Out of Depression: A Depressed Patient's Successful Self-Help

Chapter 24 In-depth analysis of depression (7)
When the confrontation between these two forces reaches a fever pitch, he will turn from escaping the failed reality and self to "eliminating" the real self-when this body does not exist, the war will end.This is also a "solution", but it is a helpless and most "stupid" solution.Although destroying oneself can stop this war, at the same time, it will also lose the two most important things in life: "love" and "hope".So there must be a better choice, not to eliminate the real self to stop the war, but to conduct a detailed analysis from both sides of the war.

In fact, the origin of this war lies in the unacceptability of the real self and the unreachable distance between the idealized self.Patients caught in this war often have a kind of narrow thinking of "not knowing the true face of Mount Lu, only because they are in this mountain".Looking at the origin and development of the war, in fact, the patient's consistent efforts are to transform the real self to achieve the ideal appearance.When that doesn't work, then choose to escape or self-destruct to stop the war.He seldom reflects on whether the problem lies in the real self or the idealized self?Is it possible that it is precisely because we belittle and criticize the real self too much and beautify the ideal self too much that we fall into despair?If this is the case, can we give up our pursuit of the idealized self and accept the real self, so that this war can not be stopped!When one of the opposing sides disappears, the inner war ceases.When we give up the blind worship of the idealized self and can accept the self that needs to be cared for in reality, not only can we not end our lives, but we can still enjoy the two important gifts that life brings us: love and hope!

The following will introduce in more detail how to accept the real self, abandon the ideal self, and no longer hate or even want to destroy the real self because of the blind worship and fantasy of the idealized self.Some patients will not immediately agree with my above point of view, it may be because of "too deep poisoning".He will stubbornly believe that the ideal self is the real self, the one who can truly bring happiness and a fulfilling life to himself, while the real self is ugly, incompetent, useless, unlovable, How dare you let me give up my ideal self, my failed and shameless self?How will life go on if I give up?And the most important thing is, even I look down on myself, how can I let others accept it?How can I willingly face this "incomplete self" and the "incomplete life" brought about by it?How can this kind of self and life make me confident and happy, and how can I have respect and recognition from others?

The patient will find countless reasons to refute my point of view, because the "hatred" of the real self is too deep, the blind worship of the idealized self, including the countless efforts and sufferings he has put in to achieve the idealized self.So he will not easily accept my point of view, and he will still fight stubbornly "rather for broken pieces than for nothing". "Yu" represents the ideal self, while "Wa" represents the real self.In fact, the patient did not reflect, does "jade" really exist? Does "tile" really have no luster and value?Is it possible that I have been struggling in a battle that I could not win, maybe I was wrong at the origin.Therefore, all the efforts in the future will only make yourself further away from the true self, rather than finding the true self.The whole book is about finding the real self, but the real self to be found is actually "tile" instead of "jade".When we can accept "tiles", with our efforts and love, "tiles" can also shine.But if you blindly fall into the pursuit of "jade", you will get nothing in the end!
Therefore, the key point to stop this war lies in the transformation of strategic thinking: give up the pursuit of the idealized self and accept the real self.

End this section with an essay from a patient:
I should be interested in all studies, I will give all my energy, and I should be more confident.

As time went on, I would get more and more anxious.Because I know I'm not taking life seriously, and the more I try to take it seriously, the further away I am from my life.

I don't love my current life and I want to get out of it.To get rid of it is to get rid of the carrier of life, so I thought about suicide.

So now the point is, how do I love my life, my life?Everything else is just embellishment.

