Author: Katherine Morgan Schafler Category: Books Date Finished: April 22, 2023 Date Read: 2023/04/22 Genre: Self-help
Read: April 2023
The observation that when maladaptive perfectionists do achieve “perfect,” when they hit their goal, even far exceed their goal, they aren’t satisfied. Dr. Karen Horney described this dissatisfaction as an “inverse ratio” between success and inner security: “instead of feeling, ‘I have done it’ he merely feels that ‘it happened.’ Repeated achievements in his field do not make him more secure, but more anxious.” (pg 91)
—> No substitutes for self-worth or presence
Connection is a need
Dr. Barbara L. Frederickson’s “broaden-and-build” theory asserts that if you can get yourself into a positive headspace, your “thought-action repertoire” broadens. When you’re in a positive state, your thoughts about the possible actions you can take expand; you realize you can do a lot of different things, and you make choices that promote future positive states. (pg 132)
- solutions oriented perspective, not weighed down with negativity or overwhelm
- positive emotions produce optimal functioning, reserves that can be drawn on later to improve successful coping and survival
- practicing self-compassion expands thought-action repertoire (out of fear-based negativity, towards increased feelings of safety, reassurance, and positivity)
Self-punishment (138)
- numbing: engaging in an activity that helps you ignore feelings you don’t want to feel
- restorative activities help regulate emotions and gain perspective
- restoration regulates and resets, numbing represses and makes us feel nothing. pain still exists when numbing wears off
- blame: attempt to discharge pain
- adaptive: personal accountability
- maladaptive: self-blame, negative self-talk
The difference between struggle and challenge is connection (207)
- amount of support we connect to as we engage the task
- challenges are energizing even with difficulty because we’re connected. connection builds energy
- struggles are exhausting because we’re isolated. isolation drains energy
- safety requires connection, vs isolation when you don’t feel safe and make decision out of defense
- struggle does not guarantee resilience
- what doesn’t kill you forces you into a position where you have to choose between connection and isolation, and choosing connection makes you stronger
- feel your feelings, process your experience, engage connection
Anything you do to protect, save, restore, and build your energy is productive (215). Anything that helps you operate with premium-quality energy…so that you can access your abilities in a way that “burnt-out you” could never compete with
Don’t worry about getting so lost in your leisure that you won’t return to your work. You’re a perfectionist; the drive within you to excel is compulsive, so you won’t be able to help returning to your work.
What energizes you without hurting you?
The point of art is not to be beautiful but to rouse a sense of connection within the person who’s encountering the art (220). The point of art is to move you. Being moved by art looks like standing still and realizing that your internal world is so much more alive than you remember it being before you encountered the artwork.
Art is a closure-less experience, as is grief. The impossibility of closure within art is the very quality that makes art invaluable.
Sidestep judgment by holding opinions (244)
- opinion reflects thought and perspective
- judgment reflects thoughts and perspective alongside analysis of your work as compared to others
- opinion: avoiding soda is better than consuming it / judgment: avoiding soda is better than consuming it, so I’m better if I don’t drink soda and you do
Whenever we judge ourselves, we create separation between the parts of ourselves that we think deserve goodness and the parts that we think don’t
Making a big life choice: get there by “allowing yourself to entertain your desire within the framework of an impending reality—something that is going to happen—as opposed to treating your desire like it is a fantasy that could never be real” decisionmaking