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Friday, February 26, 2010

Psychiatrists Don't Give Me Techniques, Just Pills

Dear A. B. Curtiss

I am writing to you because I read a couple chapters of Depression is a Choice, and it really describe me to a tee. I am currently in an intense situation. Society as a whole is rejecting me for having an abrasive attitude. I have seen many psychologists and psychiatrists. Their main focus was to drug me. Nor have I been given and techniques for restructuring my thought process. While I try to focus on thinking positively, my feelings of being rejected tend to take me to my “ primal thinking,” instead of being able to use my higher, rational mind.

Then I cannot seem to recover until I meditate at night and early morning. Do the positive thoughts strengthen over time? I am having problems finding specific techniques in your book. This is a really bad situation. Any direction that you could give would be appreciated. Thanks, T. S.

Dear Tom,

Being a human being is difficult. Most of us didn’t have wise counseling from parents as we grew up so we grew up kind of self-focused and crooked from bending ourselves in so many ways trying to get people’s love and respect because we felt unloved and therefore unworthy.

So what is the answer? We have to remake ourselves by becoming our own parent. First, we have to realize that self-focus is the road to ruin. Avoid self-focus as much as possible and concentrate on objective, outer-directed thinking.

To make something worthy out of your day, insist on thinking only those thoughts which are not destructive and self-focused. Even if thoughts aren’t destructive to start with, if you become self-focused in your thinking, your thoughts will, sooner or later, becomes judgmental and negative about yourself and your situation.

My book Brainswitch out of Depression describes more fully how to do this because it describes more fully how the brain works. Once you really understand how the brain works, you can get it to do what you want, instead of letting it drag you where old habits of self-focused and depressive thinking patterns want to take you. And yes, this pattern of productive thinking does become easier because you literally remake the neural patterns in your brain as you do the new thinking.

Trains of thought which you concentrate on become stronger over time. Just like depressive thinking became strong because you spent so much time thinking depressively. Remember that the brain always follows the direction of its most current dominant thought. You make a thought dominant by thinking it repetitively, over and over. Don't make your negative thoughts dominant by thinking them over and over. Feelings of rejection should be relabeled as self-focused thinking and simply abandoned in favor of more outer-directed thinking. The Brainswitch book will help you with this.

Also read Dale Carnegie's book "How to Make Friends and Influence People. It contains all those things a wise parent might have advised you. I gave it to my granddaughter as she went off to college and it helped her shyness and self-focus immensely. Call yourself a beginner and begin. I’ll be glad to answer any questions you have along the way. There’s a lot of good information on my website too, www.depressionisachoice.com A.B. Curtiss


Dear A. B. Curtiss

Just a short note of thanks for how quickly you responded to my message. I am getting a great deal out of Brainswitch. It is comforting to know that it is a matter of will to handle depression. I have got
plenty of that. Sincerely, T.S.

Dear T. S.

I'll be glad to answer any questions you have along the way. We should not allow ourselves to be the slave or our own brains. It is not necessary. A. B. Curtiss

Dear A. B.

If you have time, I do have a question. My panic button goes off usually when I am in a crowded area, whether it be standing in a grocery line or in a restaurant. I have used visualization and affirmations intensely to reason with this irrational behavior. I thought I had it under control when it unexpectedly when off yesterday. Do I just need to continue doing my current approach to strengthen the neurons or do you have another recommendation? Thanks, T. S.

Dear T. S.

What you are presently doing is called rational emotive therapy—using your reason to put the lie to your irrational thoughts. When this is not enough, you might want to try a total immersion technique which is to undergo the situation which causes your fear and fully accept your fear. I did this with claustrophobia once when my regular thinking control wasn’t enough.

Go to page #411 in the Depression is a Choice book. Or if that is not available for whatever reason, I’ll try and clip it on here

"I recently took a trip during which my regular method of handling claustrophobia utterly failed. I have been successful with short trips, but this was a six-hour flight to Hawaii and I was stuck in the center of five seats on a fully loaded plane. At first I concentrated on my book, but little doubts kept creeping into my concentration until I started to panic. Every atom of my body was screaming, I HAVE TO GET OUT OF HERE NOW!!! I forced myself to check that the seat-belt sign had been turned off, I excused myself by the other two passengers, and I BOLTED into the aisle. SAVED!

"I walked up and down for a while and did not have the courage to return to my seat. They served breakfast and though I was hungry, I still couldn’t do it. I was miserable. My back started to hurt and so I sat down on the floor in the only available space I could find, which was near the lavatories. But the smell was terrible and people started giving me odd and annoyed looks for which I could hardly blame them. There were dozens of people perfectly fine in their seats. I was the only nut-case sitting down on the dirty floor where people were having to step over me. I began to be ashamed to behave so ignominiously.

