Re: The Sobriety Experiment: Chapter Two
Saturday, February 17th 2018 (Filters of Reality)
A couple of things to talk about then. A couple of things I missed out on either due to my word count limit or the fact that I often stall on things and allow myself to get carried away and intellectualise over things less important in a bid to detach from the important. Take your pick really. Lindsay is working a rare Saturday and so I have the house to myself until four. I'm going to post this then walk down to the Golden Bite for some decent breakfast. When I get back I'll be getting on with some college work for next week to help stay ahead of the game and will have the football on the radio in the background.
On Thursday I had my usual fortnightly session with my clinical psychologist. Dr. Bacon and I only have two more sessions together after which I found out during Thursday's session that I'll be getting his boss as a replacement, a consultant psychologist. My case has already been discussed and so the transition shouldn't be too much of a big thing. It'll just be a waiting game more than anything else. I have my final two sessions with Dr. Bacon a week on Thursday (March 01st) and then a fortnight after that.
It's important, then, that I have a good idea of where we are in therapy and where it is I am supposed to be going. And therein lies one of my main problems. Where I'm ''supposed'' to be going? Does that mean that therapy for me is all about waiting on Dr. Bacon to decide what it is I should be doing with my life? Being told what to do next? One of my issues is not making up my own mind on a lot of things and taking responsibility for my life at times. This is something I am told that the consultant, Dr. Bacon's replacement, will be good at. He's really experienced and will be good at pushing me. Bacon admits that perhaps not pushing me hard enough, or at least more often, is something he's perhaps been guilty of during our time together.
Another of my problems has been regarding my attempts to connect with people already in my life. One way I avoid doing the hard work yet make it appear to all not trained in psychology or otherwise super observant as though I am working very hard is by targeting people who are unlikely to give me any real positive responses back. In other words I tend to try very hard and dedicate a lot of our session time to my mother when the reality is that she is often not available or capable of giving me exactly what it is I perhaps need from her. This means that these attempts, while often painful and frustrating, are still safe options as there is unlikely to be any new developments and so no next phase. It's this next phase I am meant to be working on. It's important from now on that I try to focus my attention on people who are available to take things to the next level of connection. This is harder as it puts me in vulnerable positions which triggers Little Stevie, but it is the only real way forward is I still want things to change.
Risk taking. This is what I hope the consultant (I can already see that being his permanent name in the pages of this journal) will be good for. Encouraging me to take the necessary risks from one session to the other so that there might always be something good to look at. Optimism is another of these things I should be trying to think about since my pessimistic world view is something which often holds me back. It's important to be clear on what schemas actually are and how they affect a person's life. They are not just beliefs. They are more than that. When triggered Little Stevie will bring out a schema coping mode which then act as filter for reality, if you like. A way of seeing the world, admittedly a very distorted way. Everything and anything then passes through that distorted filter before it gets into my consciousness and belief system. The problem then occurs when it goes on like this for so long, usually a whole lifetime as has been the case with me, that the problem is then in convincing my brain that these filters aren't actual reality.
This would become really frustrating in the early days of my sobriety and involvement in these forums and recovery services when it would be suggested that I click my fingers and change my view of reality. What would have been better would have been for someone to suggest that I try to find ways of doing this. Turns out that there are ways of managing this but no one has ever been known to flick a switch as a way to trade a pessimistic world view into a positive and optimistic one.
So when I begin work with the consultant (or – now that we have established this will be his official title) the Consultant in a few weeks we will be starting from here. I know why my Schema Modes exist and where they have come from and I know the things I must work on from now on if I want to start seeing improvements in my life. Social isolation is a big problem for me. In this I don't necessarily mean that I spend all of my time on my own (this hasn't been the case for a while now I am happy to say) but is more in not feeling as though I have a place within my community, like I genuinely don't have a peer group. I would agree with Bacon on this. Sure – I like to go try new things every now and then (or at least think about trying new things from time to time) and I mix quite well with fellow students in my class – but I always get the feeling as though they are together and I am separate but joining in. Like I don't really belong.
This is the type of feelings that might – if I didn't know any better – trigger my brain into thinking it's time to get to an AA meeting. That would be a decent short-term fix and would give me the impression that I do have a peer group. I'm looking for more than that though. I'm looking for something genuine.
This is where the hard work comes in, I guess.
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Stevie
Has a distorted reality.