Lost oneself
When a person regards fantasy as reality, he will not know who he is and where he will go; when a person is caught in the war between two selves, he will lose his way forward, lose the spontaneity of emotion and the vitality of life.Everything he did was "forced", not "voluntary".Maybe one day when he looks in the mirror, he will also feel strange to the person in the mirror.Maybe suddenly for a moment, he will not know who he is... The true self is spontaneous, fluid, and casual, and it has its own unique disposition, hobbies, and pursuits.It can face failure, it can face dissatisfaction, and it can face its own shortcomings.It's real, stable, and reliable.It doesn't have to be packaged with success or money, it doesn't have to be proven with results.It is what it is, and it can do what it likes and love whoever it loves.It doesn't have to win everyone's love, it can also face the negation of others.After all, it is enough to do what you like and love the people you love, so why expect too much?So most of the time it is calm, it doesn't have to perform perfectly, and it doesn't have to deliberately win the affirmation and attention of others.In life, it is rarely trapped by anxiety and fear. Although it may also feel jealous, it will not escape because of jealousy, and will not change the direction of its life because of jealousy.Its efforts are solely to realize its own potential, not to be superior to others.Just like a donkey, it doesn't have to be driven by the farmer, it just needs to eat the grass it likes, enjoy the sunshine, get along with its companions leisurely, and walk the way it wants to go.Although it is only a donkey, it is a happy donkey.Although it didn't go very far, it experienced the joy of the journey; if it went far, it was not driven by the farmers, but only hoped to discover the distant scenery, which is a voluntary choice from the heart .Even if the journey is difficult, the longing for good things will dilute the difficulty of the journey.Generally speaking, it is happy and happy, and because it is always looking for the "beauty" in its heart, when it faces death, it can always say to itself: I have realized myself.

The idealized self is stubborn, inflexible, and inflexible. It is only concerned with results, with imperfections, with superiority.So it cannot face failure, it must arm itself with success, it cannot have shortcomings and deficiencies, it would rather cover up than see the reality.It is very concerned about other people's opinions, and it is very worried about being denied and surpassed by others.It will find the "elements" superior to others in terms of money, virtue, achievement, being liked by all, and so on.All its efforts are not spontaneous, but forced, because it must maintain its pretensions.For the sake of this highest goal, it has given up the little joys in life, its original wishes, and its real needs.It is exhausting and often suffers from anxiety, fear, and depression.If the donkey is also used as a metaphor, it is not walking its own way every day, not doing what it likes to do every day, but being constantly driven by the farmer with a whip.Because of fear, it has to move forward, although the direction it moves forward is not its original intention.The reason why it is so "obedient" is because the farmer told it: If you are obedient, I will make you a horse instead of a poor donkey.As a result, this "four different images" who looked like donkeys but not horses kept struggling, just for that "fantasy".It lives for fantasy and at the same time becomes its slave.

When a person falls into the pursuit or defense of an idealized self, he no longer knows who he is, and he does not want to see himself in reality.Some patients show that they don't like looking in the mirror or taking pictures.Because he doesn't think he looks good. Simply put, the self in the mirror or in the photo is too different from the self in the fantasy.

When you lose your true self, you lose hope and love.The loss of love and hope makes the patient live in an empty life. Although he works hard to move forward, his heart is full of emptiness and loneliness.It looks like hard work, but it is actually forced to be helpless; it looks like persistence, but it is actually because of fear; it looks like calm, but it is actually turbulent inside.In this false life he waited for a miracle to appear.As everyone knows, the miracle is like a mirage, and the root of the pain is not that the miracle did not appear, but that he has not lived down-to-earth.

Losing our true self, the next step is to find our true self.But remember, what you are looking for is your true self, not your idealized self.Moreover, only by giving up the self (the idealized self) can the self (the real self) be found.

How to Get Rid of Perfectionism
Stop the War: Letting Go of Your Idealized Self
Honor is a complex of power, prestige, victory...Under the shadow of a 'self-idealized' image, the neurotic is lost in the realm of fantasy and infinity in the pursuit of honor in order to satisfy obsessive needs.And, they get this honor only when they mistake their fantasy for their 'real self', only when they sell their soul, their real self.Thus, the pursuit of honor leads to a tormented heart.

— Karen Horney

The inner struggle comes from the battle between two selves - the real self and the idealized self.Peace of mind can only be found by stopping this war.Because of mistaking the idealized self for the real self, pathological conceit arises, which in turn leads to various pathological demands.When you can't achieve the perfection you imagined, you will have inferiority complex and self-hatred.Finally, when the inner war cannot be reconciled, the last means of escape are used: self-harm and suicide.

