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anita

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Viewing 15 posts - 31 through 45 (of 5,909 total)
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  • in reply to: Trying to find a new job #456540
    anita
    Participant

    Dear Calm Moon:

    Something in what you wrote today stayed with me — the part about allowing yourself to be human.
    For those of us who grew up being the ‘strong one,’ the caretaker, the emotional anchor- giving ourselves permission to be human is not small. It’s revolutionary.

    I can feel the inner shift you described, a gentleness toward yourself that’s beautiful to witness.

    And you’re right — parentification rewires the brain. Undoing that wiring takes time, patience, and compassion for yourself. But you’re doing it. Every time you choose rest over rescuing, humility over perfection, presence over control — you’re rewriting the story.

    I’d love to hear more about what ‘looking better and feeling better’ means to you these days — in your own words, at your own pace.

    đŸ€đŸŒż Anita

    in reply to: Trying to find a new job #456532
    anita
    Participant

    Dear Calm Moon 🌙

    What a lovely message, thank you for your thoughtfulness, appreciation and grace 🙏

    I’ve been a bit more anxious these days than previously because of the ongoing war in the middle east. I have family in Israel, a country that gets bombarded regularly by Iran, Lebanon and Yaman (the Iranian proxies is in the latter two).

    I am glad to read that your interactions with family and others have become more mature and healthier recently 👏

    You sound quite mature to me!

    Can you tell me more about how your faith helps you to release trying to control what you can’t (and release the parentified, “savior” role?)

    đŸ€ Anita

    in reply to: On Purpise and Shame- what is my purpose? What is yours? #456531
    anita
    Participant

    Dear Alessa:

    Thank you for standing up for me, saying she should not get a pat on the back (for not making fun of me in regard to the tics). It made me feel special that you did 🙏

    It’s a good thing that I’m able to show gratitude for that part, as well as for her gifts and whatever affection she threw my way. It means that now, I am less threatened by (the idea of) her.

    Don’t get me wrong though, she was horrible, real bad news in my life. I’m just glad that I can tolerate a bit of nuance in regard to her.

    My goodness, what a special way of saying it: it’s easy for people not to see their own goodness when they’re sufferring.

    I wish you didn’t suffer, Alessa!

    You are a good, loving and caring person and mother.

    I am fortunate to have you in my life đŸ™đŸ€đŸ™

    🍃 đŸ€ Anita

    in reply to: On Purpise and Shame- what is my purpose? What is yours? #456530
    anita
    Participant

    Continued:

    Campbell spelling out my age, ouch. I don’t like it reflected back to me 😕. Shame- the dragon, awareness- the sword. A violent metaphor delivered with a warm, knowing smile.

    Krishnamurti.. “a pedestal of ‘ideas’- of what a daughter or a ‘normal’ person should be”-

    What an original way of saying it, pedestal-of ideas, worshipping ideas, never one with them. Never a good daughter. Never a good person.

    Shame has nowhere to stand when the pedestal (the should- but isn’t so) is removed.

    (I feel positively important to be talked about among this group of people. Thank you for gathering the 3, just 4 me 🙂)

    Jung: shoulds= conditioning.

    Krish: learning= aware & awake, the silent observation, which reminds me. Peter. I made it a daily practice since we talked last, to Notice instead of try to Solve- Remove physical tension. And every time I just Notice, the tension eases in that moment 🙏`

    Next, Campbell again mentions my age, for crying out loud!

    Not to fix the past, but to see it clearly. There’s a lot here. I want to develop this further later (not so to fix the past..)

    “You are no longer the ‘mistake’, you are the witness”- this is deep.

    Oh, Alan Watts, thank you for stopping by! Your light heartedness is much appreciated!

    Of course, I am looking forward to using my đŸ–„ and asking Copilot for his input.

    What a refreshing, unique exercise, Peter 🙏

    🍃 đŸ€ Anita

    anita
    Participant

    Good morning, Peter:

    It’s interesting that you said you’re not sure you have anything new to say about the idea of Purpose because your very first post on tiny buddha, May 27, 2016, almost a decade ago, was about purpose.

    It was in response to a thread titled: “What is my purpose?” or, “Do I need a purpose?” (I am using my đŸ“± so I can’t check).

    There you expressed frustration with the purpose-driven mentality (I am paraphrasing from memory) where purpose is thought of as something objective (outside ourselves), measurable, and grand, positively exciting all the time,

    While you (and Cambell whom you quoted there) think of it as something that’s subjective (inside ourselves), quiet and immeasurable.

