Tag Archives: anxiety

Worry, Worry, Worry

General and Miscellaneous, Personal Conflict, Stress, Vicious Cycle Patterns in Relationships, , , , , ,

Do you ever lose sleep with worry over some situation that seems out of your control? And even though you realize that worry doesn’t help, you do it anyway? Or perhaps you try blocking it out to get some sleep, but it just won’t go away? And next day, does your sleep deprivation keep you from focusing on what caused all the worry in the first place? I hate when that happens.

Possible Quick Fixes

Well, what can you do about this pattern? Perhaps you can convince your doctor to prescribe sleeping pills. They might knock you out for the night, so that you can be more rested the next day. Or maybe your doctor would be willing to prescribe a tranquilizer. Then the challenging situation wouldn’t bother you so much – you can accept it, rather than struggling over it. Or you might practice mindfulness by living in the “here and now.” Concentrating on your breathing, or on a mantra, might release the grip of fret and worry.

All of these options may serve to relieve your anxiety and worry temporarily. This could allow you to tackle the situation fresh and relaxed when in occurs. Still it may do little to help you actually resolve the dilemma that has you stuck. While you may stop spinning your wheels with useless worry, you still stay stuck. Without a new outlook toward the situation, you are likely to play out the folksy definition of insanity. That is, you keep taking the same approach (or some variation of it), while expecting different results.

Gaining Perspective: Recognizing the Pattern

Whenever we are overcome with worry, it’s usually because someone has found a way to push our buttons, intentionally or not. Some people, particularly in families, are particularly adept at pushing our buttons, perhaps because they helped install them. And often we have pushed their buttons, as well. Frequently this becomes a back-and-forth exercise of escalating tensions, one which I have explored extensively in my posts on vicious cycle patterns in relationships.

The Blame Game

One of the factors which perpetuate the struggle is the debate over who started it. This often is a ruse to gain the higher ground of moral righteousness, rather than an attempt to resolve the issue: this not only inflames tensions, but also distracts from finding a healthy resolution. You don’t need to crawl out of a hole in the same place you fell in. When we recognize that in such dramas there are actually no winners, such concerns become insignificant.

Finding Acceptance through Understanding

A loose translation of one of the proverbs in the Tao Te Ching states that when we understand how a system (e.g., a vicious cycle pattern) works, we can have compassion for each and every participant in that pattern – including ourselves. Achieving this understanding on the level of the heart, and not just the head, can go a long way toward liberating us from the worries spawned by such interaction patterns.

Finding the Stillness in the Eye of the Storm

An analogy implicit in the vicious cycle model is that of the vortex, with tornadoes and hurricanes being destructive examples. These natural phenomena offer a hint for staying calm during chaos: the stillness in the eye of the storm. Yet such storms are usually on the move, requiring our constant attention to avoid getting swept by them. When we apply this image to our relationships, we recognize that others who are caught up in the drama often are more than willing to have us join them in the destructive pattern. Yet the real danger of getting sucked into the drama is often internal: our egos frequently draw us into power struggles and cause us to lose sight of our mutual goals. Here, our compassion for all involved in the struggle can help keep us centered and balanced in the midst of the storm.

Extricating Ourselves from Conflict

Here, I find the analogy of Velcro™ helpful. well. In order for Velcro™ to work effectively, one side has the hooks and the other side has the loops. In order for others to hook us, we have to expose our loops: no loops, no snag. We often overlook this simple insight because we focus on our adversaries’ faults (the hooks). And in turn, they hone in on ours vulnerabilities (the loops). By working on healing ourselves, we can free ourselves from the tangle. While this appears rather simple in the Velcro™ analogy, recognizing our loops is a daunting task, one which I have delved into in my posts on vicious cycle patterns (Vicious Cycle Patterns in Relationships 2.0, and Escaping the Victim Role). I would refer you to these articles to explore the particular guidelines of engagement in more practical terms.

Note that I am not advocating withdrawal and avoidance. Often, that is not possible without sacrificing much that is important to us. When we have a stake in the race, we want to know what our adversaries are up to. As the adage goes, “Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.” We need to engage, but we need to avoid getting locked into power struggles that threaten to knock us off-balance.

