I do not know anyone who has not struggled with coming to terms with Cognitive dissonance/distortions at some time in their life.

Particularly during the transition from one stage of life to another. During these transitions what we were taught, how ‘life should be’ comes in into conflict with our experiences. In many cases we will work very hard to deny that any dissonance exists and admitting any dissonance threatens our sense of identity and belonging to our community. (Equals sadness, depression, existential angst) As Socrates suggests coming to terms with such dissonance and distortions require the life long purist to “Know Thy-Self”

For me the study of how the stories we tell ourselves influence our experiences has been a great help. How much do the stories we tell ourselves create our experiences and how much do our experiences create our stories? Its always a bit of both I think, so its important that we become conscious of when which is happening and in this way,  we become the master of our stories.

A book I found that help a great deal with this idea of mastering our stories was ‘Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes are High‘ by Kerry Patterson

You might be asking yourself how a book about communication could help with CMT to which I would answer that Conversation is not just about how we talk to others but also how we talk to ourselves. Becoming the master of how you speak with yourself and you are well on the way to mastering your stories and recognising any dissonance before they take you for a ride.

Another exercise that I found helpful with CMT is becoming aware of the most common cognitive distortions. In this way when I hear myself telling a story I am better able to identity any distortions I may be creating. This creates a space to where I can respond to a experience vice react.

15 common cognitive distortions

1. Filtering. We take the negative details and magnify them while filtering out all positive aspects of a situation. For instance, a person may pick out a single, unpleasant detail and dwell on it exclusively so that their vision of reality becomes darkened or distorted.
2. Polarized Thinking (or “Black and White” Thinking). In polarized thinking, things are either “black-or-white.” We have to be perfect or we’re a failure — there is no middle ground. You place people or situations in “either/or” categories, with no shades of gray or allowing for the complexity of most people and situations. If your performance falls short of perfect, you see yourself as a total failure.
3. Overgeneralization. In this cognitive distortion, we come to a general conclusion based on a single incident or a single piece of evidence. If something bad happens only once, we expect it to happen over and over again. A person may see a single, unpleasant event as part of a never-ending pattern of defeat.
4. Jumping to Conclusions. Without individuals saying so, we know what they are feeling and why they act the way they do. In particular, we are able to determine how people are feeling toward us.
5. Catastrophizing. We expect disaster to strike, no matter what. This is also referred to as “magnifying or minimizing.” We hear about a problem and use what if questions (e.g., “What if tragedy strikes?” “What if it happens to me?”). With practice, you can learn to answer each of these cognitive distortions.
6. Personalization. Personalization is a distortion where a person believes that everything others do or say is some kind of direct, personal reaction to the person. We also compare ourselves to others trying to determine who is smarter, better looking, etc.
7. Control Fallacies. If we feel externally controlled, we see ourselves as helpless a victim of fate. For example, “I can’t help it if the quality of the work is poor, my boss demanded I work overtime on it.” The fallacy of internal control has us assuming responsibility for the pain and happiness of everyone around us. For example, “Why aren’t you happy? Is it because of something I did?”
8. Fallacy of Fairness. We feel resentful because we think we know what is fair, but other people won’t agree with us. As our parents tell us when we’re growing up and something doesn’t go our way, “Life isn’t always fair.” People who go through life applying a measuring ruler against every situation judging its “fairness” will often feel badly and negative because of it. Because life isn’t “fair” — things will not always work out in your favor, even when you think they should.
9. Blaming. We hold other people responsible for our pain, or take the other track and blame ourselves for every problem. For example, “Stop making me feel bad about myself!” Nobody can “make” us feel any particular way — only we have control over our own emotions and emotional reactions.
10. Shoulds. We have a list of ironclad rules about how others and we should behave. People who break the rules make us angry, and we feel guilty when we violate these rules. A person may often believe they are trying to motivate themselves with shoulds and shouldn’ts, as if they have to be punished before they can do anything. For example, “I really should exercise. I shouldn’t be so lazy.” Musts and oughts are also offenders. The emotional consequence is guilt. When a person directs should statements toward others, they often feel anger, frustration and resentment.
11. Emotional Reasoning. We believe that what we feel must be true automatically. If we feel stupid and boring, then we must be stupid and boring. You assume that your unhealthy emotions reflect he way things really are — “I feel it, therefore it must be true.”
12. Fallacy of Change. We expect that other people will change to suit us if we just pressure or cajole them enough. We need to change people because our hopes for happiness seem to depend entirely on them.
13. Global Labeling. We generalize one or two qualities into a negative global judgment. These are extreme forms of generalizing, and are also referred to as “labeling” and “mislabeling.” Instead of describing an error in context of a specific situation, a person will attach an unhealthy label to themselves.
14. Always Being Right. We are continually on trial to prove that our opinions and actions are correct. Being wrong is unthinkable and we will go to any length to demonstrate our rightness. For example, “I don’t care how badly arguing with me makes you feel, I’m going to win this argument no matter what because I’m right.” Being right often is more important than the feelings of others around a person who engages in this cognitive distortion, even loved ones.
15. Heaven’s Reward Fallacy. We expect our sacrifice and self-denial to pay off, as if someone is keeping score. We feel bitter when the reward doesn’t come.

Hi Zita

“There is a lot of chaos inside me and I keep searching for that stillness”

If you have ever read anything about chaos theory you might see that there is order in chaos. If you can learn to breathe through this paradox you may find that within chaos there is also stillness.