    Back to your yesterday’s post, you mention again the “grand meaning” of the objective, measurable type of purpose vs the quiet, subjective meaning of “wakingup to who we actually are, beyond the labels and the terror” (beautifully said!)

    Yes, this very much resonates. It makes me smile in a combo of youth nostalgia and pity for my younger self, to remember my dreams of grand purpose: to be rich and famous, and in so being, deserving of being valued.

    Fast forward, being valued by my own self ( a new and beginning experience for me), really is subjective, an internal experience that’s not at all measurable by objective achievements. It’s like a shortcut to valuing myself, a shortcut that took half a century to stumble into.

    I can almost see Jung leaning forward with piercing 👀- thank you, Jung. “To allow the Self to finally speak”- yes, this is why I post SO MUCH on tb. I was silent for too long that to speak in a public forum is intoxicating, the idea (and sometimes fact) that I am actually heard.

    Yes, the freakishness loses its sharp edges when it’s integrated into the human, meaning, there’s no freak out there (the dissociated, separated me), threatening.

    This is fascinating, Peter, thank you for gathering these famous people together to discuss.. me 🙂

    I’ll continue later.

    🍃 đŸ€ Anita

    in reply to: I just randomly and suddenly fell out of love #456524
    anita
    Participant

    Good morning, Confused:

    I reread what you shared in your 2 posts before I left to the taproom yesterday, and I figure, again, that what you’re going through makes complete sense — not because something is wrong with you, but because of what you lived through growing up.

    You said something very important: “I’ve never spoken to any of my parents about my feelings, they haven’t either.”- that means that as a child, you learned that emotions weren’t safe. You learned that closeness wasn’t safe. You learned that opening up wasn’t safe.

    So now, when you’re in a relationship that is actually healthy and emotionally close, your system doesn’t know what to do. It’s like you’re walking into a room you were never allowed to enter as a kid.

    Your mind might understand what’s happening, but your body reacts in a much older way — the way it learned when you were little.

    That’s why everything feels so sudden and intense, why you feel numb, blocked, or like you can’t feel love, and why your thoughts are spinning in every direction.

    This isn’t you rejecting her, or you refusing to accept the truth, or you using her.
    This isn’t you being broken. This is your nervous system going into shutdown because closeness feels unfamiliar and overwhelming.

    And the fact that it happened with her — someone you actually cared about — makes perfect sense. We shut down the most with the people who matter the most, because the stakes feel higher.

    Nothing about what you’re experiencing is strange or shameful. Nothing about it means you’re incapable of love.

    It means you’re reacting exactly the way someone would react if they grew up without emotional safety.

    Your system is trying to protect you in the only way it learned how. And that can feel awful — but it’s understandable.

    In your new post today, you asked: “Hmm, I think I need alone time and a break? I am not sure..”-

    Confused, it makes total sense that you’re thinking about needing alone time or a break. When your system is overwhelmed or shut down, everything inside you is saying: ‘I need space to breathe.’

    That’s not a sign that something is wrong with you or wrong with the relationship — it’s a sign that your nervous system is overloaded.

    When someone grows up in a home where feelings weren’t talked about and emotional closeness wasn’t safe, being in a relationship that is close can feel like too much, even if you care about the person.
    Your body reacts before your mind can make sense of it.

    So, the feeling of needing space is understandable. It’s your system trying to calm itself, not you rejecting her or running away from the truth.

    You don’t have to make any big decisions right now. You’re in a state where everything feels confusing and heavy, and that’s not the moment to decide anything.

    For now, it’s okay to slow down, breathe, and give yourself a little room without turning it into a verdict about the relationship or about you.

    You’re not stuck this way forever. This is a state, not your identity 🙂

    đŸ€đŸŒżAnita

    in reply to: I just randomly and suddenly fell out of love #456515
    anita
    Participant

    Hey, dear Confused:

    Thing is, you’re trying to figure things out logically, when logic is not something that connects with you, does it?

    What you need is calm, not logic.

    Calm, like giving yourself a break, a space to just breathe.

    I’ve been trying to promote logic this whole time, but what you need.. you tell me, Confused. What is it that you need emotionally, now?..

