Dear Lukas,

you’re very welcome.

My parents never judged materialistic people, they themselves are very “rich” without living like it, also had friends which were living a very materialistic life.

That’s good to hear – so you actually had a good role-model: your parents are rich and humble.

I think I need to make a choice in some sort of way, I don’t want o to impoverish myself, but I want to leave the consumption-oriented business, I think these things are harming our planet and our future livelihood and I can see and feel that this is not in accordance to what I want to be living.

That’s a very good, a very noble striving. To not add to destruction of our planet and exploitation of people and resources, but instead to do something positive, something that adds real value. I admire you and support you in that striving, Lukas!

You don’t need to impoverish yourself, indeed, but come up with a different business model, where you’re doing something worth-while, something with purpose, something that makes you feel good about yourself.

Living a capitalistic life and nurturing capitalistic tendencies don’t go together with my concept of not harming other living beings.

A while ago I’ve come across a website called consciouscapitalism dot org. You may want to check it out, it seems like their values might align with yours…

I wish you all the best in finding your way – a way that aligns with your highest values and yet provides income for you. If you ever feel like sharing about your journey, be it successes or challenges, you are very welcome. I am rooting for you!

Dear Lukas,

in addition to all the great input you’ve already received, something occurred to me that might be relevant for your situation. You say:

my parents never valued anyone more than an other, they are the real Buddhists without knowing, truly beautiful people.

i cant manage to be happy with what i have – which is plenty. I can manage this in nearly every other Situation but not in this. And it really dissapoints me with myself that i am this “unnobel”

When you say your parents were “real Buddhists without knowing it”, it occurred to me that perhaps you were brought up with the idea that you should be happy with little, and that seeking material success is not very noble, not too enlightened? And when you see your brother achieve that material success, you’re jealous, because a part of you would like to be successful too, but another part believes it’s wrong to have it?

Dear Addy,

yeah unfortunately covid is still around, and even if it’s omicron and I’ve been vaccinated 3 times, it’s not too easy on me. Thank you for the advice – I’ll try the ginger tea with honey and lemon…

It’s good you’re realizing that some inner child work is necessary too, and that you can’t only focus on the future without addressing the past.

Today I was thinking about a question you posed earlier – why it is that you’re afraid of emotional intimacy and feel trapped in relationships:

I shun emotional closeness and I’m not sure why…

Now I started to think I do have the issue of expressing my emotions or share it openly

When they [a girl that you like] finally start to get even closer with me, I just feel like I don’t know how to explain but like trapped?

Well, I think it’s because you were taught not to show your feelings (your “bad” feelings, such as anger and hurt and sadness). You were taught to always show a happy face and never complain. And you probably believe that this is how it should be in romantic relationships too.

If you believe that you cannot be honest with the other person, that you need to pretend to be perfect (perfectly happy and capable and optimistic and driven) – then no wonder you’ll feel trapped.

So it seems to me that you believe – due to your childhood conditioning – that you need to fake it in relationships, and you don’t want that. You’d rather be alone.

Anyway, that’s my best guess…

What do you think?

Dear Addy,

Well, it’s not the best weekend for me because I tested positive for covid today, and am having a pretty massive headache. But it’s a little better now than a few hours ago, and thankfully, I am able to reply 🙂

Let me be frank: it seems to me that you’re in a bit of a Protector mode again, since you’re now trying to diminish the bad that happened in your childhood (your father harshly criticizing you for even small “imperfections”, getting furious and yelling at you, easily losing patience with you). Here is what you said earlier about it:

My father is a civil engineer and perfectionist and he gets angry if things aren’t going as he wants it to be. And in my teenage I used to help him even though I didn’t really wanted it but in my head I was like no let me help.. But whenever I do something wrong, or get anxious to find tool or take some more time to find.. He’d get furious and scold me

Once while working he told me find something and I couldn’t find it and he give me like a “dead eye” and I got really frustrated and I screamed at him and ran into my room and like “I ain’t no living here no more” but my mom stopped me tried so solve this matter.

What you’re mentioning now (in your latest post) is only that he was comparing you to other boys in your village, and that all parents were doing that. But that’s not the only thing he was doing, was he? It was his anger and rage at you that was truly damaging to your psyche, and then in addition, there was comparison and criticism if you haven’t performed as well as others. This kind of treatment for sure left a mark on you, even if you claim it hasn’t.

Anita already talked about it (not sure if on this thread or elsewhere) that in childhood our psyche is like a sponge and soaks in both the good and the bad conditioning. That’s why the first 7 years of our life are called formative years. So even if you think that some things that happened to you weren’t a big deal – from an adult’s perspective – they were a pretty big deal for you as a child. And it left a mark on you, your self-confidence, your relationships etc.

So please Addy, don’t try to minimize what happened to you. Your father unfortunately wasn’t a loving and kind father, but a strict, judgmental and angry father. Perhaps he was sometimes nice to you, but only on those occasions when you did everything “perfectly”. Otherwise he wasn’t pleasant at all, as it seems to me.

