Posted by alexandra_k on December 1, 2005, at 5:11:18
In reply to Zeugma, posted by alexandra_k on December 1, 2005, at 4:21:34
i had years of cbt
years and years and years of it
where they tell you that
thoughts -> feelings
and that painful feelings...
are the result of illogical thinking
cognitive distortions
etc
etc
i guess i accepted that enough to learn logic
it was hard not to accept that
when 'professionals' tell you it is the truth
and call your reasoning ability into question
i guess it is a very rare person
who wouldn't start to doubt themself
to doubt their reasoning ability
and thus i learned logicand over time...
over time i came to the belief that it wasn't really a matter of logic...
it wasn't really about the 'cognitive distortions'...
these 'cognitive distortions' that i must endorse
by definition
because of my intense emotional state
i must endorse these cognitive distortions
by definition
and if i say that i really don't think i do most of the time...
but when i am upset then at those times i might well be more inclined to accept them...
then they tell me that i accepted them before my emotion, and that i 'unconsciously' endorsed them...
and what kind of nonsense is this???and i started questioning the model...
thoughts -> feelings
and intense feelings are the result of faulty / distorted / illocical thinkings...
i did not accept it...
and i started thinking that while that does seem to be true sometimes...
sometimes it seems to be the other way around...and linehan agreed.
bravo.and in learning about emotions...
learning more about emotions
(i still don't know very much and i suppose i'll only discover more and more ignorance over the next four years...)
but in learning a little about emotions
there is something called
the affective primacy thesis.
and it is accepted.
it is accepted.
and it shows that affective / emotional states can indeed occur before conscious thinking.
because people do respond emotionally to subliminally presented stimuli (which is not consciously experienced or recognised even)and sometimes...
thinking and emotion come apart...so one can have a fear response to spiders...
while knowing full well rationally that that spider cannot harm youand you can tell yourself rationally that that spider cannot harm you
over and over and over
to no effectbecause...
there is evidence for two pathways in the brain...
there is empirical support for the thesis
that while sometimes
thought -> feeling
and that while othertimes
feeling -> thought
on other occasions...
thinking...
feeling...
are independent from each other...two pathways.
and thats not a matter of logic.
wiring...
our brains are 'wired' in the sense of the neural connections...
the neural pathways...
the wiring changes...
the product of unfolding from within
(genes)
the product of responding to experiences
(environment incl nutrition etc)
some peoples nervous systems are wired to 'reactive'
so they respond quick...
'jumpier'
and some peoples nervous systems are wired up so that they have a more intense response
and are slower to return to baselineand that is a result of both nature and nurture...
and different people have different ratio's of how much it is due to their nature (ie their genetic inheritance) and how much that is to do with their nurture (ie their traumatic experiences) but really it is impossible to draw a hard line between nature and nurture anyways because nutrition (for example) is environmental... yet without any nutrition at all it wouldn't really make sense to talk of the 'unfolding' of ones genetic inheritance...and that emotional process...
can run independently from conscious thinking...and sometimes... conscious thinking can get us into trouble (this is the idea about our 'secondary emotions' being the result of cognitive evaluations of ones emotional state)
so that...
one feels angry in response to some stimulus feature (which doesn't even need to be consciously experienced)
then one becomes consciously aware of feeling angry
then one judges oneself for feeling angry
'i am such a f*cked up horrible person and i really shouldn't be feeling angry'
then one feels the secondary emotion of shame.the cbt thought is that it is those secondary emotions that are most painful
(i'm not sure about this...)
and it is those secondary emotions that are the result of 'thought distortions' / 'cognitive errors'. its those that you are supposed to change.
linehan talks about...
lifting the judgement.
the secondary emotion comes from the negative judgement.it is our judgements that can be changed by acceptance.
accepting ourselves...
rather than judging ourselves harshly
with 'shoulds' etc.but regarding the 'primary' emotions...
the wiring of our nervous system...
and sometimes there is little to be done but to ride it through
and comfort oneself as best one can...
and know...
that it will pass...and not to make it worse with judgements...
poster:alexandra_k
thread:575153
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/write/20051022/msgs/584081.html