Spiralling with trivial thoughts

[WishyBee]

I’m hoping someone might have some insight or advice if they have dealt with similar issues to me.

I seem to be most affected by trivial mistakes I have made in my life. I am triggered by a small remark (the worst if it comes from a stranger) something like “please move you’re blocking the exit” or a car horn tooting at me will send me spiralling into continuous negative thoughts and over analysing. This will also bring up a lot of trivial mistakes from my past, some mistakes I think about are from when I was a small child, so time doesn’t seem to lessen the affects of these incidents, they just accumulate. 
I know logically that these remarks/incidents are mostly meaningless and sometimes nothing to do with me personally, but the way I feel about them is utterly devastating. 
If I try and share these thoughts with family and friends I really start to give myself a hard time to the point where I feel suicidal. 
I have no control over when or what I will be triggered by or how long I will be agonising over these things. Sometimes I could be feeling this way for ten minutes, sometimes it’s for days. I cannot sleep during these times and I get by on autopilot as the thoughts are all consuming. 
I have had plenty of traumatic events and major problems in life that I don’t agonise over it’s only the insignificant things that seem to affect me. 
Has anyone else experienced this or found an effective coping strategy?

[indigo22]

Hi WishyBee,

I noticed that you are a new member, are you finding your way around the forums ok?

It is odd that the small things are your triggers but I wonder if you have done any analysis on wether there are any small things connected to the major events you have spoken about. Maybe something similar was said at the time of one of those events that triggers you. You may be unaware that you are actually reacting to one of the major events triggered by something seemingly insignificant. This may even go back to when you were quite young and you haven't yet connected to dots.

Since you haven't been here long, you may not be aware of a thread that has been contributed to by many members of the community on varying ways to help yourself. You may find some helpful tips and topics in there

https://forums.beyondblue.org.au/t5/anxiety/self-help-tips-for-managing-anxiety/td-p/50482

There are also a couple of Apps that you might like to check out. Although I have not used these myself, I have heard some good feedback - Smiling Mind and Beyond Now

I hope this is of some help to you, please feel free to continue the conversation if you wish.

Take care,

indigo

[WishyBee]

Hi indigo22

I seem to be managing ok with the forum. 
Thanks for the thread link.

[therising]

Hi WishyBee

I feel for you so much as you face such terrible ongoing torment, while not being able to experience a more carefree time in life. I can't help but wonder what your inner dialogue sounds like. I've found there's a difference between thinking about past mistakes and trying to managing the inner dialogue that can come with them. I've found my inner critic to be pretty brutal at times, even when it comes to the tiny things. At times it can kinda sound like 'You're hopeless. You're never going to be any good at this' or 'How come everyone else can manage this but you can't? It's because you're stupid'. While my inner critic can lead me to dwell on past mistakes at times, it can also impact future choices, 'Why try that when you know you're going to fail at it, like you have in the past' etc etc. I think the inner critic in a person can be a real mongrel, a mixed breed of past opinions and conditioning from depressing critical people, elements of our fears, past mistakes we maybe can't let go of or make sense of and so much more. So, the question can become 'How to deal with such a mongrel of an aspect of our self?'. And this is it, it's just one aspect that goes toward making up the whole of who we are.

I've found that developing other aspects of myself has been incredibly helpful. What would other aspects of me have to say if I gave them a chance?

• What would the analyst in me say about this mistake? Perhaps 'Stop overthinking this or meditating on it and move on. You're wasting time while your focus needs to be on other things' or maybe 'You need to take the time to make better sense of this mistake, in order to move on for good and not look back'
• What would the student (of life) in me say about this mistake? Perhaps 'If there is a lesson to be learned from this mistake, what is the lesson?'
• What would the sage in me say about this mistake? Perhaps 'There may be a need for guidance in this case. Search for the best guide, someone to help lead you through the challenge this mistake presents, while also helping you shed a lot more light on it'

I've found at times that if my inner critic is the most well exercised part of me, it's pretty much all I can hear. It can be a tricky aspect of self to deal with also. It can have us creating lists, maybe without us fully realising. When it comes to a particular mistake, it can sound like 'Think of all the times you've done something like this'. You can start thinking, 'Well, there's this time + that time + plus those times and these times in the past...'. Before you know it, your list has become an equation that all adds up to 'I'm hopeless, I'm always making mistakes' or something else along those lines. It can become a depressing kind of math. My inner critic has a real knack for getting me to add up or calculate all the tiny little insignificant things.

While people can have their so called 'inner demons' that can make life feel like hell on earth (with the inner critic being one of them at times), there are also some truly divine aspects of our self really worth tapping into. New practices/exercises can have us practicing/exercising channeling those parts of our self to life. Perhaps it was a more divine part of you that suggested 'Why not go on the Beyond Blue forums' and here you are. 🙂

[WishyBee]

Hi therising,

Thank you so much for your reply. You put into words exactly what I experience- managing the inner dialogue that comes with making mistakes, and yes a lot of the time it feels like torment.

