Hi Russ,

I have gone through the entire thread and although much has already been very well suggested to you, I thought of replying to you too.

I liked Nina’s suggestion and think that it may work well for you.
“perhaps you can go volunteer someplace – a solid 2 hours a week, no worries about socializing, appearing a certain way – simply going there to do a service and see a world outside of your own perception.”

When you are of service to others (without any expectations), you forget your own worries.

I have read all of your posts and fully agree with sadgirl – that you sound like a kind soul.

At the very beginning when you started this thread you said-
“Did not anticipate anyone would reply!”
and look now you are on the Page 3 of this thread with wonderful responses from people communicating with you.

You did not think you would get in touch with so many people in this way.
So notice the difference – Is the situation really causing the problem? OR is it the thoughts about the situation causing the problem?

“Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it. Always work with it, and not against it…This will miraculously transform your whole life” ~Eckhart Tolle

Take one moment of your life at a time. Do not think anything about the past or the future – will I have friends (future), what did the person at the church think of me (past).
Simply bring intense focus on whatever you are doing at “that” moment..on that one tiny segment of your life.

Simply say “hello” or respond to that person at the church and move on.
That moment is gone. So the next moment is you have started walking down the church. Another person passes you by. Do whatever action is required for that moment for eg; saying “hello” again. Then you would continue walking. So bring your attention back to your feet. Watch your steps as you are walking, as that is what you are doing at that time.
Walk as if your feet is kissing the ground.

“Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh (Zen master)

Just to give you another example-
“When we drink a glass of water, and if we know that we are drinking a glass of water, if we’re concentrated on the fact that we are drinking water, mindfulness is already there. And the water drinking becomes deeper, truer, and real.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh

You need to start watching/paying attention to your hand from the moment your hand reaches the glass of water, to holding the glass, to bringing it back close your mouth, to taking the sip, observing the water flowing through your throat. Just like the slow motion action replay on any sports channel. You will find out that while doing all of this, there was no mind activity about any other external situation because your full attention was on the drinking of water. I hope you get the point.

This will take your mind off of any activity going on in the head, and will make your life blissful, and you may well reach a stage where whether or not having any friends in your life doesn’t matter you anymore….You can then feel peaceful with yourself and give your time to your three beautiful children.

Remember, No judgement or criticism about any person (including yourself) or situation, or event. Give your fullest attention to whatever the moment presents. That will bring you to absolute stillness. You don’t even need to forcefully love yourself or others if you follow this. It will happen by itself.

This is practiced more by using a technique called as Mindfullness (there are lots of articles on the web to explore about this).

“Mindfulness means paying attention in a particular way: On purpose, in the present moment, non-judgmentally.” ~Jon Kabat-Zinn

Take care buddy,
VJ

• This reply was modified 7 years, 4 months ago by VJ.
• This reply was modified 7 years, 4 months ago by VJ.

Dear Russ,

It hasn’t been an easy process but worth it. I still feel anxious, low once in a while but I am better at coping with these states. There is more balance now. It was worth to make an attempt to change my outlook.

How I started was through plain research – looked through various kinds of therapies, self help books, talked to people who knew me well and I trusted them. During that time going to therapy was beyond my economic means, so i didnt opt for it. I did go eventually for a short while and felt that my problem was workable with right support and information.

Therapy teaches us the means to cope better but it is us who has to implement them after all when in distress. Medication is one way but there are more too. It boils down to understanding the problem and doing ones homework.

For example, here you can pick up the various points others have raised as possible areas to look into, strategies. Copy paste these down in word for now.

I accumulated all the ideas, points I came across relevant to my problem in a word doc with a big heading – “Means for change” – then of course the question came, what do I really want to change?

I always had a basic idea about what I hated about myself, my life but the list seemed never ending. I was worried all the time about everything possible. You can imagine how difficult it was to be this negative and anxious. This next list called what I want to change was huge as a result.

There were two things that I then considered :-

1) How do I like what I am and what I have?
2) what can I actually change?

This is where the serenity prayer comes in –

“grant me the serenity to accept what I can’t change, the courage to change what I can and the wisdom to know the difference”

Of course this process was messy and took time

So this is where the excel comes in –

Now I had tried to write here on what the excel really looked but I realize it’s too cumbersome to explain in words what is essentially a rather long doc. If you would like, I can send you the format and a sample. Share any email ID and I will send it across.

Ironically this internal audit was very helpful in helping me keep track of things and it appealed to my type A nature.

Regards
Nina

Hey Russ,

Forgot to ask you something though – which was the point of your first post, especially about friends.

What do you define as a friend?

How do you find them?

What does having a friend do for you?

Do you reckon it gets harder to make friends as one gets older?

What kind of friendship do you want?

What qualities do you generally look for in a friend?

According to me, there are acquaintances, people between acquaintances and friends, and then of course friends. The intimacy and familiarity varies accordingly.

Based on this, what do you really require? What’s the need they will serve for you?

You seem like a really considerate person bdw. I was very happy to see that you put the effort to personally reply to us all. Very rarely have I seen this and appreciate this.

Regards
Nina

Have you mentioned this anxiety about money to your therapist? I think a deeper assesment of its roots would be beneficial. How did it affect your relationship with your former spouse ?

(Sorry about the numerous questions 🙂 )

Dear Russ

I am going to get back to you soon about this once I go through the previous posts as well. I feel it would give me a better understanding of things.

One thing I am still unclear about is how did their time of financial difficulty affect you?

Were you a teen then or a kid? We’re there any instances you felt anxious or felt instances of irritation from them? What was the environment at home when this phase was going on?

What do you mean by “responsibility of it transferred” – does this mean when you went to college, or when you got married or when kids happened? When do you reckon the anxiety really got bad about this? Please explain this particular thing in detail in terms of who, when and how. Hope you don’t mind me bugging you with these questions 🙂

I will send you the file soon once I can find it after my laptop is back from repair. Do write back, it’s good to dig deeper into some specific areas and understanding ones own belief systems. Everything is oddly linked.

Regards
Nina

• This reply was modified 7 years, 4 months ago by Nina Sakura.