1135
Saturday, February 17th 2018 (Filters of Reality)
A couple of things to talk about then. A couple of things I missed out on either due to my word count limit or the fact that I often stall on things and allow myself to get carried away and intellectualise over things less important in a bid to detach from the important. Take your pick really. Lindsay is working a rare Saturday and so I have the house to myself until four. I'm going to post this then walk down to the Golden Bite for some decent breakfast. When I get back I'll be getting on with some college work for next week to help stay ahead of the game and will have the football on the radio in the background.
On Thursday I had my usual fortnightly session with my clinical psychologist. Dr. Bacon and I only have two more sessions together after which I found out during Thursday's session that I'll be getting his boss as a replacement, a consultant psychologist. My case has already been discussed and so the transition shouldn't be too much of a big thing. It'll just be a waiting game more than anything else. I have my final two sessions with Dr. Bacon a week on Thursday (March 01st) and then a fortnight after that.
It's important, then, that I have a good idea of where we are in therapy and where it is I am supposed to be going. And therein lies one of my main problems. Where I'm ''supposed'' to be going? Does that mean that therapy for me is all about waiting on Dr. Bacon to decide what it is I should be doing with my life? Being told what to do next? One of my issues is not making up my own mind on a lot of things and taking responsibility for my life at times. This is something I am told that the consultant, Dr. Bacon's replacement, will be good at. He's really experienced and will be good at pushing me. Bacon admits that perhaps not pushing me hard enough, or at least more often, is something he's perhaps been guilty of during our time together.
Another of my problems has been regarding my attempts to connect with people already in my life. One way I avoid doing the hard work yet make it appear to all not trained in psychology or otherwise super observant as though I am working very hard is by targeting people who are unlikely to give me any real positive responses back. In other words I tend to try very hard and dedicate a lot of our session time to my mother when the reality is that she is often not available or capable of giving me exactly what it is I perhaps need from her. This means that these attempts, while often painful and frustrating, are still safe options as there is unlikely to be any new developments and so no next phase. It's this next phase I am meant to be working on. It's important from now on that I try to focus my attention on people who are available to take things to the next level of connection. This is harder as it puts me in vulnerable positions which triggers Little Stevie, but it is the only real way forward is I still want things to change.
Risk taking. This is what I hope the consultant (I can already see that being his permanent name in the pages of this journal) will be good for. Encouraging me to take the necessary risks from one session to the other so that there might always be something good to look at. Optimism is another of these things I should be trying to think about since my pessimistic world view is something which often holds me back. It's important to be clear on what schemas actually are and how they affect a person's life. They are not just beliefs. They are more than that. When triggered Little Stevie will bring out a schema coping mode which then act as filter for reality, if you like. A way of seeing the world, admittedly a very distorted way. Everything and anything then passes through that distorted filter before it gets into my consciousness and belief system. The problem then occurs when it goes on like this for so long, usually a whole lifetime as has been the case with me, that the problem is then in convincing my brain that these filters aren't actual reality.
This would become really frustrating in the early days of my sobriety and involvement in these forums and recovery services when it would be suggested that I click my fingers and change my view of reality. What would have been better would have been for someone to suggest that I try to find ways of doing this. Turns out that there are ways of managing this but no one has ever been known to flick a switch as a way to trade a pessimistic world view into a positive and optimistic one.
So when I begin work with the consultant (or – now that we have established this will be his official title) the Consultant in a few weeks we will be starting from here. I know why my Schema Modes exist and where they have come from and I know the things I must work on from now on if I want to start seeing improvements in my life. Social isolation is a big problem for me. In this I don't necessarily mean that I spend all of my time on my own (this hasn't been the case for a while now I am happy to say) but is more in not feeling as though I have a place within my community, like I genuinely don't have a peer group. I would agree with Bacon on this. Sure – I like to go try new things every now and then (or at least think about trying new things from time to time) and I mix quite well with fellow students in my class – but I always get the feeling as though they are together and I am separate but joining in. Like I don't really belong.
This is the type of feelings that might – if I didn't know any better – trigger my brain into thinking it's time to get to an AA meeting. That would be a decent short-term fix and would give me the impression that I do have a peer group. I'm looking for more than that though. I'm looking for something genuine.
This is where the hard work comes in, I guess.
'
'
'
'
'
'
'
'
'
'
'
'
Stevie
Has a distorted reality.
1135
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