Iâm laughing, but thereâs a super useful corollary, which my husband calls âthe Red Balloon.â He was a defense lawyer and had a fair number of drug addicts come through, and there is a thing where if youâre like, on your first offense, theyâll do a thing where you can go to treatment and if you complete it theyâll take the conviction off your record.Â
And he would tell his clients, âLook, everyoneâs going to tell you not to do drugs. Theyâre going to say it over and over again. And itâs like, if people tell you not to think of a white elephant, youâre going to think of a white elephant. But the trick to not thinking about a white elephant is to think of a red balloon. So you need to find your red balloon. For some people itâs yoga. For others itâs woodworking. For some people itâs scrapbooking or gardening or any of a long list of things to do. They focus on that, itâs a lot easier to succeed in ignoring the white elephant.â
So yeah, âwatch yourselfâ is one thing⊠but the better idea is to watch something else. (Even if itâs fanfic about werewolves fucking.)
Itâs a form of productive dissociation, and is super, super helpful.
Itâs easy for me to get bogged down in how much pain Iâm in⊠but some of the most painful periods of my life have also been the most productive, writing-wise, because writing is one of my red balloons.Â
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