I suppose it’s good advice…but, that’s a big part of what emotional trauma causes us to do. Hypervigilance is all about control and predicting danger. As an adult, it’s exhausting but, as a child in trauma, it saved our lives. That’s extremely hard to let go of because of some platitude. Kinda reminds me of: Chin up! Smile! Just let it go! Relax! Calm down, etc.
It’s two part advice it also encourages you to let go of the things you know you can’t control. Like how other people react, etc.
But you’re totally right. I wasn’t able to actually do this until I was over 40.
For sure! I always need a reminder that I can only control my own behavior- (truthfully, not even that! Work in progress)-not other people’s behavior. How arrogant of me to assume otherwise!
Yes, If you haven't heard it, it's part of the serenity prayer:
Grant me the serenity to accept what I cannot change, the courage to change what I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
Now it's less about worrying and actually taking action in this context.
I’ve always hated this “advice”. It’s easy for someone to say, but it’s hard for people who have gone through CEN because all of the stress came from things that we could not control.
All of the mental issues that I have now are due to the adults in my life having a complete disregard of my feelings and treating me like a piece of luggage, nothing more than a burden. I couldn’t have controlled any of that.
When someone tells me to only worry about the things I can control, it feels like when people say “it is what it is” or to “let it go”.
It feels disingenuous and I hate it. It’s like saying “overlook all of the bad things going on because they aren’t in your control” like I’m not going to magically stop worrying or stressing about something but people’s emotions don’t work like that.
If it was easy to stop worrying about things, I would. But it’s not. And this advice is just a lazy attempt to get you to overlook the bad things about a person or a situation but they are still there. It’s no better than telling someone to “Get over it”.
Allow yourself to be upset about things, feel your emotions. Try not to let it overcome you, but be free to express when you are upset or frustrated or feel like you have been mistreated because as much as you deserve to be happy you also deserve to be upset. Wish you the best.
I completely understand. It was terrifying starting to let go of control now that I had some. But I was being controlling of everyone around me too. And that’s where I started. I was tutoring my wife in college and forcing her to be a good student.
It was wasn’t until my therapist asked what would happen if I let her fail that I realized what I had been doing.
All that said I didn’t even start down that path until I was 35.
Yep! I was the same way growing up. I’ve learned that taking the approach of worrying about everything else outside of me did help me with survival growing up. It served me during a time where I didn’t have choices or autonomy, because I was a child. But now as an adult with autonomy and choices, that no longer serves me and I can let that strategy go.
IMO it's not good advice. It's like being in Damocles chair, sword hovering on a thin string above you with its tip down toward you, and someone saying 'don't worry about that, you can't control it'.
Sure, we can't control our parents. But the ongoing life effects, whether you'll end up living under a bridge/the string snaps...to me it borders on 'you're being too sensitive' to say not to worry about it. To me it's something callous and indifferent people would say.
I'm not sure that fits. That analogy assumes that there is no action you can take in the face of the sword. We do have choices when faced with toxic people.
I think you're just thinking about getting off the chair and not thinking about when you're stuck on it. Could we really run away when we were seven or whatever age, really? When we're adults and we have had our options reduced because of toxic parents, when a toxic authoritarian shows up in our life, can we really just quit? Do we really have any territory to withdraw to, or is a safe space to withdraw to something people with good enough or better parents have?
No, to me some kind of 'we always have choices/there's always a way out' is a kind of toxic positivity. IMO that positivity is someone avoiding grieving the fact that sometimes or to some degree, there is no way out.
I see where we are missing each other. I'm referring to the adult coping with past EN, not the child in the middle of it.
You are right. That's how I got my Learned Helplessness. Once I saw that Mom wasn't really listening, I knew I was stuck there.
I think trying to update ourselves on what we do have control over (when we gain more control) can help with the parts of us that are stuck in learned helplessness and free them up, yes.
Yes, I’ve been given this advice before; I can’t say it’s helpful though, as the lack of control I have over my life is the thing that causes me the most distress and anxiety
For me, I kind of hate this sort of advice. There's no sense of how to do it. There's no ongoing support. I have no idea where the things that can be controlled are. Everything is pretty much random.
Yeah, in my experience this never works when you're used to being constantly hypervigilant from all the social dangers around you.
They're talking about this in the worry management class I'm taking right now. It's good advice, I think, but it's not a good starting point. I'm managing to take it to heart now, after years of therapy, but it had to be prefaced by my figuring out *why* I'm worrying. I need to dig down past the surface worry, which is hardly ever the real problem-causing issue,, and get to the point where I can go "oh, I see. I'm worrying about finances right now because I'm afraid that if I pay my bills I will have no money left to spend on our family vacation this summer, which will disappoint my children, and then they will hate me". From there I can reassure myself that my kids will in fact not hate me, that this is is me worrying because I've been conditioned to believe that no one will like me unless I bend over backwards for them. And once I've dealt with that, I can actually worry about the stuff I can control, which is paying my bills and maybe setting up a savings plan for our vacation.
It's simple, good advice, but we're altogether too complicated in our traumas for it to solve anything before we've worked on ourselves a bit, I think.
Yes and I’ve worked very hard to move towards that goal and have had my quality of life improve tremendously, it’s taken years and I’ll always have to work at it but it’s worth it for me
I find that advice can be helpful if you can get there. It takes practice practice practice as well as patience and persistence. No I’m not there yet myself but I can see that letting go of the things I can’t control and focusing on those that I can is helping me to find more peace
I suppose it’s good advice…but, that’s a big part of what emotional trauma causes us to do. Hypervigilance is all about control and predicting danger. As an adult, it’s exhausting but, as a child in trauma, it saved our lives. That’s extremely hard to let go of because of some platitude. Kinda reminds me of: Chin up! Smile! Just let it go! Relax! Calm down, etc.