Self-Exploration and Mindfulness

This self-exploration to resolve interpersonal conflicts causing worry is compatible with relaxation strategies. Thus, I am not renouncing the mindfulness training (or the judicious use of psychiatric medications, for that matter). Indeed, we can use meditation to cultivate the clear-headedness needed to achieve insight into our involvement in these conflicts. Many mindfulness exercises offer a temporary reprieve from worry by focusing attention elsewhere. This often is on current sensory experiences, such as music, nature, or our own breathing. Yet for these exercises to help alleviate conflict, they must be strategic retreats, not avoidance.

Making Peace with Uncertainty

We can expand our view of mindfulness practices to include attention to some unsettling feelings. These might include frustrations and resentments over past interactions or apprehensions about the future – in short, worry. We might observe our minds calling up past events or conjuring up fantasies of future interactions. Yet we resist the pulls that threaten to engulf us in these scenarios. We can note our emotional reactions to these events, real or imagined, whether that might be anger, resentment, guilt, shame, embarrassment, envy, worry, disgust, fear, loathing, etc. Again, we observe our feelings, preferably with compassion for ourselves, yet without allowing ourselves to be consumed by these feelings. We might also step back to recognize how vicious cycles have engulfed others, Furthermore, we realize that they, too, are suffering, regardless of their roles they have assumed.

Letting Go of Unrealistic Expectations

By undertaking these steps, we might transform our worry into an acceptance for how things are. This contrasts with our earlier protestation over how things are not as they are meant to be. When we recognize that reconciliation is unavailable, we may need to grieve. Then, we may realize that it is time to let go of the relationship.

Developing a Plan and a Strategy

Or the acceptance might be more hopeful, if we can envision ourselves as taking a different approach, one that might improve prospects for a constructive resolution, or at least might allow our disentanglement from the vicious cycle pattern.

Rehearsal: Developing Skills

In the latter case, we might go beyond the mindfulness mindset to engage in rehearsal of how we might respond to our anticipated challenges more effectively. We undertake this step, realizing that we lack some interpersonal skills for relating to others. By performing a self-evaluation, we can identify areas requiring further work. These areas may include asserting our positions, asking for what we want and need, setting limits with others, using leverage appropriately, active listening to others’ perspectives, bargaining a compromise, and collaborating. At this point, we can practice and develop these skills.

From Worry to Planning

Here, it may be better to rehearse these positions and develop a strategy, rather than winging it and learning strictly by trial and error. Through these steps, we have the potential to transform debilitating worry into constructive contingency planning, possibly leading to conflict resolution on the practical plane and reconciliation on the deeper personal level. Hopefully, we don’t have to figure this out at 3 AM.

Escaping the Victim Role

Interpersonal Roles, Personal Conflict, Vicious Cycle Patterns in Relationships, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The current post identifies features of the Victim role and explores strategies for escaping this role. This draws upon the vicious cycle patterns addressed in a previous post, including Steven Karpman’s Persecutor – Victim – Rescuer cycle, cited in Games Alcoholics Play, by Claude Steiner. Most people are probably familiar enough with the Victim role so that it needs no introduction. If you haven’t fallen into that role yourself, you no doubt have encountered others who have. Or perhaps you have been cast in the complementary role of either the Oppressor or the Enabler in dealing with the Victim role. Of course, your familiarity with the subject won’t stop me from sharing my ideas about it.

Defining the Victim Role

The Victim role represents a particular response to suffering. This might be described through the questions, “Why is this happening to me, of all people?” and “What did I ever do to deserve this?” Implied in such questions is an assumption that life should be fair, and that we should get our just desserts without having to struggle for them. This sentiment is so common that Rabbi Harold Kushner wrote an entire book, Why Bad Things Happen to Good People, to address it.

The Victim Role in Relation to the Oppressor Role

While the Victim role is sometimes adopted in reaction to events such as illness, accidents, and natural disasters, more often it is a response to the actions of others who are seen as intentionally abusive or unjust. This frequently involves establishing relatively enduring interaction patterns between the Victim and the Oppressor, as discussed in my page, Vicious Cycle Patterns in Relationships 2.0. Below is a diagram illustrating a common interplay between the Victim and the Critic, a relatively benign variation on the Oppressor role.critic-victim-cycle1

Here, Victims view their Oppressors as powerful and controlling, and in turn see themselves as powerless, helpless, and hopeless. These perceptions often serve as self-fulfilling prophecies, as they encourage Victims to practice avoidant and accommodating styles of dealing with conflict in relationships. In the process, other styles for dealing with conflict get neglected, resulting in a deficit of assertiveness and conflict-resolution skills: if you don’t use it, you lose it. In turn, the lack of such skills makes one all the more vulnerable to oppression by others.

