So how do we resolve this?

As mentioned earlier, everything I list here is just a means of showing how mechanisms might work, they are not saying this happened to you. But the chance is you will have experienced something emotionally similar because no-one gets out of childhood without experiencing a version of it. Anyway, one way or another the process of therapy starts to awaken deeply buried emotional memories from childhood where we struggled to understand aspects of our childhood experiences. We then unfortunately add our own ‘kids logic’ interpretation. This interpretation concluded in the oncontravertible belief that we are not good enough. Well almost incontravertible…

The belief is so painful that our subconscious locks it away in a sort of Pandora’s box in the deepest part of our mind and then builds defences all around it so we avoid it at all costs. These defences will often appear in our behaviours.

Here is one of infinite possible examples: A parent had a massive uncontrollable rage that terrified us because it was directed occasionally towards us. Using kids logic we interpretted it as a judgement about who we were. We felt unworthy and ashamed. This could take us in several directions as we get older.

Example 1: We might feel the need to manage the emotions of everyone around us so that no-one gets angry and makes us feel rejected and worthless. A common people pleaser type response. It rarelyt works because it’s impossible to manage the emotions of others in any way effectively. It’s also exhausting.

Example 2: We might learn that the closer we get emotionally to anyone, the more risk there is of them hurting us because we learned that the people we love hurt us in the end. We might start relationships but end them the moment we start to care because that vulnerabiliy feels dangerous and doomed to end in painful rejection, so get out before the pain of rejection becomes possible. Commonly the commitment-phobe, or people that maintain an emotional distance.

Example 3: Basically your mind could come up with any behaviour that seeks to avoid the risk of of feeling rejection.

We can see the behaviours are not logical and might actively work against us, but we feel compusively condemned to comply.

Now consider the impact of an emotionally distant parent, or one who is constantly critical, or ignores you, or who is dismissive of you, or can’t cope themselves so you feel responsible for them, or left because they couldn’t handle it. Etc etc, ad infinitum.

It might be a small but persistent thing. It might be something massive. It has an impact on who you become.

Though at times it can be a malign energy, it is usually not deliberate, just parents doing the best they can with limited capability or understanding of their impact. We don’t get taught abot the emotional development of children at school after all. There is a very apt poem by Phillip Larkin called ‘This be the verse’ that simply explains it all quite well.

So into that well defended place, step you and your therapist with questions and a desire to understand. Because the truth will actually set you free, even if it feels like the most dangerous thing in the world to examine. Something that might destroy you existentially by proving you are actually as worthless as you fear you are. Because thats the risk. If a stranger passes you in the street and calls you a ‘potato’, you can easily dismiss this because it’s a stranger whose opinion you are less concerned about and you don’t believe you are a potato. Also in most cultures there are no immediate negative associations with the being a potato.

However, someone you care deeply about says that they are ‘disappointed’ in you. and suddenly all the alarm bells go off.

Firstly it’s someone you care about, meaning it’s a relationship you value, meaning you are fearful of losing it. Secondly, and most importantly, they have just confirmed something you already believe about yourself. Your worst belief about yourself in fact: that you are actually a disappointment, or not good enough, or unworthy. So now you feel worthless and maybe depressed. A failure.

So when we finally get to open the box, what we actually find is something that was done to you, not really something about you. The moment was created by someone elses inability to provide you with the safety you needed at that crucial time. Remember children are the innocents.

But the experience left a wound (as we like to say in therapy). And every time we get close to that wound it hurts. So don’t do that, avoid or deny, or joke, or distract, or perform or put it on someone else. These are the types of defence mechanisms that keep us from getting close to the source of the pain because we really don’t want to be reminded of the shame and our percieved worthlessness.

The journey with the therapist is to work our way through the defences so we can open Pandora’s box and process all of the emotion that has been leaking out like toxic waste, poisoning everyday life. Connecting the feeling to it’s inception allows the feelings to be processed and the wound to start to heal. Once emotionally processed and integrated we at least have a chance of operating without the unprocessed emotions sabotaging our every experience.

To do this, means that the therapist has to create the circumstances where your subconscious feels safe enough to open the box. This can be a lengthy process as each week your subconscious trusts the space just a little bit more until it feels emotionally safe enough to let the lid up a crack.