In this post, I will take a look at the Life Trap of Pessimism, which in my experience goes hand in hand with the Trap of Failure. Feeling like a failure all the time, how could I possibly be thinking in a more optimistic way?
A brief summary based on what the book, Tunne Lukkosi by Kimmo Takanen, tells us of the Life Trap of Pessimism and Negativity:
I pay more attention to the negative things in my life and in my opinion I’m only a realist, everything tends to go terribly anyway, right? My future is bleak, as I keep worrying and overthinking about the possible (terrible) things that can happen there.
When things go smoothly, it feels temporary, and it is my firm belief that it will lead to something bad happening sooner or later. I am a sponge for all the negativity in the world, sucking it in and using it to paint threatening images of mine and other’s lives. This causes me continuous anxiety.
Since everything, for everyone, will go bad anyway, there is no point trying to affect it with my own actions. Anything good is probably just a coin toss, a chance, and so it won’t happen again. No matter how positive a thing, I can and will find something dark about it.
I fear that I may be making decisions that lead me to chaos and crisis. Even small mistakes can bring me a world of hurt, and that is why I try to avoid risks in my life. People may get fed up with my negativity, and take some distance from me – after all, it’s hard to be around someone who only sees the negative.
Pessimism colors my whole life as far as I can remember.
As things have gone from bad to worse and then to hell in my life, it became very difficult for me to see anything good in it. My truth, my reality, was for the longest time that everything is terrible, and will always be. That’s just how it was meant to be when it came to me. And, being the failure I was, it was what I rightfully deserved.
I was never making any definitive plans for the future, never climbing towards my own dreams. As someone who tried to do her best to be a people pleaser and avoid abandonment, it seemed like a pointless endeavor, to begin with – my dreams, needs, pains, in essence, me, didn’t matter.
This has lead me to believe that I will never experience true happiness. I’ll never feel true love. I’ll never get anywhere anyway, so why bother and make it more painful for myself. It’s a rough belief to have, especially when I have a husband who tells me every day he loves me truly. Why am I incapable of just taking the good things in as they come?
I only hear the criticism.
For a long while, it has been almost impossible to have any sort of constructive talk with me, as I take criticism as an attempt to stomp me to the ground and make sure I won’t get up again. In my eyes, it’s not like anyone wants to even hear me out, hold me as equal, or in any way want anything good for me. People are just there to manipulate me, to make me a puppet.
Guys, it’s hard to be a puppet. Being wary all the time, thinking that everyone that ever talks to me has some ulterior motif… It’s very distressing. I don’t feel safe around anyone, and ever since the drama with my family, I don’t feel safe with them either. My poor husband has to live knowing that I keep doubting him and his motives on a daily basis as well.
When things turn for the worse, as life has a tendency to move in cycles of good and bad times, I often forget about the good days, sometimes I literally can’t remember anything good that has happened, and have to ask people what I’ve been doing, in an attempt to try and find something positive in my life. The dark things blow up proportionally in my mind, as per the Good Little Borderlines Guidebook to Life dictates.
Failure and Perfectionism, the two direct more power into Pessimism.
As I can not possibly be perfect all the time, I keep thinking that I’ve deserved a miserable life. Whatever bad things happen, I earned it by not being adequate. It is partially my doing, because I angered the balance of the universe by staying alive, and partially some higher power that dictates that one Maria Vana will never amount to anything more than a doormat.
It is the best course of action for me to lay low, never to be seen, and to avoid conflict and risks alltogether. This is how I’ve lived my life until fairly recently when I packed my books and plushies and left to marry a man I had only known for about half a year. Now that was a lifetime risk, and I’m proud I took it!
The problem with this is though, that as I’ve been tossed around like a trophy on some dusty shelf, I can’t trust that this will last. One day, in whatever way, I will fuck up, and my beloved, amazing, gorgeous husband will be fed up with me and vanish like every other good thing that happened to me. Such a BPD thing to say, but hey, it’s one of my beliefs.
It is my reality. People get fed up with me and leave, preferably in the most bombastic and hurtful way they can come up with.
There is good news though, I think, as this emotional blockage can be resolve with hard work like the rest of them. The book says that once the Life Trap of Pessimism starts dissolving, I will be able to make more positive estimations of the future. I will see other options in it, and understand that things can turn out for the better too. This makes it easier for me to breathe, as I worry less about the bad things that are about to happen, and makes way to feel joy and to get my needs fulfilled.
As a true pessimist, I see a billion problems with resolving any of my Life Traps. I won’t be good enough. I’ll give up anyway. I don’t have what it takes. I don’t matter so why bother.
It’s a rough road ahead, at the moment I am just trying to make myself understand that I, Maria Vana, have value and am worthy. I am more than enough. That’s where the journey starts for me, every day.
How about you? Is the curse of pessimism affect your life? Let us know in the comments below!
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Absolutely, I fail on purpose sometimes because I already know the outcome. This blog opened up my eyes to a whole lot of stuff. WOW
Thing is, we can’t ever really know the outcome, can we? It’s a funny thing what our minds do, when we repeat something enough we start truly believing it. And that in turn messes things up for us…