"When the aisles were cleared from breakfast, I walked up and down for a while longer and then I tried to sit in the pull-down stewardess seat but I was told it was against regulations. My back was starting to hurt again from standing and I started to think about my situation. I guessed I could stand up for another three hours. But what kind of a fake was I that I was writing a book about Directed Thinking and I couldn’t even control my own claustrophobia? I began to study my situation, earnestly, in terms of what was the fear about. Not why was I afraid but what, exactly, was I afraid of? I thought that I could control myself long enough to belt myself in for a landing, but I wanted to do better than that if I could. I didn’t want to be a phony. Was I going to put my money where my mouth was or what?

I didn’t try to search for anything rational. I knew that my terror was totally irrational. My former success with claustrophobia, I now realized, was limited. I could handle short flights in a three-seat flying situation. In a crowded auto I learned that I could control my panic if I could sit on the very edge of the seat or someone’s lap, where my arms and legs were not confined, and lean into the space between the two front seats. Luckily I am not a large person, so I could usually maneuver a workable position. But this was the middle seat of five, in a totally full airplane and I was terrified. Over the years I had just naturally avoided situations which were this uncomfortable. I was able to get aisle seats in airplanes. But not this time. I had received my comeuppance.

"I was thinking about all these things while I was studying my situation on the plane. What exactly was I afraid would happen if I sat back down in the middle of those crowded seats? That I would flail my arms around and scream! Well, I thought, that is just behavior, isn’t it, and I’m sure I can control my behavior so that I do not do that. Yes, I decided, I could depend upon my earnest commitment to not flail my arms around or scream. So what did that leave? The terror. Yes, I could do nothing to prevent the terror. I would feel like I was dying. I would feel like I couldn’t breathe. Well, I thought, that is all just feeling, isn’t it? I just have to stand the physical pain of that terror. I have to control my behavior and just feel the terror, just sit there quietly, even if I pass out, or die if that is my fate. I decided I could do that.

"I sat back down, buckled myself in and prepared to feel the most absolute terror of my life. I opened myself up to whatever pain would come. I was absolutely determined to bear the most unimaginably painful feelings, whatever they were. The most amazing thing happened. No terror came. Not even the smallest tinge of it. I completed the rest of the flight in complete comfort. Now and then I invited the pain and terror if it wanted to come. But it never did.

"I think the whole key was to separate the gestalt of panic into its plain, more user-friendly concomitants of behavior and feeling. Looking at the separate parts of my panic gave me a clue as to how to proceed. I saw the panic in terms of tasks to accomplish, rather than fear to succumb to. I could see that, although it might be difficult and painful, it was possible for me to control my behavior and keep myself from screaming or flailing my arms around. And it was possible to bear any pain that my feelings were going to inflict upon me. After all, they were my feelings, weren’t they? What could my own feelings do to me, really? I know I can do that again. In two weeks, I would have to return from Hawaii. I determined to seek out the terror again and see what more work I had to do, or what new tortures my terror would teach me.

"On my return trip, I found I had been given an aisle seat and I was tempted to let it go at that. But because I felt obligated to finish this story for my book, however it turned out, I told the clerk I was working on my claustrophobia so would she please give me the worst crowded-up inside seat she could. Again I settled down quite prepared to feel the terror NO MATTER WHAT! In the beginning I got just a few tendrils of panic and again I opened myself up to whatever horror would be visited upon me. The tendrils of panic just faded out to nothing. I felt perfectly comfortable the whole trip.

Ms. Curtiss

In the past month I have made remarkable strides in controlling my depression, and anger. However, I become self conscious when having a conversation as part of a group. It is though I consciously come up with the thought “here we go again” and there it goes again!!!! I have tried to focus before hand on erasing the thought but I have not been able to control it. Any suggestions?

Also, if I wanted more info on self hypnosis, where would I go? My meditative state is unreal, and I would like to discover ways to use it as a useful tool. Your tools are making a difference, which is what life is all about. Thank you for your contribution. T.S.

Dear T. S.

Remember that your brain works by learned association. So if you think "there it goes again," and continue to focus on that thought, it is instructions to your brain (always your most obedient servant) to put you in touch with all the other downer thoughts of that kind in your memory bank. So drop that thought immediately, as soon as it pops up. Decide, in advance, what thought you are going to use instead of that negative thoughts. And whenever the negative thought pops up, use instead the thought you have chosen.

