[taoplr]

i meant taoplr, sorry. no disrespect....

Next you'll be forgetting what I look like... Then what?

Not offense taken. BTW, I couldn't get to the computer until now and I won't able to finish the next installment until later. But I'll get it done asap.

Meanwhile, try the same exercise asking "What" questions instead of "why," as in "What do I get from (Feeling this, doing that, worrying, imagining her being with another guy, etc.)?" "What stops me from ________." "What might happen if I _________?" "What part of me causes me to _______?"

Get creative.

That will bring up a different information set. Enjoy the ride.

Tao

[vanheart]

Thanks no worries, that gives me a lot to think about. Putting the question in context to the future in a positive light (action oriented) Im pretty bagged only slept 3hrs. Last night. Will come back with something when I can gather my thoughts, If you have time expanding upon that in the meantime, I would certainly welcome any thoughts. Thanks... Wait, you just did.

[taoplr]

... Putting the question in context to the future in a positive light (action oriented) ...expanding upon that ....

The next step is to take the process a little deeper. First, let's repeat the premises of the model, and acknowledge what you have done so far.

You successfully created a state of mind in which you communicated with yourself in a way that enabled you to ask some useful questions and make some declarations. You made the courageous choice to pursue your fear, and got answers. It can be said that two or more parts of your mind communicated with each other, and that each has a perspective, an opinion, and even a personality. Based on that, the model presupposes that you, and all of us, can be seen as communities of parts, rather than single, congruent selves. Seeing ourselves this way makes accss to our own unconscious minds possible at levels and in ways that make changing and growing easier and more reliable than most approaches, most notably logic and reason.

You have found that out.

Each of these parts has a job, a function, and is created for and dedicated to its function. Think of them as having been created in childhood, either because of genetic instructions, or modeling the people around us, or because we create them. Some of them are dumb and simple—I call them "brain bots"—and jut runsimple routines, others are very smart and complex and handle Big Item strategies within us, like how we make a living, or what kind of lover we are. Smart or dumb, they operate like software, faithfully doing what they are created to do until given a reason to stop.

And I'm going to stop here because I'm testing using Dreamweaver to compose my text. I find it hard to write into the window on AMHD's site, and want to see if I can copy and paste from my desktop. I'll be back.

Tao

[vanheart]

Tao,
I totally get it & for the first time I am getting the sense of being free. The child reference really helped me understand the notion of conditioning and what you meant by "floating above" yourself. Being in touch with those "brain-bots" and as you mentioned & actually being the "user" of that software. Learning to get the system running efficiently again & almost recognizing that that system is always there & running for you. Thanks so much. I will be thinking about this.

[chuff]

Honestly, Tao is amazing. I've been thinking about aspects of my life not even related to relationships and doing exactly what you did here by writing them down just like you did. I live by the belief, "I will take something good from this." and I hope you are getting that, even though the emotions are raw. I hope you are getting the feeling something good and I dare say better will come from this experience. They say that that does not kill you makes your stronger, and I think we've seen that today.

[vanheart]

Its funny that you just wrote that, chuff, As I was ready to call it a night, I was feeling guilty that the thoughts of ultimate revenge were creeping up and made me feel out of touch, in a way. So unlike my nature. Then recalled your post about turning my frustrated & confused rant around. Then thought, this feeling is one of my last negative feelings and will be easy to discard. As it has been challenging to remove her out of all the context, I wrote a note to myself before: "This is the only favor that she has ever has ever really done for you" And for that I am grateful & I will be empowered for that in truly grateful & positive way. It will only be realized in how I use that gift. Thanks man. And yes, both you & tao rock.

[taoplr]

"This is the only favor that she has ever has ever really done for you" And for that I am grateful & i will be empowered for that in truly grateful & positive way.

OK. That worked. Good. And thanks to you both for your kind comments.

Communicating with one's parts of mind is like diplomacy: you have to build respect, trust, safety and the willingness to take creative steps. If you establish and sustain rapport you can get access to the depths of your mind. (Rapport - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) If you approach yourself in a harsh or blameful manner, access is quickly denied; you just lose focus somehow, like your brain did the Jedi mind trick on itself, or you get no answers, or some part of you gets defensive. Your inner self has had enough brutality inflicted on it, and will only let you in if you listen and talk with gentle respect.

That's one reason why the anguish you have been going through takes so long to run its cycle. And that's why the answers you got so far are about her, but not yet about the depths of you. You connected with a part of yourself that has wisdom about this relationship, and is giving you good advice. This interaction serves as an example of whether you can be trusted if allowed further in; you're not going to break the furniture in a fit of self loathing if you get some insight into your unconscious patterns. But you don't yet have access deeper down.