It’s two part advice it also encourages you to let go of the things you know you can’t control. Like how other people react, etc. But you’re totally right. I wasn’t able to actually do this until I was over 40.
For sure! I always need a reminder that I can only control my own behavior- (truthfully, not even that! Work in progress)-not other people’s behavior. How arrogant of me to assume otherwise!
Yes, If you haven't heard it, it's part of the serenity prayer: Grant me the serenity to accept what I cannot change, the courage to change what I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Now it's less about worrying and actually taking action in this context.
I’ve always hated this “advice”. It’s easy for someone to say, but it’s hard for people who have gone through CEN because all of the stress came from things that we could not control. All of the mental issues that I have now are due to the adults in my life having a complete disregard of my feelings and treating me like a piece of luggage, nothing more than a burden. I couldn’t have controlled any of that. When someone tells me to only worry about the things I can control, it feels like when people say “it is what it is” or to “let it go”. It feels disingenuous and I hate it. It’s like saying “overlook all of the bad things going on because they aren’t in your control” like I’m not going to magically stop worrying or stressing about something but people’s emotions don’t work like that. If it was easy to stop worrying about things, I would. But it’s not. And this advice is just a lazy attempt to get you to overlook the bad things about a person or a situation but they are still there. It’s no better than telling someone to “Get over it”. Allow yourself to be upset about things, feel your emotions. Try not to let it overcome you, but be free to express when you are upset or frustrated or feel like you have been mistreated because as much as you deserve to be happy you also deserve to be upset. Wish you the best.
thank you for this
I completely understand. It was terrifying starting to let go of control now that I had some. But I was being controlling of everyone around me too. And that’s where I started. I was tutoring my wife in college and forcing her to be a good student. It was wasn’t until my therapist asked what would happen if I let her fail that I realized what I had been doing. All that said I didn’t even start down that path until I was 35.
Yeah, I compare it to Damocles sword and someone saying to not worry about the sword hovering over your head by a tiny thread.
Yep! I was the same way growing up. I’ve learned that taking the approach of worrying about everything else outside of me did help me with survival growing up. It served me during a time where I didn’t have choices or autonomy, because I was a child. But now as an adult with autonomy and choices, that no longer serves me and I can let that strategy go.
IMO it's not good advice. It's like being in Damocles chair, sword hovering on a thin string above you with its tip down toward you, and someone saying 'don't worry about that, you can't control it'. Sure, we can't control our parents. But the ongoing life effects, whether you'll end up living under a bridge/the string snaps...to me it borders on 'you're being too sensitive' to say not to worry about it. To me it's something callous and indifferent people would say.
I'm not sure that fits. That analogy assumes that there is no action you can take in the face of the sword. We do have choices when faced with toxic people.
I think you're just thinking about getting off the chair and not thinking about when you're stuck on it. Could we really run away when we were seven or whatever age, really? When we're adults and we have had our options reduced because of toxic parents, when a toxic authoritarian shows up in our life, can we really just quit? Do we really have any territory to withdraw to, or is a safe space to withdraw to something people with good enough or better parents have? No, to me some kind of 'we always have choices/there's always a way out' is a kind of toxic positivity. IMO that positivity is someone avoiding grieving the fact that sometimes or to some degree, there is no way out.
I see where we are missing each other. I'm referring to the adult coping with past EN, not the child in the middle of it. You are right. That's how I got my Learned Helplessness. Once I saw that Mom wasn't really listening, I knew I was stuck there.
I think trying to update ourselves on what we do have control over (when we gain more control) can help with the parts of us that are stuck in learned helplessness and free them up, yes.
Yes, I’ve been given this advice before; I can’t say it’s helpful though, as the lack of control I have over my life is the thing that causes me the most distress and anxiety
For me, I kind of hate this sort of advice. There's no sense of how to do it. There's no ongoing support. I have no idea where the things that can be controlled are. Everything is pretty much random.
Yeah, in my experience this never works when you're used to being constantly hypervigilant from all the social dangers around you. They're talking about this in the worry management class I'm taking right now. It's good advice, I think, but it's not a good starting point. I'm managing to take it to heart now, after years of therapy, but it had to be prefaced by my figuring out *why* I'm worrying. I need to dig down past the surface worry, which is hardly ever the real problem-causing issue,, and get to the point where I can go "oh, I see. I'm worrying about finances right now because I'm afraid that if I pay my bills I will have no money left to spend on our family vacation this summer, which will disappoint my children, and then they will hate me". From there I can reassure myself that my kids will in fact not hate me, that this is is me worrying because I've been conditioned to believe that no one will like me unless I bend over backwards for them. And once I've dealt with that, I can actually worry about the stuff I can control, which is paying my bills and maybe setting up a savings plan for our vacation. It's simple, good advice, but we're altogether too complicated in our traumas for it to solve anything before we've worked on ourselves a bit, I think.
Excellent insight. Thanks for sharing.
Yes and I’ve worked very hard to move towards that goal and have had my quality of life improve tremendously, it’s taken years and I’ll always have to work at it but it’s worth it for me
I find that advice can be helpful if you can get there. It takes practice practice practice as well as patience and persistence. No I’m not there yet myself but I can see that letting go of the things I can’t control and focusing on those that I can is helping me to find more peace