    đŸ€ Anita

    in reply to: On Purpise and Shame- what is my purpose? What is yours? #456502
    anita
    Participant

    I am thrilled to get your replies, Peter and Alessa🙏🙏 I’ll reply by tomorrow.

    in reply to: I just randomly and suddenly fell out of love #456501
    anita
    Participant

    B Back 2 u in a few hours (going to the taproom)

    đŸ· Anita

    in reply to: I just randomly and suddenly fell out of love #456498
    anita
    Participant

    Hey Confused:

    Double posting 🙂 I can’t tell you whether you should restart it — that’s something only a doctor or prescriber can guide you on. It could be helpful to reach out to the person who prescribed it and let him know what’s going on.

    * When someone stops a medication that affects mood or the nervous system (like escitalopram), the body often needs time to rebalance itself. That period of rebalancing is called adjustment, and it can feel like being disconnected, numb, foggy, etc. Maybe this is part of what you’re going through now.

    Ten days is still very much within the time when your body can be adjusting.

    🌿 đŸ€ Anita

    in reply to: I just randomly and suddenly fell out of love #456497
    anita
    Participant

    Hey Dear Confused:

    Had more time than anticipated 🙂

    Confused, I hear you. The dog example is something we can understand with the thinking mind — it’s a conscious explanation.

    But what you’re feeling right now isn’t happening in the thinking mind at all. It’s happening in the body.

    When you say it ‘feels like something else,’ that’s actually very accurate.

    FA patterns — especially the numbness, the emptiness, the lack of love or sadness — come from a deeper, older place than logic. They’re not intellectual. They’re nervous‑system reactions that were formed long before you had words for anything.

    So even if the explanation makes sense, the felt experience can still feel foreign, heavy, or unreachable.
    That doesn’t mean you’re doing anything wrong. It means you’re in a shutdown state, not a thinking state.

    Shutdown is not a choice and it’s not a sign that you don’t care. It’s the body protecting itself when it feels overwhelmed.

    And when you’re in that state, it’s almost impossible to ‘apply tools.’ Not because you don’t want to — but because your system is offline.

    For now, the most important thing is to be gentle with yourself. You’re not supposed to feel love or clarity or motivation when you’re in shutdown. Your only job in moments like this is to take things slowly and let your system settle.

    You’re not alone in this, and nothing you described is strange or wrong. It’s a state — not who you are.

    🌿 đŸ€ Anita

    in reply to: I just randomly and suddenly fell out of love #456493
    anita
    Participant

    I was wondering about you stopping the meds, Confused. Maybe it would have been better to increase the dosage for better effect than to quit it altogether. I’m in a bit of a rush now, I’ll write later, probably in a few- 5 hours from now. I hope that you feel better soon.

    in reply to: I just randomly and suddenly fell out of love #456487
    anita
    Participant

    Developing my thoughts in regard to craving and fearing closeness/love, best I understand it as it applies to me:

    I imagine that as a child, I felt loving closeness with my mother. I am sure I did, although I don’t have a single memory of such.

    What happened, what must have happened is comparable to let’s say, you feel very close to your dog who loves you, you pet him and he responds affectionately. But then, out of nowhere, he bites you and you bleed, and it happens repeatedly.

    You stop petting him because you’re afraid of another bite. And over time, you forget there was ever affection and closeness, and you figure you’re safer away from the dog, away from closeness.

    Because in your mind, closeness gets associated with being bitten.

    And then, this association appears with other people- so you stay away (avoidant), or if you get close (because, being human,you crave closeness), you enjoy it for a little while, but then you remember the biting ( even without being aware of the memory) and you get scared and withdraw ( fearful-avoidant)

    So, it’s a tug of war between needing closeness-love (a human.. and Canine need) and getting scared of another bite.

    🐕 đŸ˜± 😍 đŸ˜± 😍 đŸ˜± Anita

    in reply to: I just randomly and suddenly fell out of love #456486
    anita
    Participant

    Well, Confused: I like everything I read about her teaching (summary above). Thank you for introducing her to me. In future communications with FA attachment people, I will recommend her 👌

    In regard to your most recent post of less than 2 hours ago: “How can we not ‘crave’ the loving treatment and we shutdown”?-

    According to Paulien Timmer (right above), we, FA people- do crave loving treatment.

    And we are afraid of it.

    The two things happening back and forth.

    In yet other words, it’s not one (craving love) or the other (fearing love).

    It’s both.

    That’s the “internal conflict” she talks about.