Stillness is a paradox. Even when we are still we are moving at amazing speeds through the universes. From which point then can we measure that we are still? The word Seeking is a verb, life is karma (action) cause and affect / movement. As long as someone is seeking stillness as separate from movement it will never be found.

It is when your mind can be calm within movement, the center of the hub of the spinning wheel, that you will discover what you seek and what you seek you already possess.

Here is a riddle for you

“At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;
Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,
But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,
Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,
Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,
There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.” – TS Elliot

Hi Nirvair

I have a friend that is certain that she can remember many past lives and like many who have the same experience spends a lot of time looking for ways to prove the experiences are “real”. (begs the question what makes a experience real? )

My opinion is that such searches to prove and explain the experiences  are interesting but often misses the opportunity to learn something about ourselves from them.

A question I might ask myself is what blue eyes might mean to me. Blue is often symbol of spirituality and enlightenment but it is also a symbol for cold.  Can “enlightenment” also leave one feeling cold?

I like what the bible has to say about such experiences – “But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart”  There is a time to share such experiences but also a time to treasure them up.  Words have a bad habit of diminishing a experiences, especially the words of others who are more then willing to tell you what qualifies as a real experience.

• This reply was modified 7 years, 1 month ago by Peter.

Sounds to me like the guy has issues with the idea of love and relationship in general.
For whatever reasons he’s not ready or willing to to work on a relationship. This is about him not you, and better you know now before spending anymore time on it. You can’t fix him. If you did get back together, my bet is that it will become one of those on again, off again, on again, off again…. relationships.

All of the methods mentioned in the rant can be helpful, however if the aim is enlightenment your likely to miss the target. Or not… as such practice tend to lead to the realisation that what your seeking you all ready have and so don’t need the practice. There is a zen story I like.

A senior monk and a junior monk were traveling together. At one point, they came to a river with a strong current. As the monks were preparing to cross the river, they saw a very young and beautiful woman also attempting to cross. The young woman asked if they could help her cross to the other side.

The two monks glanced at one another because they had taken vows not to touch a woman.

Then, without a word, the older monk picked up the woman, carried her across the river, placed her gently on the other side, and carried on his 
journey.

The younger monk couldn’t believe what had just happened. After rejoining his companion, he was speechless, and an hour passed without a word between them.

Two more hours passed, then three, finally the younger monk could contain himself any longer, and blurted out “As monks, we are not permitted a woman, how could you then carry that woman on your shoulders?”

The older monk looked at him and replied, “Brother, I set her down on the other side of the river, why are you still carrying her?”

There are variations on the story. In one the student builds a raft to cross the river. Once across the master asks the student if, because the raft was useful, if he should to carry the raft with on his back as he continues the journey.

I think the lesson is that a student must always be prepared to let go of any teaching or practice once it has served its purpose. It is very easy to mistake the raft for the journey.

Thanks Neville

Of course, my “Spiritual Team” selected the theme of “thinking to much” for my soul to live out. So I’m fulfilling my purpose. ?

“Open your mind and your life and be like an empty bucket waiting for the gap between your thoughts to fill you with infinite wisdom” I like that, and to fulfill my purpose I must ask, how thought, action and wisdom relate to each other. If I think about what is filling the bucket do I change the substance of what is in the bucket, yet if I do not think about it and make it conscious what is learned, what is wisdom?

The first meaning of emptiness is called “emptiness of essence,” which means that phenomena [that we experience] have no inherent nature by themselves.” The second is called “emptiness in the context of Buddha Nature,” which sees emptiness as endowed with qualities of awakened mind like wisdom, bliss, compassion, clarity, and courage. Ultimate reality is the union of both emptinesses – Ari

• This reply was modified 7 years, 1 month ago by Peter.

I’ve often wondered… what if ones “Soul Contract” theme chosen was to struggle with the question of meaning and purpose. In such a case a person would be fulfilling their purpose by not knowing their purpose.

With regards to the idea of Soul Contract on the one hand I can see the benefit of believing that I choose to experience the theme of suffering/depression in this life time. (the exercise of free will happening before consciousness) What can I do I chose it might as well go all in and experience it fully without worrying about it? Ah but the theme includes the experience of wanting to overcome the depression as that’s part of the experience of suffering. There is no way out. No free will, all the choices made before consciousness.

The image that comes to mind is a soul voyeur going on vacation in an experience simulator, the avatar a play thing of the soul. Perhaps life in the spirit realm is boring and the soul longs to feel something, so anything it feels pain or joy is good but I find no comfort in that.

Do you have any thoughts as to what is behind your depression? Is it mostly brain chemistry, existential angst, traumatic past event, a little of everything.?

For the longest time I was depressed about being depressed. Depression is like that, it likes to work its way in like a cancer and reproduce it self.

In the words of Sun Tzu “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”

That said I don’t like looking at depression as an enemy as that tends to set up resistance and depression is very good a using resistance and turning it against ourselves. We are after all resisting ourselves. As Walk Helly said “We have met the enemy and he is us”.  You don’t want to become your own enemy and work against yourself… which if your depressed you probably are. Still the advice holds true, if you know your self and know your depression you need not fear.

Today I might say I have a relationship with depression. There is, I think, a time for all things even depression however I no longer fear it and not fearing it know its time will pass.