Sometimes we just have to force through something. One way to do that is to connect with your goal (and recursively up through your goal’s goal). I assume this is for class. That’s probably part of the problem: you aren’t motivated to write the paper. But what’s your goal? To pass, get a good grade, so you can go on in your education so you have a degree that might have some value on the job market.
There are also various tricks you can google, such as writing by freehand non-stop for 15 minutes (even if it’s “I don’t know what to write.”).
But for a slightly different take than pjeby, or maybe just a different presentation. You write: “These thoughts are much harder to clear, both because there are more of them, because of their emotional content.”
At least in the medium/long term, not “clearing” them but instead “listening” to the resistance, asking the resistance questions, will be more effective. Why is your emotional content blocking you (pjeby: “when it’s chronic, the thought is nearly always something about you, and what it “means” about you if you don’t do it”). So I don’t know if it’s always about you, I think maybe it could be arbitrary emotional impressions from earlier life, but I agree what one could call an emotionally intelligent approach is what is needed here.
Ha, fair enough. On a serious note though, I guess I’d say then that I don’t know if trying to find out what it means about you might less effective than just finding out what it means in general, because looking for the piece connected to you might lead you down the wrong path if it’s a few steps removed?
I don’t know if trying to find out what it means about you might less effective than just finding out what it means in general, because looking for the piece connected to you might lead you down the wrong path if it’s a few steps removed?
If you actually have the ability to openmindedly inquire and observe your automatic thoughts (as opposed to your consciously-intended ones), then you certainly can just look at them.
However, if you don’t have that skill—and it’s hard to realize that you don’t! -- then you’ll go less astray if you ask that question.
What I usually ask people is, “what’s bad about that?” (and I already know, from their voice tone, whether I should be asking “what’s bad” or “what’s good”). If a person starts going in circles and complex explanations after a couple askings of “what’s bad about that?”, I shift to, “What does it say about you that X? What kind of person does that make you?” and usually get a better answer.
My critierion for knowing whether their answer is correct is partly by length and partly by how “rational” it sounds. When it comes to irrational behavior, the more rational your reasoning is, the more likely it is to be false.
Correct answers have a tendency to sound stupid, irrelevant, or at the very least, highly emotional and personal. They’re also brief: any sentence structure more complex or lengthy than a proverb or slogan your parents shouted at you is also unlikely to be relevant.
IOW, if your answer to the question doesn’t surprise you, you’re probably just making it up. If it involves reasoning and logic, or lacks any non-implied emotional content, you’re definitely making it up.
The part of your brain that actually runs things is not a deep thinker: it’s a massively-parallel, ultra-cached machine for jumping to emotional conclusions based on expected survival and status impacts. If you’re doing something that doesn’t make sense, it’s for a reason that doesn’t make sense. So don’t try to make sense out of it—try to see what nonsense you actually believe.
Sometimes we just have to force through something. One way to do that is to connect with your goal (and recursively up through your goal’s goal). I assume this is for class. That’s probably part of the problem: you aren’t motivated to write the paper. But what’s your goal? To pass, get a good grade, so you can go on in your education so you have a degree that might have some value on the job market. There are also various tricks you can google, such as writing by freehand non-stop for 15 minutes (even if it’s “I don’t know what to write.”).
But for a slightly different take than pjeby, or maybe just a different presentation. You write: “These thoughts are much harder to clear, both because there are more of them, because of their emotional content.” At least in the medium/long term, not “clearing” them but instead “listening” to the resistance, asking the resistance questions, will be more effective. Why is your emotional content blocking you (pjeby: “when it’s chronic, the thought is nearly always something about you, and what it “means” about you if you don’t do it”). So I don’t know if it’s always about you, I think maybe it could be arbitrary emotional impressions from earlier life, but I agree what one could call an emotionally intelligent approach is what is needed here.
When you’re a kid, everything is about you, even stuff that’s really about other people. ;-)
Ha, fair enough. On a serious note though, I guess I’d say then that I don’t know if trying to find out what it means about you might less effective than just finding out what it means in general, because looking for the piece connected to you might lead you down the wrong path if it’s a few steps removed?
If you actually have the ability to openmindedly inquire and observe your automatic thoughts (as opposed to your consciously-intended ones), then you certainly can just look at them.
However, if you don’t have that skill—and it’s hard to realize that you don’t! -- then you’ll go less astray if you ask that question.
What I usually ask people is, “what’s bad about that?” (and I already know, from their voice tone, whether I should be asking “what’s bad” or “what’s good”). If a person starts going in circles and complex explanations after a couple askings of “what’s bad about that?”, I shift to, “What does it say about you that X? What kind of person does that make you?” and usually get a better answer.
My critierion for knowing whether their answer is correct is partly by length and partly by how “rational” it sounds. When it comes to irrational behavior, the more rational your reasoning is, the more likely it is to be false.
Correct answers have a tendency to sound stupid, irrelevant, or at the very least, highly emotional and personal. They’re also brief: any sentence structure more complex or lengthy than a proverb or slogan your parents shouted at you is also unlikely to be relevant.
IOW, if your answer to the question doesn’t surprise you, you’re probably just making it up. If it involves reasoning and logic, or lacks any non-implied emotional content, you’re definitely making it up.
The part of your brain that actually runs things is not a deep thinker: it’s a massively-parallel, ultra-cached machine for jumping to emotional conclusions based on expected survival and status impacts. If you’re doing something that doesn’t make sense, it’s for a reason that doesn’t make sense. So don’t try to make sense out of it—try to see what nonsense you actually believe.