panther's lair

part two of that huge book is on conquering depression and building self-esteem. the first chapter is on the four steps to happiness.

apparently, you should do this each day. even better- do it each time you feel depressed or upset. the main problem with all this, of course, is that when you are depressed there is a serious lack of motivation and a buttload of apathy that get served with it. it is hard to sit down each time i am sad and do this. hell, i am having a damn hard time doing it this time. anywho- i will try to do this now though, and will handle each other time i am down as they come.

first though- my scores on the anxiety and depression weekly test- see how i compare to before. both were taken on sept. 12, 2006.

anxiety- 55, still in the extreme anxiety or panic...but it is still one point lower than last time. probably not statistically different, but i like the direction it is headed.

depression- 33, still in the severe category. sigh. however, it is 5 points less than last time...and they are both getting closer to the next highest category...

must keep working. must. keep. trying.

so, back to the topic of the day- the four steps to happiness.

step 1- identify the upsetting event. the more specific you make it, the easier it will be to resolve it. just writing life sucks doesn't help. you have to write specific problems, isolated incidents that you react to.

for me- i wrote that i feel very down about our money problems. that it is discouraging that we got my retirement money and it is already gone (on the plus side, we paid a large portion of our bills...so that is a relief). but i won't get a paycheck until the end of october. the sweet one will get one at the end of sept. but it is getting really hard to keep scrounging. because we are in such a place right now, i get really freaked out about a couple of the expenses that are coming up in the next few months- we have to move, in january or before...but i am really worried that we won't have the money to do it then either. i also need to try to go visit my family this christmas, as it is the first one without my dad. i don't know what to do about all this. i would rather they come here and see me this year...but i don't know how feasable that is.

anywho, that was my step one.

step 2- record your negative feelings. this is where you write your emotions down, and rate them each on a scale of 1-100 (i have a problem with this because according to what i have seen and heard in the psychological research- that is far too large a scale. people can break things down from about 1-7, but once you have a scale that gets much bigger people lose the ability to do as good of a job). however, the purpose is to estimate how bad you feel, and then after doing the exercise completely, you rerate each feeling again. you can see if it helped any...the other reason is to help stop thinking of feelings in such black and white terms. i often go from 0 to 100, all or nothing (when it comes to this...i try to live a large part of my life in the gray areas but i do have my own all or nothing areas to deal with). but this way you can stop and think- wait, am i really as sad as i was earlier...no- ah...i must be feeling a little better. i have a tendency to assume it didn't work if it doesn't completely cure me. i have to get away from that- because NOTHING will completely cure me. at least, not that fast. so i need to recognize when i do feel at least somewhat better...or i will get too discouraged to keep trying.

so...without even more ado- here are my negative feelings and their ratings (the rating part was VERY VERY hard for me to do).
sad- 60
anxious- 100
frustrated- 85
hopeless- 85
guilty- 100
discouraged- 85
angry- 75
embarrassed- 85
resigned- 60

step 3- this is the one i am dreading (it is the most work intensive). first, you write down your automatic thoughts. these are those ugly thoughts that come to your mind automatically when you are really upset (i'm a big fat pig, i'll be stuck at this job forever, etc). the book also gives an interesting way to figure out your automatic thoughts too (because sometimes they can be hard to really get at)...you draw a stick figure with a sad face. you put a thought bubble over it. then you write down in his bubble what is making him so unhappy. according to the author, what you write in the thought bubble should tip you off as to what's bothering you. i am iffy on that however- as that is a projective technique, and i am very very skeptical of those. also, i never have a shortage of negative automatic thoughts...so no stick figures for me.

after you have written them, you estimate how much you believe them on a scale from 0 to 100 again (this is how much you believe them while you have them). those numbers are in parenthesis after the thought. after you have rated each one, you identify your distortions in your thinking (from that list of twisted thinking). i put that after the first belief rating.

the next part of step 3 is to then provide a more rational response to each of the automatic thoughts, and rate them in terms of how much you believe them. i put the rational response after the distortion for each...

for me-
1. we will have money trouble forever, this will never get better. (90). overgeneralization, all-or-nothing thinking. we may never be rich, but it won't always be as hard as it is right now because we will both be earning paychecks again in another couple months. (80).
2. i am a loser for not providing for my family better. (90). discounting the positive, labeling, personalization & blame. i provide as much as i can, and i do my best. (60).
3. we will lose everything and end up on the streets. (60). overgeneralization, fortune-telling. we have too many friends and family members who won't let us end up homeless, and we do have some income coming soon. (90).
4. i always mess up. (90). overgeneralization. i make mistakes, but so does everyone else. (90).
5.i paid too much on that damn phone bill so now we are dead broke again. (100). um...not too sure this does have twisted thinking in it...maybe personalization & blame, magnification. i got nervous and paid more than i meant to while on the phone with the phone company so we do have less money now than i had hoped but at least we won't have that huge phone bill hanging over our heads anymore. (80).
6. i have the worst luck ever (100). overgeneralization, magnification. sometimes my luck does seem pretty horrid, but i also have a lot of good luck too (good wife, son, cats, friends, family...a mini cooper). (100).
7. how stupid am i that i can't keep better track of this money. (100). labeling, emotional reasoning. it isn't that i am stupid, it is that we have to dig our way back out of our debt- we are keeping better track of the money now than we did in the past- and eventually we may be better off. (100).
8. it's not fair!!!!! we have been trying so god damn hard! (100). whining...no, that isn't a form of twisted thinking...discounting the positive. we are making some progress in getting things under control, and it just takes time. (80).

