#emotion hacking

[hexpatient]

another therapy thing is like, "now what if you could [basically stop being a human being]?"

trying to get me to agree that i should stop feeling fear entirely, that i should stop having negative thoughts, that i should stop being influenced by my circumstances... ultimately, thats all just human being stuff. no, i cant stop that. and im not going to try because thats a punishing and fucking impossible task you jackass.

i read a quote earlier today and i wont track it down to share it but it said something like, when you realize the kind of internal thought scripts you go through repeatedly, you come to realize how dumb it is to keep doing that. stop doing that. (ok thats not what it said but thats what i took away from it lol) like.

dont you think i would love to not have the same spiral every day. id love to. i promise i would love to. and lemme tell you, i have practiced many different avenues of trying to stop it, but have mostly been unsuccessful because thats the nature of my existence in this world: i have the same ~10 breakdowns repeatedly, not because im weak and never try to stop, but because ... such is life sometimes. sometimes the unpleasant realities of life win. and its not some kind of failure of mine. im always trying anyway cause i dont want to suffer but it really is very much outside of my control. welcome to life on earth.

im personally not interested in aspiring to a literally impossible ideal. id rather acknowledge that shit sucks and im not going to be able to transcend it no matter what, so its ok that i experience pain and im not going to punish myself for feeling pain, thereby adding even more pain and shame. no thanks.

[hexpatient]

emotion hacking

so much of therapy (and the grey area of self help as well) is just unreasonable unhuman expectations for people that i call emotion hacking. its like a life hack or even biohacking in that its fucking stupid and often really rigid skills and rituals to try and transcend human weakness. for example, the idea that you should just choose to feel neutral or good about something bad happening to you. or "reframing" "negative beliefs" as a supposed way to change your life (change your mindset change your world, but thats not how reality works...), or using thought and emotion stopping techniques to silence the pain while the damage continues. punishing and conditioning yourself to radically accept miserable circumstances, to deny objective reality, to choose happiness. to master all these twisted skills and rituals so you can thrive in the midst of anything because you have exalted yourself above the shameful human condition of being influenced emotionally by your hellish circumstances.

its literally inhumane. would jt be nice if i could just decide out of nowhere to feel good no matter what? i guess. would it be nice to just ~let go~ of my lifetime's worth of trauma and ptsd and not "live in fear" anymore? maybe so, but thats fucking stupid and not the point. but its so incredibly unrealistic to the point of parody. why is it my job to transcend being miserable because i live in a hell world. why is it so bad and so evil for me to be sad or afraid because bad and scary things keep happening to me. its just another fucked up pseudo-spiritual thing that implies the real problem is my reaction to hell, not the hell itself. im not a robot who needs to be reprogrammed. im not a failure for being affected by the things around me. i am a human being and i shouldnt have to become something else more holy. that transcendental expectation is fucking brutal. id rather be authentically miserable than rigidly emotionally controlled into fake happiness.

[hexpatient]

me seeing this meme: suffering thrice. way to miss the fucking point about fear and anxiety.

"Dont forget to be ashamed!"

[hexpatient]

i also obsess over trying to find the secret to becoming indifferent to ppl being mean/cruel/bullies/etc to me. but there just isnt. there just isnt a way. and even if it makes me look weak or whatever i wish i could just let myself be affected by that instead of trying to play it cool. cause that shit hurts. loaded language hits hard. manipulation manipulates me. insults make me feel bad about myself. taunting makes me irritable and afraid. humiliation makes me extremely embarrassed to the point of physical pain. accusations make me confused and feel doubtful and i take it to heart because i dont want to be bad. bad faith arguments are distracting. being lied to results in me beliving something that isnt true. etcetera. i am not immune. and its impossible to be imune. and im not wrong for having reactions to bad behaviors.

but yeah man if life hacking my way into rigid emotional control actually worked, it would be fucking nice! if i could thought and emotion control myself into only feeling and thinking things that are acceptable and pleasant, that would be nice. but human beings just cant do that. transcending pain is impossible. and i think anyone who tries to tell me they have the answer whether its Science or religion or self help or thought magics or magic or behavior modifiers or emotion hacks or skills or rituals, they are lying. and not only lying but probably will end up hurting me harder in the long run. i am not falling short by experiencing pain due to painful situations. it means i am a real person living in the world. the societal expectation for me to be indifferent is a cruel and impossible one. and therapy acting like they have the secrets of the universe about pain is also lie.

