Random thought

[firecat]

(also posted to alt.poly)

To what extent is having irrational fears a luxury?

Comments

irrational fears

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

papersky!!! *bounce*.

yes, that's pretty much how i feel about irrational fears for myself, probably because i don't recall having any when my life was mostly about surviving day to day. my fears, then, were rational.

and i do mean to belittle irrational fears, again, for myself. i don't want to have any, and when i do, i work to get rid of them.

Re: irrational fears

[elisem.livejournal.com]

Belittling the fears would be a different thing from belittling yourself, yes?

Re: irrational fears

[firecat]

I'm not pleonastic but I think belittling oneself is generally a pretty crappy and useless thing to do. On the other hand I do think that it's worthwhile to belittle some of the notions that show up in my mind, such as "I can't/don't deserve to have a nice life."

Re: irrational fears

[elisem.livejournal.com]

Eggzackly.

[baratron.livejournal.com]

Ah, then I have misunderstood the question, because I was thinking you meant "irrational fears" as in phobias. I have a whole bunch of them :) Some of them are basic primeval responses (such as arachnophobia - I don't have that one, but it makes evolutionary sense to me - many spiders are poisonous to humans, therefore it is useful to the human species as a whole if we try to avoid spiders), some of them are Pavlovian learned responses (some of which I should try to get rid of, as a learned response to an ex's behaviour may not be appropriate for a current partner), and some of them are just interesting ways in which I'm fucked up, which therapy may or may not resolve :) But I've clearly misunderstood your question. So, could you give more context, please?

[firecat]

More context is here.

I think of phobias as veryvery strong fears, which might or might not be irrational at their base (although their intensity is usually irrational, or else we wouldn't call 'em phobias).

Re: irrational fears

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

oh, definitely. i try not to belittle myself in all seriousness, and if i do, i consider it a useless thing to do. i do it in fun, but i've got to be careful with that one, because true negativity can sneak in that way.

i really like putting stupid emotions in their place though. this is where the adherents of the "ëmotions are neither good nor bad, they just are" school always lose me. i've never yet gained anything just accepting stuff like "i am a worthless piece of protoplasm, my mother said so". i've fought it actively, and have gotten rid of a lot of that sort of thing, and i am a lot happier for it.

Re: irrational fears

[firecat]

I consider "I am a worthless piece of protoplasm" to be a belief, not an emotion. I think it's certainly worth fighting stupid beliefs. (Heh. I know no one reading this has any idea!) Insofar as the belief gives rise to an emotion, I think fighting the emotion itself doesn't make sense.

Re: irrational fears

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

that phrasing is a translation of what it feels like -- it's a dreadful feeling of worthlessness, not-belonging, and it's underneath where i'd call something a belief. it used to just well over me; sadness, dread, a shrinking of the self. yeah, i call that as much an emotion as love, it's similarly complex. and i had it before i understood the belief -- i understood "not worthy, not wanted here" before i could put words to it. my mother was an excellent teacher. *wry grin*.

and yes, i think fighting it made a lot of sense for me. that feeling was rational around my mother, but not rational around many people who came afterwards. and even if i intellectually told myself that it wasn't true, that just didn't do anything much for me -- i mean, i knew that from a certain age on, i understood the etiology of the damn problem. but i had to counter-act the emotion itself, actively, at the time that i felt it, before i made any inroads.

i do this a fair bit with emotions i consider to be not-good for me. especially with the depression; it would just be too damn easy to sink deeper and deeper into dark stuff. and intellectual attempts to manage it, while i'd love them to work better than "thinking happy thoughts" (which is badly simplified), just don't do the job alone.

Re: irrational fears

[firecat]

Emotions that stick around and drag you deeper are worth fighting if you can find a way to fight them that works for you. I think the folks who say "emotions just are" have the experience that most emotions go away within a reasonable period of time. I never had that experience until I went on meds.