Dear Anita,

Thanks for your explanation and earlier reply. Now I read your thread, I find it easier to explain why after all I am unable to share my situation with anyone. It is indeed feelings of shame and guilt that don’t let me speak out loud what’s inside my head, and because of it I still cannot say all this in front of anyone. I feel that one reason behind my evident lack of self-compassion is this ‘figurative pus’ you mentioned, which makes me judge myself for my thoughts and doesn’t let me do thing for my betterment. But, I didn’t understand how my shame and guilt are fueling my emotions of despair, hopelessness etc.?

I don’t know how much of a role my father played in this thing. Its true that my parents kept some unrealistic expectations from me in terms of academics, behavior etc. and I was criticized for every small thing, That did cause an internal critic within me but I do not particularly feel that my father’s sermons instilled shame and guilt in me. But, its been pointed out to me by some of my closest people that I do have a habit of self-loathing, so maybe that is related with my guilt and/or shame related with my intrusive thoughts? Please tell me something I can do to ease these harmful emotions so that I can reach out for help and stop giving so much pain to myself. I will try to talk to my therapist, I am thinking to send her a compiled journal entry but I feel I am not ready to talk about this thing in-person with anyone right now.

One more thing, Anita. I feel like my intrusive thought patterns have also harmed my perspective towards life. Sometimes when I am in a spiral, I feel that life is pointless. Somedays I am upbeat, but remaining days I am just down in the dumps, and then I begin thinking like this. For example this thought came to me- I gave a huge amount of effort for my masters, even when I was struggling a lot with my mental and physical health, and all of it was on the verge of becoming zero- I couldn’t do anything. And when I finally got the scholarship, even in that I was just a passive recipient, it just happened to me.  What is the point of putting in your life and efforts when everything is so random? When everything is decided by supposed uncontrollable factors that in real life are actually like that scholarship official, what is the point of things after all? True, at the end, getting that scholarship had become as random as the entire fiasco, and all these thoughts seemingly make me question everything. Its like I achieved my goal, but am paying a high cost for it. After all, these intrusive thoughts and emotional issues  are also a challenge. So does this mean that anyways, all I have to do is to keep facing challenges? I cannot remember the last time when I had a long period of substantial mental peace. How does it make sense after all? It feels like no matter how hard I try, I can never find mental peace, and even after moving to a better place in life (like getting the scholarship) will bring more trauma.

Thanks

Kshitij