[The Cloud]

I've been exploring the issue, and I believe that I have distilled down to the basic beliefs that are causing me difficulty.

My desires harm others.
I cannot allow myself to hurt others.
I am worthless.
I must do as I am told.

These all seem to cover a vast, vast collection of self-defeating behaviors that I have. I am worthless, so anything that I do I do wrong, and thus to the harm of the person I'm doing it for. But I must submit to authority, which forces me to cause harm to others, because to not do so is to invite negative consequences on myself. Also, should I express my desire for anything I want that I cannot procure for myself, I am being a burden on others. So my response is to separate myself as much as possible. This avoids the negative consequences to myself from punishment for my inevitable failure at any tasks I would be given. It also avoids any harm I may cause others by my failure at the tasks they give me. Additionally, I avoid harming anybody by burdening them with my own desires. It's the trifecta, the optimal solution for everybody involved.

I still don't know where exactly this is all coming from, but I have a good idea for some of it.

I believe I'm worthless: This comes from my step-father. He was very verbally abusive, so every day was a fresh assault on my self-esteem. I eventually came to believe that I was incapable of any success, or anything but failure for that matter.

I must do as I am told: This also comes from my step-father. We lived on a farm, and I had chores to do. If I did them, there was a good chance that I would do something wrong. But if I didn't do them, there was a 100% probability that I was bringing about the apocalypse, which boiled down to a world class ego-smashing from him to me. So I learned not to take joy in my work, because I would do it wrong and likely be punished for it anyways, but to do it only in order to avoid negative consequences.

My desires harm others: This one actually may have come from my mother, whom I love very much. As I said, I lived on a farm, which implies the middle of nowhere. Without a car, it would take an hour to even bike anywhere, so I couldn't do much about my own transportation. Despite that, I wanted to do things after school, or go to a friends house, or other social things. I would never willingly talk to my step-father, so that left my mom as the only person with a vehicle. But she never had time for me, there were always chores to do, or she was tired, or we were really busy and I needed to be home to help with the bottomless list of jobs the farm could generate. So only very rarely could she actually take me anywhere or host a friend of mine, and even on those times it was obvious to me that I was just putting more strain on her already very stressful life, what with my step-father constantly creating some kind of drama. So my desires were rarely met, and when they were they came at the cost of somebody I loved.

I cannot allow myself to harm others: This final one also comes from my step-father. I don't blame him for the way he is, but there are things about him that are very negative to be around. When he is around, everybody is more miserable. He makes everything more difficult, and it's always somebody else's fault when something goes wrong. I saw that, I saw what it did to me and the people I loved, and I hated it. I hated what he was. I hated it as much as I have in me to hate anything. So I suppose that at some point I resolved never to allow myself to become that. I may be worthless, I may be nothing, but I will never be less than nothing. Maybe I can't help, but I will never ever harm. That will be my contribution to the world, my highest aspiration; to do no harm.

This is all supposition. These beliefs may or may not come from the sources described. It just seems logical that these are the general episodes that spawned my current world-view. And I don't actually think in these terms, I've merely derived these terms from what I noticed about the way that I think. More implicit assumptions than explicit statements.

I don't know if I should post this, I don't even know what to do. I can't trust my feelings anymore. The behaviors that feel right now turn out to perhaps not be, the ones that feel wrong may not be, I can't feel the difference. This taints everything that I say and do, and I don't know how else to be. I'd say I'm sorry for filling up the forum with my personal issues, but I don't even know if it's wrong.