Acces to deeper levels is like reputation on this forum (Askme). The more positive interactions, the more trust. So the next step is to go inside yourself again (and again) and talk with whichever parts are willing to talk with you. General "getting to know you" conversations are fine, or you can try addressing problematic things that you do, like suffering over this girl beyond a certain point. The key is to enter your inner world and take everything at face value; if some part of you emerges, take it seriously.

You might visualize parts of your mind, ask them their names, interact, play games, re-experience history, think some things through, and more. I spent almost a year hanging out daily with that six year-old boy with whom I hadn't spoken for almost 30 years; sometimes we talked an hour at a time. I would just go into my office, lie down on the floor, and visualize him and talk with him. He was me at six, a part that dealt with trauma, and who stayed there and then, trying to recover. Over that year, he slowly got what he needed to integrate into the adult me, having updated his function of getting affection.

Eventually, you will want to talk with the part of you that suffers fear and anxiety within you. The information that emerges in that conversation will not be about anyone else but you. That gets difficult, but you will find out what you get from some of your emotional states and behaviors.

At this point, you will find it useful to understand that each part, no matter how troublesome their behavior, is there to do something good. Each part gets you one or more results, which are called "secondary gains." The part of you that makes you afraid might have motivation as its secondary gain, for example. It drives you to grow or act on your own behalf by scaring the s**t out of you. That's just an example; I'll show it below.

But the bottom line for now is that each part gets you something that you need. It's method might be obsolete or obnoxious, but it drives behavior that gets you something you want. One form of reframing is to separate this method from the intention behind it, and to enable new methods to form while preserving the intention. This process is guided by evaluations of the actual outcomes you get, like what you get from feeling anxiety. You can achieve this through dialog with the part that owns the function of making you feel anxious.

To clarify, you have: Intention-->Method-->Outcome. You intend to get to work; your method is to take your car; your outcome is that you arrive on time. If you were stuck with an out-of-date method, like taking a horse, the outcome might be poor. If you still cried when you were hungry—the method we all are born with—instead of updating the method—developing gestures, words, sentences, reading menus, and as an adult,"I'll have the chateaubriand, please."—you would never get fed at Chez Pierre's French restaurant.

While being shattered by having your heart broken is absolutely normal, so is healing. The parts of you that are sustaining fear and anxiety, independently of this episode in your life, are exercising methods that give you something that you need in general, but in his case are keeping you from healing and being done.

This means that you can ask what that part gets for you and go deeper and deeper, layer by layer, until you find the secondary gain that you truly want. Then, you invite your creative mind to invent several methods for getting you that, methods that don't make you suffer. Example:

"What do you get for me by making me fearful?"

"I make you miserable."

"What do you get for me by making me miserable?"

"I make you insecure."

"What do you get for me by making me insecure?"

"I motivate you to get off your and grow."

"Thank you for that because I really need it. If there were a way to get me off my and grow that didn't include being fearful and insecure, and so didn't make me suffer, a way that worked at least as well as the current method, but without the downside, would you consider using it"?

(Long silence; internal scanning going on)

"Yes, I would consider it."

You get the idea. At this point, one gives the creative parts of the unconscious mind the task of coming up with three methods, each of which fulfills the job of motivating you better than the current method, and presenting them to "the motivator" who picks one, two, all three, or some hybrids combinations of the three. The amazing thing is that almost all of the process happens outside of consciousness.

More on that later.

tao

[vanheart]

Thanks, tao for breaking that down further. When you say "parts" what are you referring to? The part that make you feel_______? Need to let all this soak in and try communicating with myself in a deeper fashion. Appreciate it, very much.

[talaniman]

Just a question,

Being that long distance relationships are difficult at best, what carried this one for 5 years with no end goal insight? Most normal relationships have a direction, and a goal to work toward, but from what you have written, I don't see that here, is why I ask.

[vanheart]

Tal, that is a good question & something that I really need to take a hard look at. What I am faced with seeing that the majority of what I believed from her and any goals were false. Don't get me wrong, I take responsibility for this as well. What I feel is that she kept me at a distance, was frustrated that there was no plan, yet kept any plan from occurring.

[talaniman]

The reason I asked was because I would have been pizzed at the lack of progress in this area, and confronted her about it. (a year or so ) and instead of being mad for long, would have been backing out on my own.