You are also finding excuses for your mother. But she did tell you to stay silent and not confront your father, hasn’t she? When he criticized you, when he was extremely harsh with you, you were supposed to endure it silently and “turn the other cheek”. Because in your culture, the father needs to be respected, even if he is a bully.

Your mother didn’t want conflict indeed, but on what terms? Well, the terms were that you suppress your protest and your justified anger (and your natural self-defense mechanism), and keep silent. This is how you’ve learned not to set boundaries, to never say directly and openly if something bothers you. To never complain. To not act in your best interest (because sometimes it is in our interest to protect ourselves). Your mother taught you that.

She pleaded at your reason, telling you that you should be more mature than your father:

My mom to me is like “one of you have be the understanding one, Now you decide”

She presented it (enduring abuse) as a virtue. And you obeyed. You decided to be the “understanding one”, who will take the abuse silently. And so you accepted – due to your mother’s programming – that you cannot protect yourself from your father’s anger, that he has the right to disrespect you whenever he pleases, and you should just swallow it. This is how she disabled you from setting healthy boundaries.

I am not saying that you should be angry at either your father or mother, and go to attack them and tell them all your grievances. No, that’s not what I am saying. But what I am saying is that you need to first accept that certain abuse and false, harmful conditioning happened in your childhood. Even if your parents didn’t know better – even if they didn’t do anything outside of your culture – still, they have harmed you. Their parenting left a mark on you, left certain wounds in your psyche, which you need to heal. If you want to have a happy and fulfilling life.

Admitting that the damage happened – even if your parents didn’t do it on purpose – is the first step to healing.

Dear humour,

if you relate to these things, then you too, like me and so many others, are probably suffering from Complex PTSD (C-PTSD), which is another word for childhood trauma. A good book on C-PTSD is “A practical guide to Complex PTSD: Compassionate Strategies to Begin Healing from Childhood Trauma“, by Arielle Schwartz.

Another great book to start with, perhaps a little easier read, is “Running on Empty: Overcome your Childhood Emotional Neglect“, by Jonice Webb.

I did not have any communication with my mother growing up. She used to be very busy. Its only since a few years we talk to each other.

This sounds like you were emotionally neglected by your mother. She was so busy that she didn’t have time for you, not even to talk to you, not to mention meet your emotional needs, such as soothe and calm you down when you’re upset, protect you, cheer you on, praise you, encourage you etc etc. If your mother didn’t really pay attention to you, she couldn’t meet your emotional needs either, and as a result, you couldn’t develop self-confidence and other capacities for happiness…

You said you never went on holidays, never spent time together, never even had a meal together… Was it because both of your parents worked incredibly hard, practically non stop? But even so, how come you never had a meal together?

You also said you wanted to make your family happy. What have you tried to do, which you hoped would make them happy? Of course, if you’d like to share…

Dear Katrine,

I am so glad that this year has been one of the best years of your life, because as you say, you’ve had some major successes, in spite of the struggle and challenges. But you’ve really made great progress, and so yes, you should be happy about it, and also proud of yourself!

It’s also great that you’re realizing how supportive your colleagues are (specially X and Y), and that they are in fact safe people – people who accept you as you are, don’t judge you and wish the best for you. So I hope that you’ll be able to relax even more in their company. The goal would be to become so relaxed around them to actually invite yourself to the New Year’s party (!!) instead of waiting for them to invite you. To say something like “hey girls, I decided I’d like to celebrate this New Year’s Eve properly – is there still space at your party? I’d love to join after my shift is over.” I am sure they wouldn’t have anything against it, in fact they would be thrilled.

I know that you said it would be pathetic if you invited yourself, but it’s not pathetic at all. It’s called self-confidence. You’ve already established that you are liked by many people, and by X and Y particularly. So you could just approach them with that attitude of openness, of cheerfulness, of self-acceptance… and I am sure they will welcome you with open arms!

I’m gonna start to watch Dr Nicole Lepera’s videos tonight. Being in the overwhelming state of fight/flight is by far the harddest for me to deal with. Like the time in the bar where a girl was flirting with him, that one was so strong it took me a week to return to my baseline. A process a want to speed up so for one I don’t do anything that I might regret and also because it’s extremely hard on your mind a body to be in.

I hear you when you say it’s hard to not slip into the fight-or-flight mode, once you are in a challenging situation. I do hope Dr. Lepera’s videos will help. Anita mentioned DBT and mindfulness, which are great methods for emotion regulation. The key is to breathe deeply, from your belly, and remain in your observer mind (observing your racing thoughts and feelings, knowing that those thoughts are trauma-driven thoughts and not true. So you just observe them but don’t believe them. You mentally separate yourself from them.)

