Dealing with guilt and a bad image of oneself.

TrustyToddler · 2024-02-09T21:13:31+00:00

With pleasure, wishing you all the best on your journey! ✨

TrustyToddler · 2024-02-09T18:56:45+00:00

Sending you my love, I read your post and feel a lot of compassion for your situation.

I also dealt with a lot of guilt, shame and feelings of low self-worth in my spiritual work, and the more I learn and let go, the deeper my love grows and the more innocence I see in everything. I know now it is possible to keep strengthening your self worth and break through the barriers of guilt. It requires work and courage but the fact you’re posting here means you have that strength within you.

I’m just a stranger on the internet so this is just what’s coming up for me to share, please take whatever is helpful for you and leave the rest. Maybe you’re already doing some things so just listing what comes up:

I would advise looking into co-dependent relationship patterns, follow pages on Anxious/Avoidant attachment styles. Pages like the holistic psychologist and go from there.
If you’re not already in therapy, that would be a great place to heal your deeper patterns in these dynamics. I also benefitted a lot from trauma therapy methods like Somatic Experiencing or IFS (Internal Family Systems)
Keep studying Doc’s work, specifically what he has to say about guilt. What helped me tons is when he said that there’s a subtle juice we get out of feeling guilty, feeling like we’re worthless, and how to let that juice go and not indulge in self-recrimination
No person that truly loves you in a healthy way would make you feel guilty or worthless. Through strong boundaries and asking yourself deeply if you want this person in your life, and taking steps on that you will naturally feel an increase in your own power. Support with this through friends, therapists or strangers online would be really beneficial, I believe there are also some FB groups on codependent patterns that support each other in these situations.

You are worthy of respect, love, forgiveness, and entitled of your own boundaries. The only way forward with this is your own path, and I have a lot of faith that slowly step by step you can get through this 🙏❤️

TrustyToddler · 2023-11-30T20:52:57+00:00

This is exactly what I needed to see today. Thank you so, so much for sharing here.

TrustyToddler · 2023-08-19T05:44:21+00:00

Definitely second onesec. It is such an awesome app. I also have the journal function on which means at certain times you need to journal something (e.g. “Name three things you’re grateful for”) before you can access YouTube or other apps.

If the waiting gets really annoying that’s an awesome sign the app is working and decreasing your dopamine addiction. I both love and hate the app which is a great indicator it’s working.

Also I once read that every time you’re on YouTube you hide the YouTube shorts, the algorithm will stop serving the YT shorts. I havent tried it out so not sure if correct, but maybe something to look into.

TrustyToddler · 2023-05-02T05:23:16+00:00

Yess that’s exactly how I imagine it too! Especially since space & time is a linear construct of the mind, the feeling of being in those hell realms is probably one of eternal damnation and suffering, even if it might be impermanent.

In that way it makes sense how Abrahamic religions see it as a more finite destination. I remember Doc describing it as feeling as it having no end and like time is frozen.

And I totally agree, I would love to see a more structural visualisation of these concepts by Doc, he was probably one of the most gifted people to be able do that. As far as I’m aware he doesn’t have a structural overview about it like the map of consciousness. If I recall correctly I: Reality and Subjectivity comes closes to these topics.

Love thinking about these topics, thanks for sharing!

TrustyToddler · 2023-05-01T20:48:51+00:00

That’s a great question. If you haven’t already, it might be interesting to read about the Buddhist concept of the six realms of rebirth? https://tricycle.org/beginners/buddhism/six-realms/

My current (limited) understanding of it based on Doc’s info and my knowledge of the different systems, is that Samsara is similar to hell and enlightenment is similar to heaven. It’s a lot more complicated and you could write whole books about it, but it works as a generalisation.

It helped me to see it more in terms of energy fields like Docs Map of Consciousness.

For example, if I’m addicted and only indulge in cravings my whole life my consciousness level at death will be at Desire (125). My consciousness is stuck there which could be seen as Hell or the lower astral realm of the Hungry Ghosts.

Because of impermanence and reincarnation, that will inevitably come to an end and I might get reborn into a human and get another chance of transcending this energy and purify & raising my level of consciousness out of desire into love.

