QUESTION:
Hi
Curtiss,
Hope you
keeping well,
These
days losing control of my thinking, and seeking to raise the level of
positiveness biased to sexual thoughts and behave through face expressions
and eye gestures because of the repressed fear causing losing control.
Need to
get out from this fall. I have been trying to get out from this from the last
few days.
is Unbalanced
brain chemistry causes these symptoms. since deep fear was holding me for
few weeks Thanks Curtiss
ANSWER:
Remember that
will is destiny, biology is not destiny.
There is
nothing more powerful than the human will to do better and we can always think
a better thought. A better thought will change our brain chemistry for the
better. Just say to yourself, I’m doing better and better. Then choose some
mantra and meditate on that to keep the more destructive thoughts from
bothering you. When fear comes, acknowledge it, accept it and then the fear
will diminish and you can move beyond it.
As for fear of
losing control you can use cognitive behavioral thinking for this. Here’s how I cured myself of
claustrophobia which appears in my book Depression
is a Choice. Ask yourself what,
exactly are you afraid you will do physically with your body. Once you decide
what that is, you can, at the same time, commit to the decision that you will not do that. Then
what is left is just the fear again which you can accept, let it finish and
move on.
Here’s the
excerpt from my book:
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 sit down. 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 brainswitching
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. 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. We can all make our life into something immensely satisfying
regardless of the circumstances of it. With the earnest desire to do so.
Anybody can do it with a little practice.
A. B. Curtiss