Self-empowerment as an Escape Plan

The above description of the Victim role suggests self-empowerment as a means for escaping the role. This typically involves a willingness to engage in conflict rather than avoiding it or capitulating to the demands of others. Commitment to this approach is only a start – empowerment requires working smarter, not just harder. Not only can we work toward mastering the different interpersonal conflict strategies, addressed in a previous post, but we can also develop our understanding of when each is appropriate. Just as in football, where each side runs different plays depending on the game’s circumstances and the anticipated play of the opponent, strategy counts in conflict resolution. Perseverance counts, too: note that wars have been won even when the majority of the battles have gone to the other side. It is prudent to choose our battles, and to retreat in order to fight another day.

Knowledge is Power

Holding our own in conflicts may well depend upon our understanding not only of our adversaries, but also of ourselves. By understanding our adversaries, their weaknesses as well as their strengths, we can better judge when and where to use leverage effectively, and when and how to propose compromises from a position of strength. Stephen Mitchell’s translation of the Tao Te Ching notes the risk of underestimating one’s adversaries, such as by viewing them as evil. Such a simplistic perspective may blind us to the complexity of their perspectives and motivations, thus placing us at a disadvantage. Perhaps an even more difficult challenge is understanding ourselves: the Gospels note Jesus observing how it is easier to spot the splinter in another’s eye than to see the beam in our own. It is also quite helpful to understand how our interpersonal styles interact with the styles with others. My webpage, Vicious Cycle Patterns in Relationships 2.0, explores how certain common roles tend to interact with one other in a vicious cycle pattern. It offers some general suggestions for escaping the vicious cycle roles, regardless of the particular role one has assumed.

Shifting the Balance of Fight vs. Flight

Once one understands various aspects of a conflict, one can then put this understanding into practice through active engagement with one’s adversary. Here the motivational factor is quite relevant, with anger and fear being basic emotions involved. Anger charges us up to confront our adversaries, while fear serves to mobilize us to flee to escape danger. In evolutionary terms, our biological system is wired for a Fight vs. Flight reaction, which is appropriate for survival in life-or-death situations, but is excessive for most conflicts in civilized society. As we become more knowledgeable and skillful in dealing with interpersonal conflict, we become better able to stand our ground and assert our claims. Here, intense fear and anxiety can get in the way of this process by supporting old patterns of avoidance and submission. Anger can serve to override our fears and mobilize our active engagement in conflict, yet its intensity can be disruptive to the processes of negotiation and conflict resolution. Like steel, anger must be tempered to be used effectively. One strategy to accomplish this involves the use of meditation or other relaxation techniques to reduce the intensity of emotions from “so mad you can’t see straight” to a more moderate level.

Challenging the Attitudes That Incite Impotent Rage

In confronting our anger, we should recognize that our anger can be incited to rage not only through our more primitive Fight vs. Flight reaction, but also through our more advanced thought processes. This issue is addressed in a previous post, When Thinking Distorts Feelings. The post also presents a strategy for challenging some of the attitudes and underlying assumptions that fuel the fire of emotions, often to the point of their being disruptive rather than helpful (hence the term, “impotent rage”). By putting our anger and anxiety into proper perspective, we are better able to assert ourselves, rather than either going ballistic with rage or capitulating to our adversaries out of fear.

Developing a Positive and Realistic Perspective

There are other attitudes and expectations that often discourage us from asserting ourselves effectively in conflict. For one thing, it is pretty common to get discouraged when we stumble in our efforts to assert ourselves. We may need to remind ourselves that we can expect to make mistakes as we are practicing our newly learned assertion skills. We can reassure ourselves that these are only failures if we give up on the process. Furthermore, it helps to recognize that we can learn more from our mistakes than we can from our successes, unless we are blaming ourselves too harshly. It is also reassuring to know that progress is seldom linear, with it often involving two or three steps forward, followed by one or two steps back. We may also need to give ourselves permission to choose our battles, so that we might “live to fight another day.” We can also console ourselves with the recognition that wars have been won even when most of the battles went to the other side. Strategic retreat can be a valuable tactic, as long as it does not turn into unconditional surrender. Unless we adopt these attitudes, we run the risk of falling into the Critic role with ourselves, thus becoming “our own worst critics.”