[hexpatient]

therapy is trying to sell you that there’s some science or magic way to feel good and ok even when life is terrible. and there really isn’t. you may be able to find some small pockets of joy even in misery, or learn some skills for coping a little better, but there is no way to thrive in hell. but that’s what therapy promises, and then when you don’t get there, it’s somehow your magical evil fault. when i was in ACT, they wanted us to learn to “not just survive, but thrive in a crisis”. and that’s just an incredibly unreasonable expectation.

it reminds me of the biohacking thing, specifically the kind where if you just eat and exercise and take supplements on a rigid schedule, you will reach this incredible level of health that you’re almost not human anymore. it hinges on supernatural/spiritual transcendence,. and that’s what therapy is doing. you can’t therapy hack or mental health hack or emotion hack a life under oppression and capitalism and all the other horrors into one that is excellent out of controlling your thoughts and emotions with therapy skills and rituals. feeling bad in a shitty world is normal and you deserve to feel better, but in order to improve how you feel, we need to change the world into one that’s worth living in instead of using thought and emotion stopping techniques to silence the pain. 

[hexpatient]

[no photo ID] how is someone supposed to go from fear zone "i get mad easily" to "i recognize that we are all trying to do our best"? the learning zone stuff is not an actionable behavior... it is a result of something. a result of what though? i dont fucking know! theres several internal growth steps between these different "zones" that are not explained.

its a mindset magic thing i think. they just expect you to somehow have control over how you see things and just change it (Just Do It). just Change your mindset. but like. mindsets are not purely the source of how you see things. mindsets are also a result of how things are. if i have a "negative mindset", its because my mindset has been constructed to match reality, not to create and define it.

maybe NT people can Just Do It and change their mindset. i dont know. but i cant just change the way i see things, at least partially because i choose how to see things based on evidence and facts and observations??? so when i get told i should see it differently, im like uh so you want me to believe lies?? a false version of reality??? (yes. thats what they want.)

this infographic is so unhinged in general like did you notice the "growth zone" thing that says "i am happy and hopeful"??? again i was handed this around march-may 2020 so this was at the extremely chaotic and deadly beginnings of the covid pandemic. and the Good and Correct way to Be zone says "be happy and hopeful" uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh why is that an expectation?

i can understand these things are supposed to be steps. but like. when you're in the kind of fear that the pandemic caused, you can't just choose to slide towards growth somehow. it's an incomplete chronological order of events. and being handed this only really resounded "here's what you are doing Wrong" not "How to learn to do better." it gives me the goals only, not how to get there.

[hexpatient]

in one of the IOP day program lessons we talked about motivation. we talked about what motivates us, and the pitfalls because it can dissipate quickly and then you just stop working towards your goals. and the leader asked us something like "so what do you do when you run out of motivation?" and we kinda shrugged and looked at each other and said "give up until the motivation comes back i guess idk, unless you're one of those freaks who has discipline."

and the ending message was that "the most crucial time to continue to work on your goals is specifically when you have lost motivation." which is like. ok sure but people dont often work like that. if u have Discipline to make yourself work towards goals even when you're not feeling it, then cool and great. but a lot of people just dont. so how exactly are us regular people supposed to persist through low motivation? Just Do It! its a life hack emotion hack that is just unrealistic: Just Do It! somehow. how exactly? Do it. its another one of those logical leaps that just does not reflect reality. i need to know the steps between having low motivation and doing stuff im not motivated to do anyway. like what are the steps. how am i supposed to get there?