What's wrong with me?
What's wrong with me?
Objective:
As we go through the journey of life we’d encounter people and situations that would make us doubt who we are and what we’re worth. These will lead us to question all the things we’ve done and makes us think that it’s all because of us why things didn’t go the way we expect it to. This episode seeks to dig deep with these thoughts and to see if it’s really just on us. Are we the only ones who were at fault?
Flow:
Why do we always think It’s us who’s not enough?
· Self-Blaming a survival response when a negative experience happens like when someone stops talking to us or something doesn’t go our way, we always look inwards and ask what went wrong.
· As humans we always would like to have the reason as to why things happen that way.
· A part of us thinks maybe it was something that we could have done because those are the only things we have an idea of and power over.
· By blaming ourselves, we maintain the perception that we’re still in control of the situation and ultimately safe -even when we’re not.
Why do we blame ourselves for the things we can’t control?
· There are various reasons why we do this because at this point it’s a learned behavior. Meaning that the people around us may have something to do with it and how we grew up in our household.
· We may have been surrounded by people who don’t take accountability for their actions and puts the blame on people who doesn’t have anything to do with it. Usually happens with parents and kids who have dysfunctional relationships or being with a toxic partner.
· Because we want to have a sense of control, being able to know figure out what went wrong on our end to be able to avoid these negative experiences in the future.
· Let’s remember that blaming ourselves is a survival response and when triggered it causes us to be hyper vigilant and fixated on the things that could have been rather than the truth of what happened.
How do we free ourselves from self-blame?
· TAKE A STEP BACK. Whenever you experience a negative experience, try to step back and not go into problem solving mode so quickly. Feel first the pain, the guilt and question it.
· Question the experience on the way it made you feel, asking the true story of what happened, understand what are you telling yourself and compare it to the actual story of what happened. Reframe your thoughts and look at things in a less biased perspective. You can process this with a friend if you can.
· Decide how you want to deal with that place of hurt, shame and guilt. See how it really makes you feel and try to see it as it is instead of judging yourself harshly and all the could have been.
· Be compassionate to yourself, a negative experience is bound to happen in our lives and most of the time it’s not in our control, all we could do is experience and learn from it.
· Take responsibility not blame, if you have a part in how this all happens make peace with it and accept what has happened and learn from it. Blaming yourself forever won’t solve anything and will just lead you to doubt yourself.