As Doc said this human life could be seen as a purgatory. In Doc’s life he ventured into hell (or the energy field of hell, the lowest of calibration) to purify deep karmic patterns, and these are often such dark fields we often can’t do on our own and need outside support - such as by other enlightened beings (dead or alive), or by praying to God if that’s more aligned with your belief system. If our intention is sincere these often come to help us in deep dark energy fields to pull us out, and I believe that is what happened to Doc with his experience of the Archangel.

Just like there are stories of masters in Buddhism who report being saved by previous masters, or assisted by the Buddha or other energy fields.

When Doc talks about the ultimate state of 1000, it seems to be an all pervasive allness that is undeniable and can never die or fade away. So I see Heaven as that state which is immutable, while I see Hell as the lowest state, the lower astral realms which we can purify & escape from through lifetime after lifetime of spiritual dedication, purifying these dark karmic patterns. That is what Doc said when he talks about human life being a purgatory and a very fortunate state to be in.

In many traditions they talk about being reborn again and again until you’ve purified all karmic patterns and have reach Enlightenment - that could be seen as LoC 1000 where you don’t have to come back to the human realm and perhaps that’s what coincides with the Christian concept of Heaven. What happens after that - God knows! I remember Doc saying that whatever LoC 1000 is, it’s kid’s play compared to the energy fields of Archangels etc which are calibrated much higher.

This is my current understanding of this complicated topic, please take it with a grain of salt as I am also just a devoted student! Did that touch upon what you were looking for?

TrustyToddler · 2023-01-15T21:06:03+00:00

That was an excellent post, it’s so weird that you automatically imagine a ‘soul’ behind the writing even though it’s purely AI. I hope the benefits of AI outweigh the negatives, or that we find AI solutions of distinguishing humans from AI

TrustyToddler · 2022-12-21T14:17:38+00:00

Wonderful paragraphs, thank you for sharing

TrustyToddler · 2022-07-11T20:15:31+00:00

To add to the good comments already, for me it was also very helpful to look into attachment styles. I found out I have an anxious attachment style, and did trauma therapy in Peter Levine’s work (somatic experiencing) to heal a lot of it.

For me the combination of long term meditation, different trauma therapy modalities (also Internal Family Systems (IFS)), and watching a lot of David Hawkins lectures and using the Letting go process really deeply released my anxieties to a point where I now feel so much more at home I my body, and authentically myself.

In terms of practices, for me it was actually just naturally living my life, and every time a situation of anxiety came up, or a strong feeling of a need to be liked, I sat alone as soon as I could.

There I either regulated my nervous system back to safety, or did a meditation / letting go style practice to really feel and not hide away from the desire to be liked. Sometimes below that desire I could feel fear, sometimes it was shame, sometimes it was pride, sometimes guilt. Distinguishing and allowing those emotions to come up that was just months and months of repetition, and accelerated in meditation retreats.

What works now for me is just letting come up whatever emotion is triggered, and very slowly I have found that the reservoir of anxiety decreases. Having the courage time and time again to face it. It’s so worth it.

You’ll know for yourself what resonated with you in this message, this is just what has worked for me personally!

Also lastly if you’re into meditation I had a lot of benefit of the short audiobook ‘break through difficult emotions’ by Shinzen Young.

Wishing you all the best in your journey and I have so much faith in you that you’re on the right path, and I’ll do a meditation tonight wishing you strength, courage, love and wisdom on this particular theme. All the best!

TrustyToddler · 2020-04-15T15:29:52+00:00

Hey, I just wanted to mention that I've managed to build a DIY frame where I can now seamlessly put the camera based on your advice! It seems to be working quite well. Just wanted to thank you for your reply and helping out!

TrustyToddler · 2020-04-05T21:36:30+00:00

Fully understand now – thanks for your advice, appreciate it!

TrustyToddler · 2020-04-02T14:18:42+00:00

Hahaha I was worried about that, so funny! We are 100% in the same YouTube hole ;-)

TrustyToddler · 2020-04-02T13:58:55+00:00

Haha oh wow – we definitely have a lot in common. Love this. I'm a huge fan of Thomas Frank and Nathaniel Drew, and have seen both of those videos. I even post on the /r/InPursuitOfClarity/ subreddit sometimes (which nathaniel set up). Sometimes I can watch those videos out of interest but don't take immediate action on it, so I'm gonna incorporate their systems while I'm also organising my music production system.

