or warning as of yet… my other posts are still there and account still active..

It’s technically doing the exercise, especially based on the video permission…. but it is against the norm of other postings…

and it sorta proves the statement wrong….. I’m putting myself first in sharing my natural reaction to the exercise… and putting myself first did not equal highest good of all concerned…
and doing what was absolutely necessary… led to erasure….

I guess basic CBT fundamentals aren’t allowed in the forum?

Deef

Deef Day 13 Exercise: “Putting Myself First”

Okay…. another angle for Day 13 exercise, putting the self first, is attempting to differentiate.. Putting your self out into the world, is to emphasize differentiation over togetherness…

BUT others in society where codependence is the norm, and also others in support community where parasitic codependence is the norm..

This happens based on Bowen Theory

1m30s portion at the end.

When anybody pulls up to a higher level of self
There are 3 predictable steps

The other reacts in the nature of: “You are wrong! You’re hurting me! This is a terrible thing you’re doing!”

Change back

if you don’t these are the consequences

so anytime anybody makes a significant step toward differentiating itself
the rest of the emotional system attacks in these three steps
this is my notion of why it is so difficult for a person to differentiate from another person
it upsets the other and it upsets self to have the other upset

If my post didn’t get deleted, I’m sure I would’ve gotten negative reactions #1, and nudges to join the group think #2. but instead I got #3…

So while the exercise supposedly was about putting self first, and RG’s day #13 video clip stated it even more emphatically. Togetherness and maintaining emotional system over-rides any genuine differentiation… So words and story is about putting self first, but if anyone dares to put self out too much, it gets squashed….

Here’s another framing from Bowen Theory (great precise observations but language tends to be too scientific and dry, but oh so accurate!)

Pseudo-self is made up of principles, beliefs, philosophies and knowledge that people acquire because the important groups they are part of consider the beliefs and other ideas to be correct. Pressure from a group to incorporate its ideas comes in many forms and with varying degrees of intensity. One powerful reason for people to incorporate and espouse the right thing to believe is to enhance their image and sense of belonging to the group.

Pseudo-self is negotiable in a relationship system, meaning a person will disavow or discard a belief or principle in the face of emotional pressure to do so. …. (In contrast) A belief anchored in solid self does not evaporate in face of emotional pressure such as this. Principles anchored in solid self can change, but based only on intellectual reasoning and careful consideration of other alternatives.

A hallmark of pseudo self is people pretending to be something they are not. This can involve deceiving others and themselves. People can feel and act stronger or weaker than they really are, feel more or less attractive than they really are, and have inflated or deflated self-worth.

Knee-jerk opposition to others’ points of view is another manifestation of pseudo-self: having so little solid self that agreeing with or cooperating with another person who has a different viewpoint is untenable – accepting the other’s viewpoint equals giving up. Oppositional behavior provides the illusion of an emotional boundary, albeit a reactive one, between self and others. This is typically a key dynamic in intensely conflicted relationships.
…
Another feature of pseudo-self is holding discrepant beliefs. This occurs because the beliefs are acquired through relationship pressure to adopt them coupled with the person’s deep desire for acceptance and connection. They are not acquired through intellectual reasoning and careful consideration of facts that support or refute them.
…
Solid self is strongly related to the human intellectual system, which endows us with the capacity to think, reason and reflect. … It enables a person to withstand pressure from the emotional/feeling system. Solid self is made up of firmly held convictions, principles, and beliefs that are formed slowly during development. The contents of solid self are never changed by coercion or persuasion, such as the case with pseudo-self. They can only be changed from within self.

p50-52 Bowen Theory Secrets by Michael Kerr

You can’t short-cut a path to solid self, it just doesn’t work that way… Short cuts are just more pseudo-self or just a new fawn self.

Deef highest good of all concerned for me to put myself first?

And the emotional system of all concerned, is invested in YOU not differentiating… Stepping out and asserting more of your true solid self, equates to active pressure by others and the group to put you back into your old box…

This is the norm in society… but it’s just the norm in any given closed system. There are strong pressures to keep the system in symbiosis.

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