You may go back for forth for a while until your brain sees that you are serious about wanting to reject that thought. Remember that the mind always follows the direction of its most current dominant thought so that you can get your brain to think what you want to think by thinking productive, on purpose thoughts, rather than be carried along where old brain habits would want to force you to go.
A. B.Curtiss

Ms. Curtiss,

While I have improved over the past couple of months, currently I am experiencing hell. I am outcast by society for my angry facial appearances. I can be going along fine, and suddenly my face is transformed into an angry glaring look for no good reason. Many times I am not even feeling angry at the time. Usually it snowballs. If I have received some negative reactions over the course of the day, odds are it will happen again until I am safely back in my apartment.

This is a very organized effort on my part to monitor and admonish signs of inappropriate behavior. This is not sheer paranoia. Ironically, I am a God believing, college educated, personable man who has many successful, responsible friends(as far as I know). I sell appliances at a retail store which makes me very open to the public eye. I thought about taking off work but feel I need to face my fears. Right now I am emotionally drained and feeling hopeless. I even thought of the possibility of coming to see you for a week, if possible. Or should I just keep up with the exercises, tolerate the catcalls until I clear up the issue. I could do that if I knew it would clear things up. Any thoughts? T. S.

Dear T. S.

I don’t know what do you mean by catcalls. Just remember that anger is fear turned outward. Read chapter ten in my book Depression is a Choice, how to get in touch with repressed fear.

Fear does make your countenance look angry. When I was young, before I learned how to get rid of my depression, my children used to ask me all the time "Mommy, are you mad?" I was just suffering. I didn't know it was my great supply of repressed fear that made me look so angry all the time. I finally got in touch with it all. You can too. It is very painful, but doable. And after a while if you are very accepting of the pain, it is becomes almost fun, like a difficult exercise.

You are right. Don't get off work. You need to face your fears. Work is thevery therapy you need to get in touch with your fear. When you receive negative reactions, treat them as a sacred meditation to get in touch with your fear. You don't have to do anything but ACCEPT THE FEAR, FEEL THE FEAR. It should be very painful to feel it if you are really doing it.

Getting in touch with your fear is so painful, it really feels like you are dying but it is not you that is dying but your fear. You have probably been steeling yourself against negative reactions, protecting yourself by being defensive. Your attitude is probably: I'm okay, you are negative. Quit all that. Make the negative okay as well. Embrace all negative reactions as they are the very cure for your fear. You'll get the hang of it after a while. Don't worry about messing up the first couple of times. Existence gives you all the time you need. A. B. Curtiss

Dear Ms. Curtiss

When people see any anger in my face, they will cough. Suddenly I hear coughs from all over the store. Many times I do not notice any change of attitude, so my approach has been It is just a cough. So I do not necessarily feel the fear. The depression that it is happening overcomes me. So when I feel the situation occurring should I just focus on fear? The depression and fear are interwined. Why would not focusing on the depression then bring peace?

Also, I have tried two approaches while at work. One is to be very vigilant, focusing on my behavior. Sometimes I feel this does not work because it actually creates fear. So I tell myself to let go, and while I am happier I find myself more prone to old established behavior. I can not find a niche
that works.

I have read chapter 10 a couple of times. I have a difficult time visualizing the difference between just feeling or acting on the fear. If I consciously see myself just watching my feelings as a witness, it works. If I am caught off guard, feeling and acting seem to be one and the same.

Thanks for your quick responses.


Dear T. S.


I think it is safe to assume that a cough is just a cough and try and catch sight of yourself from time to time in the mirror and notice when you look fearful or angry so that you can then, on purpose, relax yourself. Sometimes focusing on depression brings peace because any kind of on-purpose thinking, like the thought that you are accepting depression, stimulates neurons in the neocortex and withdraws neural activity from the subcortex, where depression is produced. But for me it is easier to do the simple "green frog" kind of exercises to get out of depression. Yes, watching feelings as a witness and accepting them almost always works to lessen fear.

Another suggestion is to outer focus more. When you find yourself self-focusing and worrying about how people are perceiving you, refocus on other people and what they are doing in a way that you are interested in them for their own sake, not interested in them for what effect they may be having on you. They are human beings, too, with their own problems and fears that you can have some compassion for your fellow man. Every person is fighting their own battle within their hearts.

Remember that getting out of depression is one thing. But then you have to have something going on in your regular life that you find fulfilling, some work, some hobby, or some talent or mission that you have decided to focus your interest on. Get out of depression and get into something else productive. It is not enough just to get out of depression. A human being needs some creative activity or they will end up in self-focus again. Have you tried joining Toastmasters, International? Public speaking is a great way to get in touch with your own fear and connect with people who are also trying to improve themselves by learning to speak up before other people. Volunteer work at a hospital or soup kitchen can also refocus your attention away from self focus and connect you with your fellow man. A. B. Curtiss

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