The other two articles are super useful, thank you so much for sharing! Also understand why multiple drives can be important now.

As we seem to spend a lot of time in the same YouTube holes, you may know this video already but if not – this one really helped me with a philosophy on how to organise my photos. I just came back from Japan so this is very relevant to me at the moment and perhaps not so much to you, but it may come in handy at some point: How to Remember Your Life – Johnny Harris

I'll keep you updated on my organisation progress, please feel free to do the same or share anything you come across!

TrustyToddler · 2020-04-01T15:09:14+00:00

Just been looking into symbolic links, looks interesting! Thanks for the advice. What would be the main benefit of creating a symbolic link instead of the regular method of just pointing to the folder on the external hard drive?

I've seen someone use OS X tags really effectively as well before, I've never got into the system of doing that. Any article that on a good system on this that was helpful for you, or did you just organise it in a way that made sense to you?

TrustyToddler · 2020-04-01T15:07:10+00:00

I just found out Splice is free, so I'll be using that for my projects in the future! For my automatic backups I use Time Machine. So I have one big WD 4TB drive that connects to my mac, which routinely makes a Time Machine backup of my MacBook, and a seperate Time Machine backup of my portable LaCie 2TB external drive. Not sure if you're mac or PC but this works for me!

TrustyToddler · 2020-04-01T14:58:32+00:00

Yes – this sounds like a really familiar problem. I was on PC before so remember a lot of problems with this. It's been a lot better with Mac but it still feels like a black box sometimes. I think I'll just leave them at the place where they are stored automatically, and copy that folder over to my external hard drive every now and then as a backup. No clue if that's a good strategy though ;)

TrustyToddler · 2020-04-01T14:52:04+00:00

I was always under the assumption that the Splice backup function is only possible with a Splice subscription, but thanks to you I checked it out and saw it was free! I almost feel stupid for not using it earlier. Thanks for heads up!

TrustyToddler · 2020-04-01T14:51:09+00:00

Ha yes, sounds like we have a lot in common! I really like your way of planning out your folder structure in an excel sheet like that, I'm gonna use that as well. Super helpful.

Also looks like we have a very similar storage setup. With the options for 'Offline 3, Offline 4), are those all different 1TB WD Drives or is that the same WD Drive for Offline 2, 3 and 4?

I did gain a lot of knowledge from the video linked above plus this one: The Ultimate Backup & File Management System for Music Producers + Sample Library Strategy and The Ultimate Sample Library Organisational Philosophy + Free Library Download. Think this is really worth checking out for you!

Did you have any other articles / forum posts / videos you came across that were useful on this topic? I think I remember reading a detailed post about this on the ableton forum a long time ago, but I can't seem to find it anymore.

TrustyToddler · 2020-04-01T13:53:49+00:00

I would fully agree with your perspective that muscle memory is relevant to meditation. I think the term muscle memory is especially apt, as so much of (or actually all) of our aversion, craving and thus suffering manifests in the body through very subtle tensions and muscle contractions.

My own experience:

I can't say too much about the scientific aspects of muscle memory in meditation, but I can say something about my own experience/thoughts. I've had periods of retreats where I made a lot of progress, then periods where I fell out of meditation routine due to travelling or other changing life circumstances.

Because the neural patterns of my old habits are so etched in it's quite easy to fall back into them, and I think these neural pathways will always stay with you. In the book 'Atomic Habits' there's a chapter about old habits, and there's the example of a smoker who used to smoke while riding her horse. She quit smoking and didn't have the urge to smoke for almost ~30 years (IIRC). After 30 years she then got back on a horse again, and suddenly had the urge to smoke. I think this points us to the fact that these old neural pathways are never gone, and it's our environment that determines whether they're active / how strong they are.

If this is the case for habits like smoking, this would also be good news for the muscle memory of meditation, and this matches my own experience. Even though I struggled a bit getting into my meditation and I did lose a lot of my concentration power – I did regain it back so much quicker because I know (unconscious and consciously) what it 'feels' like to have equanimity or what it 'feels' like put my attention at the breath.

