Self Help, etc.
The self-help movement interests me. Some of it is useful. Much of it is a load of platitudes carefully reworded to sound original.
I do think helping yourself is an extremely important skill. Not everyone is willing to help themselves, and that's not only a shame, it's kind of annoying for those on whom these hopeless people are dependent. Helping yourself getting over a trauma can be an enlightening experience.
Most of you know that I take heavy doses of antidepressants and antipsychotics daily, and I have done so for about seven or eight years. I used to be a heavy indulger of anti-anxiety tablets like lorazepam, sometimes going for months at a time taking several milligrams a day. A few weeks ago I stopped taking anti-anxiety pills because they were fucking with my sleeping habits, making me gain weight and turning my lifestyle into one of walking dazes.
Of course - you've guessed it, no doubt - now I feel an urgent need to help myself in other ways. If I can't rely on extra pills to feel all right, I need to work on how I deal with the world. Self-help books are useful, sometimes, but I can't STAND books that insist on "finding your TRUE self" or being pitched to the same frequency as the universe or whatever. That's condescending, new age bullshit. I think what I need is practical advice that I start applying today and keep applying for years to come. Being in touch with the planet is probably not going to help me in that direction.
So, no Eckhart Tolle or Oprah for me. I'm looking for something less wishy washy and more practical. Any ideas?
thanks for sharing.blackhawk tactical pants.
— Spambot
"I could have done worse!" exultantly cried the murderer Lebret, sentenced at Rouen to hard labor for life. — Félix Fénéon
I do think helping yourself is an extremely important skill. Not everyone is willing to help themselves, and that's not only a shame, it's kind of annoying for those on whom these hopeless people are dependent. Helping yourself getting over a trauma can be an enlightening experience.
Most of you know that I take heavy doses of antidepressants and antipsychotics daily, and I have done so for about seven or eight years. I used to be a heavy indulger of anti-anxiety tablets like lorazepam, sometimes going for months at a time taking several milligrams a day. A few weeks ago I stopped taking anti-anxiety pills because they were fucking with my sleeping habits, making me gain weight and turning my lifestyle into one of walking dazes.
Of course - you've guessed it, no doubt - now I feel an urgent need to help myself in other ways. If I can't rely on extra pills to feel all right, I need to work on how I deal with the world. Self-help books are useful, sometimes, but I can't STAND books that insist on "finding your TRUE self" or being pitched to the same frequency as the universe or whatever. That's condescending, new age bullshit. I think what I need is practical advice that I start applying today and keep applying for years to come. Being in touch with the planet is probably not going to help me in that direction.
So, no Eckhart Tolle or Oprah for me. I'm looking for something less wishy washy and more practical. Any ideas?
Running and meditating. Both will work wonders, you just have to stick with them. Meditating can be as simple as paying attention to your own breath for 20 minutes a day.
Yay, the article I recently read in Women's Health mag is online!: http://health.msn.com/fitness/articlepage.aspx?cp-documentid=100255650
There are numerous studies touting the benefits of regular meditation, I dig this one: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43006-2005Jan2.html
For me, understanding all the science behind whatever emotional problem I might be having is one of the most helpful things.
So, for example, if I were to be having constant anxiety then reading everything I could on the subject would be my first course of action to tackle the problem. I'd start with things like wiki articles, WebMD articles etc. pretty much anything I could find online, any medical research I could find about what is actually going on in my brain on a chemical level when I feel these things, move on to any psycology text books I could get my hands on, then to books by expert doctors with different opinions of the subject as well as books by people with personal accounts of their expierences.
A couple years ago I had a really bad mental breakdown, after years of debilitating depression I finally crossed the line into full bown delusions to cope with the mess of life and it was my own efforts to understand what was going on inside me, durring my lucid thinking periods, that slowly but surely brought me back to reality. (Well, not completely my own efforts, it was also having partner who wasn't going to give up on me no matter how crazy I was and who was willing to admit his own role in leading me to the place I had gotten to.)
So, that's what works for me. Learning everything I am able.
also, painting. 
This may sound like a strange question, and i don't mean to derail, but what does anxiety feel like? I'm not sure i've ever felt anxious in my life.
I think it depends on the person and situation that said person is anxious over.
It can be an irritable, distracted, almost hypomanic feeling trying to avoid the object of anxiety. Or a sick to your stomach hard to breathe unable to move or speak crushing feeling. Or a feeling of irrational fear and feeling of inadequatness.
I think, mostly a feeling that things are going to go wrong.
I dunno...
Fear: The Friend of Exceptional People: How to Turn Negative Attitudes in to Positive Outcomes by Geoff Thompson
That is the only good self help book I have ever read. He breaks down what the fear/anxiety is, on a chemical level within your body as well as an emotional level. Very enlightening. One of my MMA teachers told me to buy it and it worked wonders.
"If there's one thing you can say about mankind, there's nothing kind about man." - Tom Waits
Have you tried kind bud?
Sanity is the playground for the unimaginative
I was working at a bookstore once when a woman came in and asked my coworker where the self help section was. He replied, very friendly and professional-like, "If I told you, wouldn't that defeat the purpose?"