How Do You Spell Relief?

Dealing with conflict is often a stressful experience, and strategic retreats to gain temporary relief can be valuable for sustaining our efforts. Here it is important to distinguish healthy outlets from those that actually “recycle” stress by providing temporary relief while worsening the overall situation. The latter often involve activities such as abusing substances, gambling, compulsive shopping, pornography, and comfort eating. Even when these outlets are pursued for strategic retreat, their emotional numbing and distraction often result in unconditional surrender through subsequent avoidance of the conflict. Furthermore, these outlets often give the Critic more ammunition with which to judge and blame the Victim, thus placing the Victim at an even greater disadvantage. Healthier outlets are available, though, with these generally fall into the categories of relaxation, recreation, exercise, and expression.

The Victim Role in Relation to the Enabler Role

Thus far, the Victim role has been defined in relation to the Oppressor role and its variants, such as the Critic, the Persecutor, and the Abuser. The Victim role is also defined through its interaction with another interpersonal role, that of the Rescuer or the Enabler, with this pattern diagrammed below.victim-enabler-cycle

In this particular pattern, Victims express themselves through complaints about unfair conditions in their lives. They frequently seek out some tangible support or relief. This may not be explicitly stated, and often does not need to be, as Enablers are ready to volunteer support without even being asked for it. The sought-after relief may take many forms: provision of a safe haven, advocacy in defense of the Victims, mediation to resolve the conflict, protection from the wrath of Critics or Persecutors, concealment of mistakes, accidents, or wrongdoings, or completing the Victims’ responsibilities for them. While Enablers practice and develop their own assertion, advocacy, and communication skills in fulfilling these functions, Victims are relieved of this responsibility and thus fail to practice and develop these skills for themselves. This leaves them less competent and all the more dependent on the generous support of the Enablers, as well as more susceptible to the scorn of the Critics.

The Escape: “Please, I Need to Do This Myself”

It should be fairly obvious from the above discussion that one means of escaping the Victim role is to resist seeking support or relief from Rescuers, when we are capable of fulfilling these functions for ourselves. This also involves declining the unsolicited offers of those services, as well. That may require considerable self-discipline: why go through all that hassle when someone else will do it for us? This does not mean that we cannot accept someone’s support, as long as we retain responsibility for our position. Taking this approach provides the practice required to develop competence, earn credibility, and empower ourselves.

Complaints: Communication without Personal Vulnerability

In voicing their complaints to their Enablers, Victims often focus on external circumstances, rather than sharing their own personal experiences. In doing so, Victims claim the moral high ground in focusing on the abusive actions of the Critic, often without addressing their own shortcomings or the legitimacy of some of the Critic’s complaints. They often overlook their own passive-aggressive behavior, avoidance of conflict, and reluctance to challenge the Critic’s authority, all of which feed into the vicious cycle. By focusing on the faults of the Critics, Victims deflect attention from themselves, thus reducing the personal vulnerability involved in sharing their own anxieties, insecurities, and shame.

Beyond Complaining and into the Realm of Relating

We can escape the Victim mindset by sharing how we are feeling and doing, rather than just complaining about external events. This involves focusing on what is, rather than on what should or shouldn’t be. Being open about our fears and insecurities requires both humility and trust. Admitting our limitations may be humbling, but it helps to minimize the humiliation that comes with others recognizing our shortcomings before we acknowledge them. Opening up requires trust both in our confidantes and in ourselves: trust in the other to respect our feelings and honor our privacy, and trust in ourselves to cope effectively with those occasions when our confidantes lets us down in one way or another. While complaining about our situation may bring Enablers to our rescue, expressing our feelings is more likely to elicit compassion from our listeners. In the long run, being cared for is likely to be more beneficial than being taken care of. A further feature of open sharing is the experience of gratitude for the other’s compassionate presence. Not only can gratitude help us not to wallow in the role of Victim, but it can also encourage our confidantes to feel appreciated for their compassion. This, in turn, could help to discourage the confidantes from assuming an Enabler role that is detrimental to our growth. All of these developments help to shift the emphasis of the relationship from using the other for our own needs to that of relating to one another.