My inner dialogue sounds very haphazard and analytical, something like - “why didn’t you see that traffic light turn green, that car honked at you, always pay attention” , “ you drank too much at that party 2 decades ago, you weren’t in control, hopefully you’ll never see those people again”, “ you stepped on the lawn, why didn’t you see the keep of lawn sign, you got in trouble, never go back there- ever”

I’m continually searching for a way to let go of past mistakes and although I’ve tried many different things, I haven’t worked out how to yet, not even a little bit. 
For now, replying on this forum seems to dull down my inner dialogue and gives me a little break from the barrage of critical thoughts.

[therising]

Hi WishyBee

I'm glad the forum seems to give you some relief from your inner dialogue and critical thoughts. Inner dialogue can definitely become stressful and overwhelming at times, that's for sure.

I find the 'you' factor of inner dialogue to be interesting. While I can relate to it myself, I'm fascinated by the number of other people who experience it also. It's quite surprising. What I mean by the 'you' factor and variations of that is you'd think when we ask the question in our mind 'Why am I so stressed?' the answer would be 'Because I am facing what's stressful'. For some, the answer sounds more like 'Because you are facing what's stressful'. In this case, the question becomes 'What is it that's saying you?' or 'What is it that's talking to us?'. Everyone's got a theory and it's all interesting stuff. Just a few of the many theories

• Facets of self: I've found a good explanation of this theory can be found in the book 'Insanely Gifted - Turn Your Demons Into Creative Rocket Fuel', by Jamie Catto. Catto talks about how facets of our self gradually or suddenly come to life, how they sound (inner dialogue), how they feel (emotionally), the challenges or abilities they present, how to manage them etc etc. A brilliant book, in my opinion
• Divine guidance and not so divine guidance: With this theory, it's more so about a spiritual kind of exploration pointing to clairaudience
• How two minds work together or how the brain interacts with itself in order to create greater levels of consciousness: An example of this theory can be found in the book 'The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind', by Julian Jaynes

Plenty more theories beyond these few.

I think if we can give a name to whatever it is we imagine we're working with, that's half the battle. No one knows for sure what it is, so it's about choosing to imagine what works for us. Kind of like take your pick from a long list of all the theories. Btw, it's important to not get too carried away by what we imagine.

By using 'Facets of Self' as an example, you could wonder about the inner dialogue 'why didn’t you see that traffic light turn green, that car honked at you, always pay attention'. There can be a part of us that can lead us to be more reasonable or reason able. It will push us to find valid or good reasons, partly as a learning experience. Btw, I can relate to the green light thing myself. Something could ask me 'Why didn't you see that traffic light turn green?'. A fair question. 'That car honked at you (and in expanding on that), why did you need an alarming wake up call? Were you not fully conscious? Why not?'. More good questions. Then a matter of fact part of me, such as the disciplinarian, the commander or the dictator may dictate 'Always pay attention!'. Good advice. The disciplinarian, the commander and the dictator can sound harsh and chastising at times but they do tend to keep us on track, based on their nature. I smile when I say my inner commander sounds like an army commander at times, virtually with the attitude 'No excuses soldier, FOCUS! Get your sh** together and FOCUS!!!'. It can have a bit of a potty mouth 😂. Being quite the daydreamer, I actually need this part of me to  wake me up and keep me on track at times.

[Eagle Ray]

Dear WishyBee,

I can relate to what you write as I have small things throw me off balance at times. Years ago I was at TAFE and we went on a class excursion. The TAFE lecturer saw me park my car and said “that’s not very straight”. Feeling terribly guilty I went back to the car and repositioned it. But really it wasn’t bad parking and yet I felt like I’d done something terribly wrong. I found it very hard to lift the feeling afterwards as if I’d done something absolutely horrendous.

For me I can link the dots with childhood trauma and why that has made me sensitive to seemingly small things in the present. I internalised a harsh inner critic because I was treated harshly from an early age. So even a minor comment from someone else can feel so impactful.

But another interesting thing I’ve been learning about are intergenerational trauma patterns. There’s a very interesting book by Mark Wolynn called It Didn’t Start With You. It looks at how seemingly minor things in the present may affect us and also how we can have thoughts and behaviours in ourselves that we can’t make sense of. As a counsellor specialising in this field, he has developed skills in uncovering intergenerational trauma patterns that can explain something in the present, such as a repetitive thought pattern. He is especially interested in language which he uses as a window into the past, in terms of the phrases we may habitually use without knowing why. He also looks at epigenentics in the transmission of information and how this is a malleable form that can also be a conduit for healing. We can actually inherit certain forms of gene expression that can have certain feelings, impulses and thought patterns embedded, so we are not such a blank slate at birth. But these patterns can also be shifted and healed.