I’ve also come across a very informative youtube channel, called Lewis Psychology. There is a video called “DBT skills: Wise Mind, Emotion Mind and Reasonable Mind.” I liked the idea of the wise mind a lot. We want to stay as much as possible in the wise mind, so perhaps having a mantra such as “I am anchored in my wise mind” would even help in the situations you’re triggered. I don’t know, haven’t tried it myself yet, but it just occurred to me that having a mantra that goes together with deep breathing might be a good idea in those situations.

It’s really good to hear that you’re more willing to go out and hang out with people, and even challenge yourself in situations which earlier would have been uncomfortable. That’s great – you’re building your “socializing muscle”, if there is such a word. Probably not, but you know what I meant to say 🙂

The only thing I am a bit wary of is the fact that your new flatmates will be a couple. I’d feel a little strange in such a constellation, but then again, I’ve never had a flatmate 🙂 I do hope it works out for you!

Dear humour,

My mother has grown weak with age but she has returned to her usual strong self. She just wants to see me happy.

It’s good to hear your mother has gotten stronger again and “can do without you”, i.e. doesn’t depend on your help. My mother also always said she wants me to be happy, however she criticized me a lot while I was growing up and didn’t have faith in me. So she kind of ruined my capacity to be happy… It took me many years to regain it…

And it’s always like that with childhood trauma – it ruins or severely limits our capacity for happiness. For example, we may feel confused and incapable of knowing what’s good for us. We don’t trust ourselves. I was like that. It came from my mother’s criticism of me, and then later I made some wrong choices, which left me feeling I can’t trust my judgment and I don’t know what is good for me.

It seems that you too have a similar belief about yourself:

I may be falling behind in life, not sure of the choices I have made, little afraid to make choices for the future. Everyone around me seems to be making a lot of progress. I don’t think I have failed but I feel I have not lived upto my true potential.

It seems you too believe that you can’t trust your judgment and that you’re afraid of making choices in the future. Another belief that I see in your words is “I am falling behind, I am worse than others”, which usually boils down to “I am a failure.” I had this belief for a long time too.

My false core beliefs are mostly the consequence of my mother’s heavy criticism, and then my father not protecting me from it, not standing up for me. So I was alone mostly, no one giving me encouragement and support, and no one telling me that I was lovable and worthy. I adopted the belief that I was faulty to my core. And also worthless.

I wonder what your family dynamics was. You did share a little about your family, mostly that yours wasn’t a happy and “normal” family. And that you tried everything to make them happy, but failed. What was your relationship with your mother, i.e. your father when you were a child? Because it defines what messages and false beliefs we adopt about ourselves.

Dear Addy,

you’re welcome, I am glad you liked the example.

Just today I’ve tried to empathize my friend, but the thing was that her stupidity made me little grumpy so.. Like who reads negative news (Murder and etc) super early in the morning and then be like “It felt like a nightmare”?

As anita said, when you see someone as stupid, it prevents you to empathize with them. OK, maybe you don’t see her as stupid, but you thought her behavior is stupid (to read the news first thing in the morning). But even so, an empathic response would have been something like “Oh that’s terrible” (reacting to the news of some murder). And then proceed with a suggestion “you know, that’s why I never read news so early in the morning – sometimes they are so horrible they spoil my entire day. I prefer to start with xyz…” (here you describe what helps you start your day in a positive, uplifting way).

So you empathize with her feeling of distress, and then you suggest something which might help her in the future. But you don’t push your opinion on her (specially since she didn’t ask for your advice), and you don’t treat her as inferior to you. If you do that, you won’t sound grumpy or condescending…

And for work I had to speak in Indirect way to one of the colleague ” like yeah it’s not like I told you to do it 3 days before. Obviously, you have other important stuff to do” but after that I felt like I did hurt her in some way.

Yes, that was rather cynical. Was it your subordinate to whom you said that? Was she supposed to complete a task and failed to do that, and this was your way of scolding/criticizing her?

I don’t know why attacking like that is a reflex for me

Being cynical and sarcastic is a defense mechanism. I think it happens when our heart is closed (guarded), and so we’re not able to empathize with others. A lot of people use it in communication on social media, specially when they argue with people with differing opinions, because it seems cool. When you use sarcasm, you’re not vulnerable. It’s like a shield. But when you use sarcasm with people with whom you want to have a close, friendly relationship, that’s a problem. Because we don’t want to throw poisonous darts at them. Rather, we won’t honest and open communication…

If you use sarcasm automatically, like a reflex, it could be because you were attacked a lot in your childhood, and you learned to close your heart and pretend it doesn’t hurt. And then you use poisonous darts to defeat the “enemy”. Maybe it’s like you’re saying “you can’t hurt me, I’ll rather hurt you“.

Maybe I buried something so deep for so long that I don’t even remember but it’s still there and I don’t know how to work on that

It could be that you built a shield around your heart, so you can’t be hurt again? And this shield goes up automatically, whenever you feel a certain friction or disagreement with anybody? And you start throwing those “darts” at them?