How to Overcome Helplessness

In order to reduce your sense of helplessness and become more self-sufficient, competent and self-confident, you need to do the following self-help activities.

-Identify those problems, obstacles, fears or issues over which you feel helpless and identify what beliefs keep you locked into being helpless for each one.

-Develop a new belief system that encourages you to recognize that being independent, competent, self-confident and capable of helping, fixing and changing yourself is healthy, desirable and necessary.

-Learn "normal" coping behaviors from others who are in a healthier place than yourself.

-Practice healthy coping, problem-solving, fear-desensitizing and conflict-resolving behaviors.

-Build on your successes at being an independent, free-standing self-helper and self-healer.

-Remember that success breeds success and be sure to reinforce yourself for all of your successes , no matter how small they are.

-Accept that relapse is part of the recovery process and get back with your program of self-help if you should slip or fall back to your old mold of helplessness.

-Call upon your Higher Power to give you the courage, strength and persistence necessary to gain self-sufficiency to cope with your life.

-Give permission to your network of support to "call you" on any lapses back into helplessness.

-When you get angry about "always having to do it on your own,'' do anger workouts to ventilate these emotions, which are traps waiting to draw you back into your old attention-seeking, helpless role.

-Parent your "inner child'' by nurturing and self-loving, and allow your "inner child'' to grow to be a healthy adult by giving it the freedom to make a mistake or fail in its attempts at self-help.

-Accept that it takes time--sometimes an entire lifetime--to fully rid yourself of a sense of helplessness since it is often such an ingrained, automatic habit of acting, thinking and feeling.

-Let go of your absolute need to be "healed perfectly" since it traps you to give up if at first you don't do it exactly right.

-Emotionally detach from all "fixers,'' advice givers, rescuers and enablers in your life so you don't fall into their need for you to be helpless.

-Stop hiding behind all excuses, beliefs and cliches about why you can't possibly help yourself.

-Have a farewell party or wake for the "old you'' who was wrapped up in self-pity, self-doubt and self-abasement. Let go of that "old you,'' and as in any death grieve all of the lost benefits from the old role of helplessness.

-Embrace the "new you'' who is more self-competent, self-helping, self-healing, self-respecting, self-confident and self-enhancing and recognize all of the healthy, normal, natural, beneficial consequences of living your life in this way.

THE TWO BASIC BELIEFS

THE TWO BASIC BELIEFS

There are two basic beliefs that are primitive and not true, though both are based on a version of "I'm screwed" (which is not a true statement!): 

    I am powerless [helpless] and dependent (on others for survival). 

       [aka:  "Me, victim!"]

         Therefore, 

              I need approval, rescue, can't stand abandonment, must be good 

                 enough [worthy, perfect, etc.], am afraid there is something wrong with 

                 me.  

              Since I need people, I am lonely and dejected without them, need their 

                 validation; my life must be meaningful or I have no basis for living.

    Something bad will/has happen(ed) to me and I'll suffer and have pain and 

       I'll be unhappy.

         I fear future happenings and I don't think I'll be happy when they happen.

         I can't stand it, something's not going my way.  (Low Frustration Tolerance)

         I'll be unable to handle it (kinda relates to the helpless viewpoint). 

              (Fearlessness.)

         I better WORRY so that I am prepared and have considered everything.  

              (Worry doesn't work!)

(Another version of this is in Change Your Mind, Change Your World, Dr. Richard Gillett.  His statement is that every single limiting belief has two components:  

"I am not good enough" and 

"I can't, I'm a victim of circumstance."  

Unraveling these two causes almost all the other negative beliefs to dissolve.  Some people think they have so many negative beliefs that it will be impossible to handle them.  They just do not know that unraveling the key ones causes the house of cards to collapse.) 

Anxiety/Panic Toolkit

Anxiety/Panic Toolkit

-Realize that primitive brain took over. Do not fight it. Do not avoid it. ACCEPT IT and invite it.

-You are stuck. Take your foot of the gas pedal

-Start abdominal breathing

-Completely stop all self-checking

-Stop fighting your body, ride the wave, let body do its thing. It is metabolizing adrenaline

-Stop any problem-solving with primitive brain. You are blocked.

-Label and dismiss all ANTs (ticker tape, leaves down the river).  Visualize ANTs as actual ants in your head.  ANTs are like small, spoiled brats who crave attention. The panic wants me to pay attention to them.

-One mindfully. Stay in the present.
-Detach and observe (Movie Theater).

-Grounding (name all objects in the room, counting backwards etc)

-Disregard any physical symptoms (headache, stomach growling, chest tightness, sluggishness, exhaustion, disturbed sleep etc). These are all related to anxiety.

-Coping statements

Calmly tell yourself “This will pass”, “I have been through this before and nothing bad happened, it was just uncomfortable”, “I can allow my body to go through its reactions and handle this, and I’ve done it before”
-Build on every successfully tolerated attack. Reward yourself.
-Do non judge yourself for having anxiety. It is a part of you. Self-soothe
-Half-smile
-Opposite action
-Build positive experiences (eat in favorite place, massage etc)

-Have fun. Spend time with kids. Enjoy them

Don't Fight Panic

Don't Fight Panic

Resisting or fighting initial panic symptoms is likely to make them worse. It's important to avoid tensing up in
reaction to panic symptoms or trying to "make" them go away by suppressing them or gritting your teeth.
This doesn't mean “doing nothing” or being helpless in the face of panic, but rather thinking about your
coping in a different way:

• Face the symptoms-don't run from them. Calmly tell yourself “this will pass”, “I have been through
this before and nothing bad happened, it was just uncomfortable”, “I can allow my body to go through
its reactions and handle this, I’ve done it before”. These are helpful coping statements.

• Accept what your body is doing-don’t fight against it. Fighting it only makes you tense which
increases the anxiety and the intensity of a panic attack. Practice the attitude of letting go, allowing
your body to have its reactions. Try to step back and just observe yourself without judgement
without reacting to it with further fear or anxiety. Float with the wave of panic rather than trying to
force your way through it

• Allow time to pass. Panic is caused by a sudden surge of adrenalin and most of this adrenalin will
metabolize and be reabsorbed in three to five minutes. As soon as this happens, you'll start to feel
better. Panic attacks are time limited. In most cases, panic will peak and begin to subside within only
a few minutes. It is most likely to pass quickly if you don’t aggravate it by fighting against it or
reacting to it with even more fear by saying scary things to yourself.

ANTs 1

ANTs are “automatic thoughts in response to uncertainty, anxiety, disappointment or other challenges.” They are “knee-jerk reactions of the mind.” We often interpret our negative thoughts as cold, hard facts. We assume they’re accurate assessments of our performance, circumstances and anything else going on in our lives. Yet they’re not.

About Anxiety

• Anxiety/fear activates the most primitive part of the brain, which is purely responsible for the survival. Thus, at that time, the intelligent part of the brain which is responsible for problem-solving is not accessible. That is why we need to use skillful means to access the intelligent part of the brain during anxiety/fear/panic attack. Think of anxiety/fear strictly on physiological level.

• Anxiety is ALWAYS transient.

• Anxiety represents old ways of thinking. It will eventually habituate and extinguish

• Anxiety symptoms (free-floating or cued) need to be consciously identified and radically accepted.