But remember, I have been dumped by many females, so what does that say about me? I don't think I could have lasted a year, let alone 5 years.

[vanheart]

You're absolutely right. I was frustrated, & didn't know exactly how to remedy things & move forward for whatever reasons whether it be coasting, confusedness or lack of effort on my part. (These are the some of the things that I really need to take a closer look at) Maybe I don't truly give to myself and feel that sacrificing for someone else makes me feel invested or associate that with love.

[taoplr]

Thanks, tao for breaking that down further. When you say "parts" what are you referring to? The part that make you feel_______? Need to let all this soak in and try communicating with myself in a deeper fashion. Appreciate it, very much.

Let's make sure we are tracking so far. Have you understood my definition of "parts of mind" in general? i.e. sub-personae, aspects of your mind, each with a function, personality, etc. The idea that we can see ourselves as communities of "parts" instead of homogeneous wholes...

Has that been clear?

If so, the part that makes you feel fearful will appear as distinct from the part that makes you love, or the part that motivates you to do your job, or that has spiritual experiences. For every function, there is a "part."

Yes? No? Are we on track?

[taoplr]

Youre absolutely right. I was frustrated, & didnt know exactly how to remedy things & move forward for whatever reasons whether it be coasting, confusedness or lack of effort on my part. (These are the some of the things that I really need to take a closer look at) Maybe I dont truly give to myself and feel that sacrificing for someone else makes me feel invested or associate that with love.

Here's an example: a part of you feels that sacrificing for someone is associated with love. Other parts of you are questioning that.

[vanheart]

Yes, got it. Thanks.
Have begun to think about all of those parts & which questions I can ask.
What is starting to help is not looking at this as purely an exercise, but more of a dialogue.

[vanheart]

Its funny that you said that, while I was in the shower, that became the subject of my first & many questions, thanks.

[taoplr]

Yes, got it. Thanks.
Have begun to think about all of those parts & which questions I can ask.
What is starting to help is not looking at this as purely an excercise, but more of a dialogue.

OK, now that you recognize that it's an ongoing dialog, it becomes obvious that you are changing, via this dialog, the relationship between you (your conscious mind) and various parts of your unconscious mind. Keep working on this relationship and you will gain access to the depths of your being. Some more key realizations are:

• You can change how you relate to yourself by changing how you relate to (dialog with) one part at a time, or groups of parts. It is in your interest to talk with the part of you that has been recently heartbroken, but whenever you want you can also address and update your relationship with any other part.
• Operate with the assumption that all the parts are working for you, doing an essential job for which they were created. There are no "bad" parts, just obsolete or dysfunctional methods.
• How you relate to the parts of your mind IS how you relate to other people.

That means that you have a part for every person you know, an internal representation of all the people in your life. That's who you talk to when you run an imaginary dialog with someone who is not there with you. Change the dialog and you change the relationship.

If you want to improve the way you relate to women, for example, start a dialog among the parts of you that empathize with them. Then add the part that is drawn to them, fears them, idealizes them, objectifies them, and so on. Invite them all. Just do the meditative thing you did yesterday and imagine yourself in a room with these "people" (they are all you, just different aspects of you--parts of your mind visualized as whole individuals) and start a dialog. Let your imagination run. Get into the conversation. Let parts come and go in the dialog as they want. Just get quiet within your own mind and let your unconscious talk to you.

Whatever these virtual people/parts say, take it as truth... their truth... the reality that they live with, and the motivation for the job they are doing for you. Understand that they don't know about time, calendars, CNN news updates and the fact that you have developed since you created them. They remain at the time and place of their creation until you bring them up to date. The whole idea is to make new choices available to them (you) and to cultivate a self-knowing, self-respecting, self-correcting, high-velocity-learning, productively entertaining relationship with yourself. Peace of mind comes with the package, BTW.

Dialog away, dude. You will discover more of who you are, and will find yourself effortlessly forgetting your heartbreak. Instead, you will be learning faster and at greater depths than ever before. When you have questions, let me know.

Tao

[vanheart]

Wow, tao. That's really helpful, I'm starting really understand. What's helps is to imagine myself in dialogue with different parts together as in a group situation. As well as possibly one or two. Thanks so much for this insight & dedication here. Truly appreciate ALL of it. Cheers.

[talaniman]

Great exercise to get you to think before you make impulsive decisions based on feelings and not facts.

Most partners go along with the other partner as a way to keep peace, not make them mad. The motivation for ignoring their BS? Keeping them in there lives. After all you can't live without them.

[vanheart]

That's exactly the frustration I felt, almost damned if you try.