An example of this is my grandfather’s war trauma. I knew nothing about it and he died before I was born. I had involuntary imagery from early childhood I couldn’t explain, especially when trying to go to sleep at night. Then many years later my dad told me about a war trauma experience of his father that was very graphic. It was literally the imagery that had filled my mind from childhood. I’ve since worked on this with my psychologist and released the hold this pattern had over me. This included working in a bit of an altered consciousness state and allowing an inner resolution of this imagery.

I hope that wasn’t too much of a tangent. I guess what I’m saying is that often our reactions to seemingly innocuous things have a logic to them and it’s sometimes a case of uncovering what that logic is. Even just seeing that logic starts to release the reactive pattern. But we don’t always know in the beginning what that logic is. Mark Wolynn looks very much at language and word associations with clients and relates those things to their family history, often leading to the uncovering of meaningful and insightful explanations. So there is likely an inner logic to your responses for whatever reason.

I’m also finding I’m developing a kinder voice towards myself including an inner carer and protector which dials down my inner critic. The self-caring part is getting stronger and the critic no longer has the field day it once had. There is parts work you can do with a psychologist on this including the Internal Family Systems approach. Gradually the inner critic becomes less autonomous and eventually gets a lot quieter.

These are just some thoughts. Sorry if I wrote too much! Maybe journaling would help too.

[WishyBee]

Hi Eagle Ray,

Thanks for your reply.

The incident with your TAFE lecturer is exactly the types of thoughts that I get caught up in.

 I can logically analyse that circumstance: It doesn’t matter that you didn’t park straight it doesn’t affect anyone, not everyone is good at parking and that’s ok, the TAFE lecturer shouldn’t have pointed out such a trivial fault (it’s also weird that they watched you parking your car) what a critical douchebag.

 I wonder if you still feel guilty about this incident many years later? Do you feel a certain way or anyway about the TAFE lecturer today? 

[Eagle Ray]

Dear WishyBee,

I was 24 at the time of that situation and I’m 49 now. I would say that for a good few years if I thought about that incident (like something triggered a memory of it) I would have all these feelings of shame flood me all over again.

However, in very recent years I would say that has diminished right down. I can see it as trivial and nothing to do with me and entirely to do with the nitpicking TAFE lecturer and their fastidious need to be critical that will be something to do with their world and experience but not me.

Why did it disturb and upset me at the time and for long afterwards when seemingly so small an issue? Well I’m now diagnosed with Complex PTSD. I grew up in a hostile, highly critical environment. I had a traumatic birth and a mother who couldn’t bond with me. Both parents carried deeply unresolved childhood trauma. My world from the beginning consisted of hypervigilance and fear. My nervous system was always on edge from birth with a lack of comfort and reassurance in childhood and I was primed to respond to threats from the environment.

So I think that is why I have felt everything to the nth degree. I’m also hypersensitive to sound (I have a condition called hyperacusis), light, smell, touch etc. However, these sensitivities have begun to alleviate a bit, especially as I’ve been working on the complex trauma issues including with a psychologist knowledgeable about trauma effects and learning how the nervous system works. My system is slowly becoming less reactive.

I have learned we can also inherit these responses epigenetically even from previous generations. Studies on mice have found a fear of a specific smell, for example, can be passed down for 3 to 4 generations. So the grandchildren and great grandchildren mice are born with the same fear of the scent even though they never experienced the exposure to the original stimulus that triggered the fear.

The good news is the epigentic switch that causes this can be reversed through corrective, healing experiences. This happens through the same processes of DNA methylation and histone modification that caused the behavioural symptoms. These processes are on the genes not in them, so the genes are not changing, just whether they are expressed or not. So in my case, I’m having the corrective experience of being seen and supported by my psychologist and I’m learning to experience more care and safety with others. This begins to change me biologically so gradually I am less affected by small things now that my nervous system experienced as intensely threatening before.

Mark Wolynn’s work looks at all of this and explains it well. Think I’m going to run over word count but that’s really what’s been happening for me. That TAFE lecturer incident is no longer a disturbing memory and it is processed and filed, so to speak.

[WishyBee]

Thanks Eagle Ray

This information is so interesting to me. We are similar in age however I can still be deeply triggered by incidents that occurred when I was 24 or younger. It seems that age or time doesn’t lessen the severe emotions I feel attached to these situations. 
I too had an abusive childhood (definitely some PTSD from it) and although I’ve done a lot of work to process my childhood I  just can’t seem to manage the forementioned insignificant incidents. 

Would you mind sharing exactly how you processed and filed the TAFE lecturer incident?