The inner war originated from the conflict between the two selves, and the patient's inappropriate solutions and efforts eventually led to "all-out war."All his efforts are to maintain an idealized self, to escape the real self.Even if he comes for psychotherapy, he also hopes that the counselor can help him insert "wings" (to achieve an idealized self).For example, during my illness, I always hoped that there would be a person and a pair of hands that could help me get out of depression and find myself.But the self I expected at that time was actually an idealized self, not the real self. In my fantasy, I expected myself to be eloquent, popular, and very successful... It seems that I can become an ideal without depression in myself.But sadly, I can't get rid of who I am in reality, and I can't achieve what I want to be, and I have been living in the gap between the two.Therefore, the key to healing is to accept the real self, abandon the idealized self, and stop the war between the two selves.

The war of the pathological conceit comes more from avoiding reality to defend the idealized self, while the war of the pathological inferiority comes more from the constant pursuit of the idealized self.Although the foundation of both wars comes from the conflict between two selves, the focus of the war is different.People with pathological conceit already regard themselves as "white swans", so they cannot accept the reality that they were originally "ugly ducklings"; while people with pathological low self-esteem, although they know that they are just "ugly ducklings" now, think they can become "white swans". Swan”, the pain comes from the fact that he clings to this fantasy, but cannot achieve it.Although the people around him told him that there is no need to be inferior or look down on himself, but he just can't believe what others say, and he just can't see that he is good enough.

The key for pathological conceited people to stop this war is: they need to reposition themselves and know who they are!People with pathological conceit often can't accept failure, shortcomings and the belittling of others, and even feel pressured in front of people who are better than him in some aspects.Maybe most of his friends are not as good as he is. It seems accidental, but it is inevitable. This kind of "choice" can make him relax and let him find the so-called "confidence".If the world is really centered on his desires, if all his morbid demands are fulfilled, is he really confident?Self-confident people can really get what they want and follow their wishes?In fact, even if he really achieves it, it is not self-confidence, but just a kind of morbid conceit and arrogant arrogance.Even so, he still won't give up easily, after all, giving up means the disillusionment of his idealized self.So he will try his best to maintain his ego, rather than face reality.

In order to maintain his morbid self-esteem, a male patient actually spent 10 years "persisting" and reveling in it.When he failed the college entrance examination, he did not give up because he could continue to take the self-examination.After taking the exam for two years and only passing one, he didn't give up, because his ego couldn't accept the fact that he was not a graduate student.So he continued to fight and fail repeatedly. Although he couldn't read books every day, he still had to ask himself to complete his "great" study plan. In fact, he couldn't do it at all, because when studying, he My mind is full of fantasies and worries.For example, he will fantasize about how versatile he will be in front of the opposite sex, and worry that he will suddenly forget everything he has learned, or be afraid that others will say that he is just pretending to learn.In fact, he just planned for the sake of planning, persisted for the sake of persistence, and didn't like learning itself at all.Most of his plans fail because of a lack of love for what he is doing.In fact, being so persistent is just to keep your ego from collapsing in the face of reality.

Therefore, only by abandoning this defense of the idealized self, and by abandoning all efforts to maintain the pathological conceit, can one find the true self.Sometimes the patient kept talking about finding his original self. When asked what his original self was like, he replied: cheerful, optimistic, energetic, popular, at least 2/3 of the people like him... because He still can't be very energetic every day; because he can't be very talkative every day; because he hasn't been affirmed and welcomed by 2/3 of the people, so he believes that the current self needs to be "modified", and if Back to the original self, life is full of sunshine.As everyone knows, what he has been looking for is still an idealized self. After all, no one can always be cheerful, optimistic and energetic, and self-acceptance and affirmation are not based on the affirmation of most people.

Pathologically conceited people need to let go of their idealized self and open the "gate" to let reality pour in, instead of living in fantasy and maintaining the castle of ego.A patient told me that after several years of hard work and treatment, he thought he was much better, but now it seems that he is not. He just regained some self-esteem, so the focus of his life is still on "defending the city". Guard this fantasy "castle of ego".But real healing can only happen the moment the city gates are opened. "Reality, this terrible reality!" Although the reality is terrible, it is real; although the real self is limited, it is free; although the fantasy world is perfect, it is just a kind of inner arrogance.If it is only to maintain the fantasy world, the whole person will eventually be bound by various pathological requirements and "musts".Although living in the perfection and conceit of fantasy will make people feel ecstatic and addictive, but all this is at the cost of losing one's freedom and growth.

(End of this chapter)