.
.
.
We are conditioned to try to control how we appear to others.
.
We want to maintain an acceptable image within our “tribe,” whether that tribe is our immediate family, a circle of friends, or our larger community.
.
When we scratch the surface of a well-educated modern human, we find a tribal member.
.
There is a biological fear behind this concern for self-image.
.
Outcasts never fared well in tribal societies—shunning meant almost certain death.
.
When I explore my clients’ social anxieties around acceptance and approval, there is always an underlying fear of rejection.
.
Once they uncover this layer, I will ask, “Then what will happen?”
.
They inevitably discover a fear of being abandoned, becoming homeless, and eventually dying.
.
In most cases a secure middle-class lifestyle does not seem to lessen this primal fear.
.
There are still subtler and more powerful fears around releasing the chronic inner grip upon ourselves: we may lose control, become disoriented, and not know who we are.
.
Essentially, it is a fear of the unknown.
.
We tend to choose a known suffering over an unknown freedom.
.
If I am not a contracted, separate self, what am I?
.
What will happen if this tight fist—this inner contraction that relates to my core sense of self—lets go?
.
Will I fragment and go insane?
.
Will I be able to function in daily life?
.
Will I disappear?
.
.
.
20 Mar
Posted by dee on March 20, 2016 at 8:15 pm
How insightful and true are these words … How insightful and true is their way … It is wonderful to find a way out … and as Einstein said ” anything that ever existed can never non exist, it simply changes shape and form ” … … …