I believe I can't be good enough

[Lauxa]

All these belief threads recently, and I think I've found a big one for me...

I was arguing with the voice in my head, the one that hates me. It seems like I can find something that works to shut it up for a while, but it always comes back, bigger and badder than before. This time, I tried an old tip from Tony Robbins, about asking the right questions. Obviously, "why do you hate me?" isn't the right question, because the voice can list out my flaws all day but it's not very helpful. So I tried the question "what can I do to make you proud of me?" and the answer came back "nothing."

I was shocked, but at the same time I wondered how I had never noticed this belief before. I mean it wasn't exactly a subtle theme in my childhood -- the church upbringing I had was all based on the theory that humans can never be good enough for God, all our best attempts are like filthy menstrual rags, all we can do is believe in Jesus and then God will save us. And anyone who believes differently is going to hell.

Also, this belief comes with a big comes with a big corollary, "so why try?"

I'm not quite sure what to do with this now that I've noticed it. I've been trying out "as long as I'm here now that's good enough" but I'm not sure I'm convinced.

[Jarrod]

Don't fight your mind with your mind.

You have used your awareness to spot it, stay in awareness and know the sensations that show its presence. Then staying separate from it ask the universe (or your personal spiritual element or any other religious thing that you trust) to disintegrate it. If you keep asking like this (some would say praying) over time it weakens.

The most important thing was spotting it. Well done

[ocean001]

I don't think so,many things for better or for worse can happen to us in our lives.

[lasti]

Don't argue with this voice - you'll only make it stronger.
Observe it. Be aware of the moments when your mind is silent.

[geekchic9]

I've fought against this false belief, too -- and it is false, no matter what your mind says. I'm on medication, I've been in therapy for years, and I've found that nothing really helped.

Then, I read Ten Days to Self-Esteem by David D. Burns, M.D. I must admit that at first I was really skeptical of this book, because

• nothing had ever helped me significantly in 10 days or less before and
• this guy is a psychiatrist, and psychiatrists are usually focused on medication management and not therapy.

Here's how the book works: Take the self-tests at the beginning of each day -- they quantify your depression, anxiety, and relationship satisfaction. The first day, my scores were 27 on the depression self-test, 36 on the anxiety self-test, and 15 on the relationship satisfaction self-test. So, according to the corresponding charts, I had moderate depression, severe anxiety, and I was very dissatisfied with my relationship. I was really surprised my scores were so high on depression and anxiety, and so low on relationship satisfaction. It must have been because I had been depressed, anxious, and dissatisfied for so long I considered it "normal."

For the next 10 days, I repeated the self-tests, completed all the exercises, and did some of the optional additional reading. The exercises and reading teach you how to productively replace thoughts such as "I'm not good enough, so why try?" to more positive, self-affirming ones. At the end of the 10 days, my scores were 3 on depression, 9 on anxiety, and 7 on the relationship satisfaction. That meant I had no or minimal depression, borderline anxiety, and extreme dissatisfaction in my relationship. I was very happy with the improvement on the first two scores, and I realized that my relationship isn't going to get any better, so I'm going to dump the guy I'm seeing.

A couple of days ago, when I was feeling bad and slipping back into old habits, I took the depression and anxiety tests again. I had a 19 in depression and 21 in anxiety, which indicates borderline to mild depression and moderate anxiety. From these results, you might conclude that the book was only a short-term fix. Actually, the book predicts that you will relapse and will need to review the parts of the book that would help you over again. The book's purpose isn't simply to make you feel better in the short term, but actually get you to get better in the long term. So, I reviewed the parts I needed to review. I took the depression and anxiety tests again this morning, and I scored a 7 for depression and 9 for anxiety. That means that I am in the normal but unhappy range for depression and borderline anxiety. That's a marked improvement from a 19 and a 21 in just a couple of days.

I predict that as long as I keep referring to the book, I will improve in the long term. Despite the title, this is a long-term strategy book for combating depression and anxiety. Considering that it's helped me more than years of medication and therapy, I'm going to keep using it. That doesn't mean I'm going to quit my meds and therapy, though. I now view them as supplements to the work I'm doing on myself, and I'm not depending on them as much. It's not bad for a $17 investment, right? I highly recommend the book -- it's a lot cheaper, and in my opinion, it works better than meds and therapy by themselves.