one thing that this has taught me is that i often believe in conflicting things- and i often believe in both sides equally. no wonder i am as messed up as i am...

step 4- outcome. the first part of this step is to go back and rerate each automatic thought since you have now provided more rational responses for each. the new values are below. the last thing you do in this step is to indicate whether you feel: not at all better, somewhat better, quite a bit better, a lot better.

1. was 90, now 30
2. was 90, now 50
3. was 60, now 10
4. was 90, now 60
5. was 100, still 100
6. was 100, now 50
7. was 100, now 40
8. was 100, still 100
after doing this activity, i feel somewhat better. this is still a pretty big problem, but i feel like i have a slightly more realistic grasp on it.

the book even says that it doesn't matter how well you do this first time, you just need to go through the motions. if you do that enough, it will get easier, the bad thoughts will become less automatic, and some more positive thoughts will slowly take their places. you just have to really keep up with this.

exhausting...really it is.

so...if you don't feel better after completing the daily mood log- there is a troubleshooting guide to help you figure out why. you ask yourself the following:

1. have i correctly identified the upsetting event? sometimes it is hard to figure out what is really bothering you (i know i often walk around in some sort of funk with no real indication as to what put me there in the first place). if you can't pinpoint your problem, it is good to review your activities for the last couple days. describe your negative event in very specific terms- what happened, where were you, what time was it, with whom were you involved...the other thing that it talks about here is if you have a lot of problems- it is overwhelming...so you just choose one and work on that one first. once you overcome one problem, it will help you get through the next (you feel better having conquered something).

2. do i really want to feel better, or do i really want to change my negative feelings about this situation? to figure this out, you should list the advantages and disadvantages of changing your feelings. sometimes negative feelings are healthy, so that is why listing the pros and cons can help you. maybe this emotion needs to be expressed rather than changed.

3. have i identified my automatic thoughts properly? it says make sure you haven't put descriptions of upsetting events or actual problems in the automatic thoughts column. you are writing your interpretation of the situation here, not a description. i still need to work at getting better at that stuff...i often mix my feelings, responses, descriptions, and everything all up together. for example, talking about paying too much on our phone bill was probably a better problem to deal with separately. the author brings up the stick figure technique again...but i still feel oddly resistant to that. maybe i need to open my mind up to that a little more...

4. are my rational thoughts valid or true statements that show the lie in the automatic thoughts, or are they rationalizations? rational responses must be realistic and contradict the automatic thoughts in order to be effective. in order to feel better, you have to see that your automatic thoughts are not valid. this won't help if you just try to cheer yourself up with fake rationalizations. a large problem that i have is that i feel like i have a hard time telling the difference between a fake rationalization and a rational response. every time i try to counter my automatic thoughts, part of brain is yelling "you are just lying, making stuff up to try to feel better." at some point, i find that i don't even know anymore if something is true or not. will things really ever get better? i tell myself that realistically- they will. but then i try to convince myself that i don't really believe it.

but for now- go through the motions. make myself do the task...retrain my brain to think like i want it to- not in it's fearful, usual, spastic way.

the author recommends using the 4 steps above (otherwise known as the daily mood log) 10-15 minutes a day, 5 days a week, for at least a month. the regular practice will help get you in emotional shape (kinda like a runner runs each day to get faster and build stamina). it is also apparently important to remember that this is not going to always be an easy task, and that your negative thoughts and feelings can often seem to overpower this...but to keep working at it.

sigh. i already feel overwhelmed.

lucky for me, the very next paragraph warns against feeling that this will be too difficult. it is hard, sure, but any average person can do this. these methods have been tried on a wide range of people, from all different backgrounds, job types, educational levels, so forth and so on...and they are effective.

enough for now...maybe more later today, probably not until tomorrow. the next chapter is on 10 ways to untwist your thinking- which is something i need to work on a lot. so woo hoo i suppose...after that, you learn to develop a healthy personal value system, and then on to learning how to break out of a bad mood. the last two chapters in this part of the book are on procrastination. i hope i get them done in a timely fashion.

i am now beginning page 97 out of this 700 page behemoth. about 1/7 finished. yay and ugh. i am pleased that i have gone so far...but i can't see the finish line either...

ugh...no more for now. i am hungry and have been for the last hour and a half. now i am feeling sick because of it, so i am going to go eat...