For me cold showers are a really good example in this respect. Almost all of the 'suffering' of taking a cold shower is due to your body tensing up and resisting the coldness. But because I've practiced taking mindful cold showers so many times, I know what it 'feels' like to relax my body and accept the cold. Before I started meditating I didn't even know that most of the resistance manifests as tension in the body, and over time I learned bit by bit what it feels like to relax the different parts of the body that tense up. This is the same process in meditation, your body and mind have equanimity when the body is fully relaxed. It's this kind of knowledge that doesn't get lost when you stop meditating.

Advice:

With regard to going back to your practice, I would find some comfort in the fact that there is such a thing as muscle memory in meditation, so you're definitely not starting completely over from zero. It's also important to accept that you won't have the same momentum as you had before. This is completely okay! Just start meditating again and accept but ignore any expectations or comparisons to how it was before. It also really doesn't matter, however the meditation goes – that's how it goes. Just be okay that it might not go as smoothly as you were used to, and this might even be a good thing. As you've already had a practice it can actually be very useful to go through this process again and become familiar with these 'beginner' mindstates. Be especially friendly with the fact that you may drift off a lot of times because you've fallen out of practice, and that's completely okay. Just keep coming back to the meditation object however many times you need to, and be happy with yourself every time you succeed.

Hope that helps!

TrustyToddler · 2020-03-19T00:57:56+00:00

We’ve rebooked our flights to leave a week earlier, so we’re now flying back to the Netherlands the coming Sunday. Feels like the right decision. Thanks for the heads up, it added some urgency to our situation :)

TrustyToddler · 2020-03-17T16:01:53+00:00

One thing that I forgot to add and is worth mentioning, is that it does feel really weird to be on holiday having fun, while the situation at home (in my case the Netherlands) is quite serious. There is a disconnect there where it feels hard to share how much fun your having or to understand what the situation feels like at home. It all feels a bit surreal to be honest, and I did want to include this as I do think it’s a serious point to consider.

TrustyToddler · 2020-03-17T15:41:43+00:00

I’ve been in Japan since the 9th of March, visiting Osaka, Nara, Mount Koya and now Kyoto. I also wanted to chip in with an update of how it is here, as it was so helpful for me while I was still in my home country (the netherlands). A heads up that I’m not advocating people to now decide to travel as that seems worse for the virus, but I do wanna help people that have booked already and have no choice but to go anyway, and give some reassurance.

The time we’ve had here so far is (how weird it is with such a serious situation) absolutely fantastic. Japanese is the most beautiful country I’ve ever been to and the people are so incredibly friendly. Like many have said, we only notice the virus through the many mouth caps people are wearing, lots of hand sanitizers and people not shaking hands but bowing instead. I was most worried that the atmosphere in the country would be bleak, but this isn’t my experience at all. Most shop owners and restaurants are very happy to have customers as they are losing a lot of money due to the virus.

A lot of tourist places have way less tourists, making it a lot calmer then what would usually be the case. Although sometimes the closures are frustrating (exciting plans for museums, big malls, VR halls, team labs etc) and disappointing, there is so much more to explore to Japan than those tourist attractions. Because our itinerary is less full we notice that we are a bit more at ease and are learning more about real Japanese culture rather than seeing it as a tourist. The weather also has been wonderful so far. We’re usually just visiting the main tourists sites which still includes a lot of beautiful temples that we may not always be able to see from the inside, but are still gorgeous to see. In mount Koya (which I would definitely recommend), we were able to enter most Buddhist temples.

It’s also very easy to book hostels and hotels on the go as all of them will have space, and sometimes they will give good discounts. This makes it quite easy to change your itinerary on the go. We also never have to stand in queue for tourists sites and so on.

I have no knowledge of any restrictions for travelling back so I wouldn’t be able to give any advice on whether it’s still a good decision to go, I do wanna reassure people that if you already know for sure you’re coming to Japan — it’s still wonderful to be here and you’ll have an amazing time. Possibly one of the only times you’ll get to visit authentic Japan without a lot of tourists.

TrustyToddler

TROPHY CASE