A "dreamer"…yup that would be me. At times a "nightmarer" would have been more suitable. I would always imagine different scenarios for different situations, good or bad, positive or negative. Some “dreams” were happy others were devastating. This would be my escape. There were times when I felt alone, so sad, and worthless; I would imagine how people would react if I ever became seriously ill or if I were in a terrible accident. There were other times when I would “dream” about a guy who I had a crush on. I would imagine what it would be like to go out together, to be the most important person in his life. Here’s how far fetched my thoughts were; I would imagine winning the lottery…the biggest jackpot ever. I would imagine sharing the money with friends, family and strangers…I would literally begin to cry when I imagined what their reaction would be because it made me so happy to see them happy.
All this seems so crazy, especially since all this affects my mood. For instance, if I call someone, email them, or text them, and I don’t hear back from them my mind starts to race. I would try to figure out why that person wouldn’t get right back to me. Did I do or say something wrong? Are they ignoring me because they think I’m annoying them? I think these things then when I see them I’m insecure, quiet, distant. Why? Because I’ve internalized it so much that I lead myself to believe that something actually happened and I actually have a reason to react the way I do when I really don’t.
Why would I do this, why would anybody? Why be the cause of my own anxiety and insecurities.
Back in December I started reading a book someone recommended. I haven’t made it passed chapter 2. I felt like I couldn't go any further until I got a handle on things. This chapter pretty much described the way I think; the way I exaggerate my own thoughts. The name of the book is”Classic Christianity” by Bob George, chapter 2 is called “The Truth in Error”
I took lots of notes when reading this. These things really hit me hard and made me realize a lot about myself, how I misconstrued things, and how that effects my mood, my reactions and my perspective.
The first note I took from the book was this, “The thoughts we consistently feed into our minds will determine our emotions and our desires, which will, in turn, determine our actions.” This is so true for me. I truly didn’t realize how much the way I put a twist on things affected me and the way I live my life.
Another note I took was, “Think thoughts that are in truth rather than thoughts that are in error.” Hmmm….what a difference that would make, and it has, less anxiety since I’ve curbed my imagination and stopped, well cut back, on over thinking things.
“Thinking of the past stirs up old emotions”, well no wonder why I had so much trouble getting over my past. I thought about it again and again. Every time I did I felt the pain over again. I was torturing myself on a daily basis. It feels good to have “thrown” it away and to not dwell on it anymore. I’m not saying I don’t EVER think about what was, I do, but the way I think and my perspective is much different now.
I really liked this next one. It helped me move away from some of my insecurities. If I’m in “worry mode” about why someone didn’t call me or doesn’t acknowledge me, if I feel like someone is watching or just looking at me I remember this, “If you’re worried about what people are thinking-forget it, they are not. Most will be thinking about themselves.”
“Don’t think about what things are going to be based on your own perspective rather than actual facts”. Facts? Oh, do those really need to be taken into consideration? How creative would my imagination be if I actually looked at the facts? This made me realize I need to take my imagination completely out of this. It’s been a struggle to stop my mind from wandering and it doesn’t always work but it is so much better than it was and my perspective on lots of things is so much more positive.
“Become so familiar with truth as revealed in scripture so that when you are confronted with error it is easily discerned. If we are not steeped in truth we become gullible and vulnerable to all sorts of error.” I am not all that familiar with scripture, but I’m learning…and it is wonderful, overwhelming, breath taking, and even frightening yet simply amazing all at the same time. I love it when I’m talking to a friend about something and he relates what I’m saying or going through to a scripture, he explains it and I look at him like, “oh”. It seems like it should be more confusing than it actually is. Things are not always as complex as I make them out to be.
And this one really made everything else fall into place. This too seems so simple, yet I, being the control freak I was, never really saw it. Maybe I just didn’t want to see it. But this has made a tremendous difference in my life just within the last 6 weeks. It truly summed everything up for me. “The ultimate error, the lie against the truth is: I know more then you, God, about what’s right and wrong and good and evil. I don’t need you to tell me the truth, I can discover it myself.” Had I recognized this years ago I would have saved myself a lot of pain and anguish. I would have slept all those nights I stayed awake wondering and frustrated. I would have prayed instead of cried trying to figure out what I was supposed to do. All the obstacles I placed in front of myself, my entire life, would have been so much easier to get over.
So I guess it’s time to move onto Chapter 3, I believe I’m ready…finally J
this book sounds like it is a perfect read for me. You are not alone in the developing scenarios based on one factor, incident, spoken word, unspoken word, look, etc and to make those scenarios a million different ways. I too would envision outcome of others, I would cry and I would see an end result that by no way is for me to determine.
ReplyDeleteI often wondered where this came from and I often told myself I was crazy. It boils down to ignoring God all this time and trying to do it all alone. Great post!