    💡 Anita

    in reply to: I just randomly and suddenly fell out of love #456485
    anita
    Participant

    Good morning, Confused:

    Paulien Timmer is a Dutch relationship and attachment‑style educator (She is not a psychologist or therapist). She positions herself as a Fearful Avoidant (FA) attachment expert and emphasizes that she healed her own FA attachment style and now teaches others how to do the same.

    She runs the platform Healing the Fearful Avoidant and a YouTube channel, as well as a Dutch program called “Rust in de Liefde” (“Calm in Love”), which helps people who constantly doubt their feelings. She calls herself a “twijfelcoach” (doubt coach).

    Paulien Timmer consistently teaches that FA attachment develops in childhood, and she talks about this connection in almost all of her content.

    She repeatedly emphasizes that FA patterns come from inconsistent caregiving, emotional unpredictability, fear mixed with love, caregivers who were sometimes safe and sometimes frightening, and environments where the child couldn’t rely on anyone consistently.

    She describes FA attachment as a childhood survival strategy that becomes an adult relationship pattern.

    According to her teaching the FA Push comes from fear of being hurt, rejected, or overwhelmed, and the Pull comes from longing for closeness and connection. She explains that this internal conflict is rooted in childhood experiences where closeness felt unsafe and necessary at the same time.

    Across her videos and programs, she mentions childhood experiences like being parentified, being emotionally responsible for a parent, chaotic or unstable environments, and caregivers who were loving one moment and frightening the next.

    She frames FA as the result of a child learning: “I want closeness, but closeness is dangerous.”

    She teaches that healing FA requires revisiting childhood patterns, understanding childhood triggers, healing emotional wounds from early life, and building internal safety.

    She often says that FA healing is about giving yourself the safety you didn’t consistently receive as a child.

    She doesn’t just describe FA patterns — she gives step‑by‑step things people can do to heal them:

    1. Regulate your nervous system first — before doing anything else: grounding (looking around the room slowly, placing a hand on the chest, naming sensations, pausing before reacting), breathing (long exhales). She emphasizes that you cannot make good relational decisions from a dysregulated state.

    2. Name the FA pattern in the moment- She teaches people to label what’s happening: “This is my fear talking.”, “This is my push response.”, “This is my shutdown.”, “This is my fear of hurting someone.”

    Naming the pattern reduces shame and gives you a sense of choice.

    3. Slow down decisions — especially big ones- FA people often panic and want to break up, run, withdraw, shut down, and/ or make a drastic choice.

    She teaches the opposite: Slow everything down. Do not make decisions from fear. Wait until your body is calm.

    This is one of her most repeated pieces of advice.

    4. Share your internal experience in small, honest pieces- She encourages FA individuals to practice gentle, simple communication like: “I’m feeling overwhelmed.”, “I need a moment to calm down.”, “I’m scared, but I care about you.”, “I’m having a push response.”

    Not dramatic confessions — just small, steady truths.

    5. Repair after a shutdown or push‑away- She teaches that FA healing requires learning to come back after withdrawing. Her concrete steps: Regulate. Reflect. Return. Share a small truth. Reconnect slowly. This builds trust and reduces the partner’s fear.

    6. Work on childhood wounds — but gently- She talks a lot about inner child work, re‑parenting, understanding the original source of fear, and giving yourself the safety you didn’t get.

    But she emphasizes doing this slowly, not diving into trauma all at once.

    7. Build internal safety- FA people often don’t feel safe inside themselves. She teaches practices like self‑soothing, self‑validation, emotional containment, and learning to sit with discomfort.

    This reduces the urge to run or shut down.

    8. Practice receiving love- This is a big one in her work. FA individuals often distrust affection, feel overwhelmed by closeness, and fear disappointing their partner. She teaches small steps like letting someone hug you, accepting a compliment, allowing closeness for a few seconds longer, noticing when you want to pull away. These micro‑moments build tolerance for intimacy.

    9. Stop interpreting anxiety as “lack of feelings”- This is one of her most important teachings.

    She says FA people often mistake fear, overwhelm, shutdown, and numbness 
for “I don’t love them” or “I should leave.”

    She teaches that numbness is a protective response, not a truth.

    10. Take relationships slowly and steadily- She encourages pacing, boundaries, gradual intimacy, consistent communication, and avoiding extremes.

    FA healing is about consistency, not intensity.

    * I need to give the computer away, will post again using my phone.

    Anita

Viewing 15 posts - 31 through 45 (of 5,909 total)