firecat

When I get stressed in certain ways then I start getting a zillion messages per minute running through my head, all of which have the words "YOU SHOULD" in them.

If this happens to you too, how do you turn it off?

(There's no emergency. I just want to fix a bunch of things that I am not in a position to fix, although I might be able to influence them.)

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From:

submarine_bells

For me, it depends on the sort of "shoulds" in question. If it's for things that commonly fall under the headings of "socially approved messages" or "manifestations of my own insecurity" I argue with them in my head, loudly and emphatically. "You really should do X.." "No I shouldn't! That's a stupid idea. Go away!"

If it's for stuff that I really should do, like work on my thesis when I don't feel like it, I try to do what the "shoulds" are telling me, and if my attempts don't work (e.g I can't concentrate no matter how hard I try) I try to take a step back and work out why it's not working. Is it an incipient migraine causing my brain to turn to mush? Am I worried about something else that's keeping me from focussing? Am I just being slack? And then I attempt to deal with that problem directly.

In a situation like what you describe, assuming the "shoulds" pertain to the thing that I'm worried about, I try to address them usefully - if I can do something specific, I do it. If I can't, sometimes learning more about the problem under discussion is useful (hello, google and wikipedia! Also, topic spcific webforums, which can be very handy for reality-checking my reactions and experiences around the angsty subject). And sometimes there's nothing to be done, and net-research doesn't tell me anything I don't already know, so I do my best to distract myself from the worries with some LOUD AND STIMULATING DISTRACTION, like a favourite action movie with the volume up high, or perhaps a computer game that will absorb my attention and let me think about something else for a while.

From:

firecat

Yes, I was all over the "how to soundproof a room" web pages yesterday morning, and later on I scanned a lot of photographs, which decidedly did not have to be done, but it was entertaining (except the part where the scanner kept randomly seizing up).