07-14-2015, 06:32 AM
You know I'm still trying to shake my habit of black and white thinking, my perfectionism. I just realized my obsession with being positive and how it causes resistance to anything negative. Lately when I've been feeling really down I've been trying to switch it around to the positive. But what I've learned is if deep down you really don't believe what you're saying, it only makes things worse. It's better to acknowledge the feelings and then do what I can to feel better, but it doesn't have to be a complete 180. And most of all stop beating myself up because I don't have the best self worth. Having low self worth isn't that great to begin with, but beating yourself up because you can't make yourself have higher self worth is even worse. Everything comes with time and I can't rush this stuff.
As an example I was working on a track the other day and thought it sounded good, then went to listen to one of my favorite producers. Mine couldn't really compare. Normally I'd try to make myself feel better by telling myself my track was good, it was just different. But I realized that was just me avoiding the painful feelings of not being good enough. So I just sat with those feelings instead and allowed them, then I looked at what I could improve on instead of feeling like a failure. No trying to hype myself up or cheer myself up, just acceptance and being objective instead of being overly attached to my work.
I'm just finding more and more that I should be more, instead of doing more. I'm always obsessed with micromanaging my thoughts in an effort to achieve some state of mind that I honestly don't know if it even exists outside of my imagination. In addition to that I've realized my fear of failure leads me to avoid taking action and I have this mistaken notion that if I just get everything right, one day it'll come to me. But it's just procrastination in a different disguise. There's a fine line between getting your mindset right vs waiting for things to get better by avoiding the troubling stuff. Avoidance only make things worse because then I'm giving more power to the things I fear, which consequently alters my life in a direction I don't want.
I think a lot of my rumination comes from a sort of free floating anxiety. Since my life feels like a mess I have this subtle kind of panic. I keep thinking that if I just practice relaxation techniques and meditate, then I can relieve it. But the solution is really just to change my circumstances so my life isn't a mess. It's daunting because I feel like I have so much to do and I'm so behind, but I know that's where the answer lies to remove this anxiety. The anxiety is telling me something, it's more like a symptom of a larger problem. So instead of expending energy being anxious about not having a job, I should spend that energy visualizing having one and working towards getting one I like.
As an example I was working on a track the other day and thought it sounded good, then went to listen to one of my favorite producers. Mine couldn't really compare. Normally I'd try to make myself feel better by telling myself my track was good, it was just different. But I realized that was just me avoiding the painful feelings of not being good enough. So I just sat with those feelings instead and allowed them, then I looked at what I could improve on instead of feeling like a failure. No trying to hype myself up or cheer myself up, just acceptance and being objective instead of being overly attached to my work.
I'm just finding more and more that I should be more, instead of doing more. I'm always obsessed with micromanaging my thoughts in an effort to achieve some state of mind that I honestly don't know if it even exists outside of my imagination. In addition to that I've realized my fear of failure leads me to avoid taking action and I have this mistaken notion that if I just get everything right, one day it'll come to me. But it's just procrastination in a different disguise. There's a fine line between getting your mindset right vs waiting for things to get better by avoiding the troubling stuff. Avoidance only make things worse because then I'm giving more power to the things I fear, which consequently alters my life in a direction I don't want.
I think a lot of my rumination comes from a sort of free floating anxiety. Since my life feels like a mess I have this subtle kind of panic. I keep thinking that if I just practice relaxation techniques and meditate, then I can relieve it. But the solution is really just to change my circumstances so my life isn't a mess. It's daunting because I feel like I have so much to do and I'm so behind, but I know that's where the answer lies to remove this anxiety. The anxiety is telling me something, it's more like a symptom of a larger problem. So instead of expending energy being anxious about not having a job, I should spend that energy visualizing having one and working towards getting one I like.
