Dear Peter,

I assume you have clothes, food, shelter, maybe even some pocketmoney :), so, why the *anxiety* to succeed or even just get established if thats a better choice of word? Of course we should give our energy to finding right livelihood, but should it be a cause for anxiety? Search for right livelihood has been very difficult for me, mostly due to fear, but it did not in itself make me anxious, I had (and still have to a small degree) social anxiety and fear because of my teens, just like you, but not anxiety about succeeding. I was and am aware that that is others expectations controlling me, the cause being that I/one has an image about myself which says “I’m capable, i have some capacity, i can do what others do just as well…” etc etc. So that is an example, a common, bare-bones one, and i proceed then to get hurt when the image gets threatened by my not living up to it, which has/is happening in yours and my case. But its just an image, and one I created myself. If we hold it, we are controlled by it until our dying day, or or more accurately, what we perceive others perception of our image to be. You seem a clever fellow, Im sure you see how utterly futile it is to play this game. We are only monkeys if we play this game, there is no freedom in life this way. We build up and nourish this image in our formative years as a defence mechanism, then it comes back to haunt us because we are controlled by the feeling that we have to keep up to it. Simple stuff, yet we seem not to want to give up on it. Pity.

“But what I’m wondering is: is stepping away from your ambition not also a step away from purpose? Isolation, although sometimes necessary, does not seem constructive in the long run.”

I tried to explain above how I personally (which I discovered mostly through J Krishnamurti’s talks) consider the image I have about myself, built up since childhood, to be responsible for ambition in its common meaning. In this sense, ambition has no meaning. So, can a man with no garden-variety ambition, with no image in his head that he is this or that, clever or stupid or artistic or whatever, find a purpose? Surely he can. To be personl for a moment, I would like to become a small urban market gardner because i think that serves a good function in life. But I dont need a mite of ambition or self-image to see that. Ambition means self-fulfillment, and that and right livelihood will surely never meet.

I am not trying to advocate that people isolate. That would be crazy. I think I said don’t shun being alone when the time to be alone is upon you, which it may be at this time, thats all. Life brings us what we need. If we find ourselves alone, it be what we need at that time. When you are surrounded by people/facebook, its very hard to have insight, because the images are whirring away. I harp on about that, but only because its the root of everything. Aloneness, which I repeat i dont advocate for in itself, has meant I have learned things about who i am and what it means to be a human being that I could never have learned if things went swimmingly, or were socially connected 24/7. I would not swap my position. I certainly would like to be involved socially and economically, but it has to happen naturally and organically as a person gets healthy again. If its being rushed, that is the image doing the rushing.

The inner child method is one Im familiar with and its helped a lot people, myself included. But I dont think it goes the whole way. I did it, I remember crying as I did it and feeling a sense of release, and while it did help, theres stuff it didnt get at, which is, in my observation, ones own reaction at the time of events. We have, I think, to see how our own behavior contributed to it. In my own case, my getting hurt, which was partly the fault of others, was also my own fault, since I had formed a certain image of myself that got then got injured. I thought I was such and such, gentle, kind, etc and then others trod on and were generally rought with me, and I was hurt. So my hurt was my own doing to a great extent. This can be hard to accept initally. When I see this, which is the work im doing at the moment, it integrates the experience much more deeply than just the inner child work alone. Any sage worth his salt has said that insight is the liberating factor, so there must be insight into the whole of hurt, not just any one particular hurtful experience, otherwise even individual hurts cannot be fully wiped away. That is my 2c anyway, for what its worth. As Anita pointed out and which i see myself even this last month, there is more energy and clarity when past hurts are recalled and dealt with properly.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 4 months ago by brian.

Dear Peter,

Anita makes good points. You are trying to run before you can walk. I sense that you feel under pressure to “run”, get a job, have a social life, a girlfriend, etc. I understand work, relationships etc are a moving treadmill and we can feel threatened to be left behind. In my case, I was left behind and am still behind 🙂 The world didn’t end 🙂 Maybe the old life has be let go completely before a new one can come about. Surely it can only come about when we feel serene, without problems, without anxiety, a feeling of strength that is not “self-worth” or any of that stuff, since the self is only the past, put together by thought.

Myself, I know problems cannot be solved by analysing them, but only being aware of them completely, which means not avoiding them, not seeking entertainment or rushing to talk to someone every time I feel anxious or confused. The confusion or anxiety means there is disorder in me, which is the burden of the past that I have not dealt with, and also the constant focus on “me”, my happiness, my life, my “self-worth”, and all of that. Both of those have to be dealt with. I had a very isolated and lonely teens, which resulted in my feeling so low that I became an alcoholic. Thankfully I stopped at 26 and am 8 years sober now 🙂
I always thought the old life ended when I stopped drinking, and that, like I said above, a new life would appear. But it hasnt magically appeared. I have not dealt with the disorder of my teens, which still haunts me in the form of recurring dreams, where im isolated and alone, just like i was in those years. Small wonder im isolated and alone today. I am also unemployed, so cheer up, you are not alone. I dont have a girlfriend either. You probably have things I dont have, like skills. But Im not miserable. I know its a crazy world, so I dont mind if i have to stand alone in a wilderness while I become aware of the reasons for my isolation, which ive touched on above, namely, being unaware of the burden of the past which has not been dealth with and therefore understood. Surely, only understanding can cast off a burden like the past. Also, as i said, as long as im constantly thinking of myself, my loneliness, my past, then im bound to isolate myself and be unable to healthily join others in economic and social life.

One other thing, and in this we are alike again. I also felt the need to be “creative” or talented in some way. We live in a competitive society as you know where people feel they are worthless if they are not special or unique in some way. We are not happy to just be ordinary. I was just like that, so are most people. Everyone wants to stand out and excel in some field. But i eventually saw the ugliness of that in myself, since everyone cannot be special, and that surely what is important is a harmonious world where people don’t suffer, have enough to eat, animals not being tortured etc etc, not my own shoddy, petty little desire to be admired by peers. Once I saw that, I was happy to be simple.

So I wish you the very best, I hope I have not given any advice, other than as Krishnamurti would say, to be “a light to yourself”. You have a journey to walk for a time, dont be afraid to be alone with your problems, dont run away from them if you can. Try and observe them, not analyse them, since they are really you rather than separate things, and also tra and be aware of your past, which got you here, and why you came to feel hurt and anxious, and if there was a better way you could have dealt with it than being hurt. I thought others were responsible for hurting me. If abuse is very severe, that of course will be so, but in situations that are more long term and chronic, there was things we could have done better, ie not being hurt through feeling sorry for ourself so much. Whichever, I truly feel we cannot just “release” the past as an act of will, it must be understood and then slip away of its own accord when the disorder has been understood and thus made orderly.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 4 months ago by brian.