Emotional Intimacy Is a Two-way Street

Note that relating to one another is a two-way street. This requires the willingness to listen to others as they recount their struggles, as well as sharing our own. This in itself can be quite helpful for stepping out of the Victim role, as we can come to realize that our own struggle with oppression is not all that special. Furthermore, we may be inspired by hearing others’ accounts of how they overcame instances of abuse, neglect, or unfair treatment. Another benefit is in feeling good about ourselves for our compassionate listening to another’s plight. Yet perhaps the most valuable impact is the development of emotional intimacy, as both we and others allow ourselves to be vulnerable in sharing our personal struggles, which allows for compassion and gratitude for one another.

When Thinking Distorts Feelings

Cognitive Behaviorism, , , , , , , ,

Emotions tend to be looked upon unfavorably in a society that puts a premium on rationality and objectivity. Feelings are often seen as clouding one’s thinking, such that it is not uncommon to hear phrases like, “Let’s be rational about this,” and “You don’t need to be so emotional.”

Yet when functioning properly, our feelings are adaptive in directing our responses to various events in our daily lives. For example, love draws us toward our partners and others who are likely to be supportive of our endeavors. Anxiety urges the exercise of caution, stepping back from situations to assess the danger before engaging. It encourages a “look before you leap” attitude. Sadness often times stops us in our tracks, which enables us to take some time to grieve our losses before moving on, so that we do not carry that “extra baggage” with us. Anger encourages us to confront others who challenge our well-being, either by threatening harm or by interfering with our pursuits. Disgust repels us from situations we find noxious, whether physically or emotionally.  In all these examples, emotions play an adaptive role in living secure and rewarding lives.

Yet our feelings do not always function properly. At times, they may be so numbed or muted that we become complacent and avoid responding to situations that need our attention. At other times, our feelings may be “over the top,” too intense for us to utilize properly. That may be somewhat akin to having a jackhammer when a situation calls for a simple hammer. Often, it is not our emotions, but our thinking that is the culprit. Our attitudes shape our feelings toward others, events, and things, in terms of both quality and intensity. We have various sayings that illustrate this phenomenon, such as “seeing the glass as half empty or half full,” “making a mountain out of a molehill,” “seeing the silver lining of the dark cloud.” Such outlooks can have a dramatic impact on one’s feelings, which in turn can have a major impact on whether and how one responds to a given situation.

If we look at stress as an accumulation of various feelings in response to various challenges in living, we come to realize that the level of stress we experience from a given event is not so much determined by the event itself, as it is by our perception and interpretation of that situation. In other words, it is the meaning that we attach to the event that shapes the types and intensity of feelings we experience from it.

Another way of looking at emotions is the analogy of potential energy, such as from gravitational pull. The force of water flowing downhill can be either destructive or constructive. When there is too much water, such as with a downburst, a flash flood can bring pervasive destruction to all downstream from it. Building a dam, on the other hand, not only offers a safeguard against the destructive floodwaters, but also provides an opportunity to harness the energy in generating electricity. Following this analogy, we can work at developing healthier outlooks toward the challenging events in our lives, so that we can make adaptive use of our emotions in guiding our actions, rather than having our feelings, supercharged by maladaptive attitudes, lead us to actions (or inaction) that we later regret.

While these unhealthy attitudes can interfere with our response to events by numbing or shutting down our emotions, this exercise will explore various attitudes that wreak havoc by intensifying the feelings. Here, we will follow the format used in my previous blog, Rationalizations Used to Minimize and Deny Substance Problems, which explores a positive application of the cognitive behavioral approach in challenging various types of rationalizations. The following table presents various types of rationalizations in the first column, while proposing healthier alternative perspectives in the second column.

Challenging Unhealthy Attitudes

[ezcol_1half]Perspectives That Intensify Our Emotions[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end]Perspectives That Temper Our Emotions[/ezcol_1half_end]

[ezcol_1half]The “Egocentric Imperative”: perceiving a situation from only one’s own point of view, often viewing other perspectives as wrong or inferior, if recognizing them at all[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end] Recognizing that there can be various legitimate points of view on a subject, without viewing any of them as inherently right or wrong[/ezcol_1half_end]

[ezcol_1half]Assumed Intent: taking things personally, such that one interprets others’ actions as intended to do us harm[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end]Working at understanding the differences and resolving the problem or conflict, with more of a focus  on the present and future[/ezcol_1half_end]

[ezcol_1half]Conditional Assumptions:   assuming that certain relationships imply specific obligations across   the board (the “fine print” in the relationship contract) (e.g., “If you   really loved me, you would . . .” Or “if you were a real friend, you wouldn’t   . . .”n[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end]Recognizing that we all must balance being-for-others with being-for-ourselves, and that others are   free to choose when to be there for us and when to be there for themselves, and that there are usually no hard-and-fast rules to determine the correct   choice at any given time[/ezcol_1half_end]

[ezcol_1half]Assigning Blame:   focusing on who is at fault for a given situation, typically focusing on the past[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end]Working at understanding the differences and resolving the problem or conflict, with more of a focus   on the present and future[/ezcol_1half_end]

[ezcol_1half]The “Fairness Doctrine”:  expecting fair treatment as an automatic or guaranteed right that we are entitled to, almost as if it were a law of nature[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end]Recognizing that fairness is a social convention adopted to help us get along with one another, and that advocacy is required not only to establish one’s rights, but also to maintain them[/ezcol_1half_end]

[ezcol_1half]Dichotomizing: using distinct categories for good vs. bad, right vs. wrong, with black and white   thinking, allowing for no shades of gray[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end]Recognizing that both sides of an issue can have both positive and negative points[/ezcol_1half_end]

[ezcol_1half]Catastrophizing:   imagining the worst-case scenario and treating it as reality[/ezcol_1half] [ezcol_1half_end]Making provisional contingency plans for the worst, but also considering and planning for other   possibilities[/ezcol_1half_end]

While this table does not present a complete list of the various perspectives which tend to intensify emotions, it covers a considerable portion of them. We can thus use this as a tool for identifying specific perspectives that intensify feelings, much as we identified various rationalizations used to justify problematic use of substances in the article, Rationalizations Used to Minimize and Deny Substance Problems. In the first column is the statement, using one’s own words or thoughts, which tend to intensify feelings. In the second column is the type of unhealthy perspective being used in this statement. Note that if your example does not appear to fit any of the above categories, you are free to come up with your own category. In the third column, you come up with your own alternative perspective that offers a healthier and more adaptive outlook to the situation. You will note that  most of the spaces on the table are empty. This is simply because I have not sought out the input of my “panel of experts” (i.e., clients with whom I work in individual, family, and group therapy, or readers of my posts). This is a project in the making, and I invite readers of the blog to submit your own examples, which I will gladly plagiarize (so as to protect your anonymity, of course). If I do use your example, you should be honored, as it is plagiarism, not imitation, that is the highest form of flattery.

[ezcol_1third]SPECIFIC ATTITUDES   THAT INTENSIFY   FEELINGS[/ezcol_1third] [ezcol_1third]TYPE OF FAULTY OUTLOOK[/ezcol_1third] [ezcol_1third_end]CHALLENGING   PERSPECTIVE[/ezcol_1third_end]

[ezcol_1third]That jerk has   some nerve pulling out in front of me without signaling. No one gets away   with disrespecting me like that.  I’ll   show him.[/ezcol_1third] [ezcol_1third]Assumed  Intent[/ezcol_1third] [ezcol_1third_end]While that is   reckless driving, it says a lot about him, but nothing about me.  I’m not going to let him bring me down to   his level of disregard by reacting to him.[/ezcol_1third_end]

[ezcol_1third]She obviously   doesn’t care about me.  She turned down   my asking her out to the movies because she wanted to get together with her friends   from work.  I guess they are more   important to her than I am.[/ezcol_1third] [ezcol_1third]Conditional   Assumption, Egocentric Imperative[/ezcol_1third] [ezcol_1third_end]If I wanted to   take her to the movie that badly, maybe I should have asked her a few days   ahead of time, rather than assuming that her life revolved around me.  I’d likely find her to be somewhat boring   if she didn’t have a life of her own.[/ezcol_1third_end]

[whohit]when thinking distorts feelings[/whohit]