Part IV: Heartbreak and the Path to Peace

The second of 12 secret ingredients that go into writing your way through tough emotions in your journal, one ingredient at a time.

#2 of 12 Ways to Move Yourself from Heartbreak to Peace of Mind.

Selective Listening

Have you heard of Selective Listening? It’s where you make a conscious decision to pay attention to one voice over another, for reasons you get to make up.

My daughter perfected this life skill in pre-school. Her ability to tune out any kind of suggestion to stop what she was doing, get ready to switch gears, move on to the next thing, or do anything else that wasn’t her idea, was so strong that her clever teachers tested her hearing, the way clever teachers do.

First, they waited for her to become engrossed in a favorite activity.

Then, they stood behind her and said, in their firm but gentle teacher voice, “Coco, it’s time to stop what you’re doing.”

Not a twitch, not a pause in play.

“Coco, it’s time to finish what you’re doing and put your things away.”

No reaction whatsoever.

“Coco, it’s time to have a cookie.”

Readers. My daughter’s head whipped around so fast, her hair flew out like the wind hit it. She was B-U-S-T-E-D. She knew it, the teachers knew it. The only thing she could do was give her best impish you-caught-me-grin and enjoy the cookie.

The thing about Selective Listening is that we all have the ability to tap into it, but most of us tap into the negative reinforcement in our heads and the joyless, cookie-less voices that have the strongest resonance, instead of the supportive, reassuring voices that need to be there as well.

The cruel and ugly voices have the strongest resonance because we tune into them over and over. We make them stronger and stronger, louder and louder, and then wonder what’s wrong with us that we can’t figure out how to genuinely love, accept, and approve of ourselves.

Taking the time to write out this negative mishmash of BS in our journals is the worst.

It’s the worst kind of temptation to fight against, the worst kind of habit to sicken yourself with, and the worst kind of mindfuck to put yourself through. There simply isn’t enough lube on the planet to make that ride pain-free.

But those negative voices make so much sense! They’re so familiar! You keep hearing them, so they must be legit. No, sorry, you’re wrong. Repetition is not validation. Lies don’t become truth just because they’ve been told over and over, no matter what they try to tell you.

It’s 100% about what you believe.

Want to know a secret? You can believe anything. You can believe the opposite of what those voices say. You can balance any outlandish negative thoughts with equally outlandish positive thoughts until your mood stabilizes, your breathing returns to normal, and clarity parts the clouds of confusion in your brain so you can think logically again. You have the power.

But it’s really hard.

We human beings embrace the mean voices because the more dramatic they are, the more we feel them, and the more we feel them, the more they ring true. For some obscenely twisted reason we really get off on this pain. We repeat the negative voices over and over, and make them stronger and stronger, and then when they gang up on us and make us feel like absolute shit the moment someone breaks our heart, we wonder how they got so strong.

Of course he dumped you; you’re not worthy of love. Of course he didn’t think to discuss it with you; you don’t matter. You never mattered. This is proof that you will never matter, never be loved, never be worth even a basic conversation.

Um. Seriously? Yeah. Seriously. This is the shit I hear knocking on my door when I am tired, when I am sad, and when I am vulnerable. I would never, ever, think this about another person, let alone say it or write it out and give it a place in the real world. But I can say it to myself because who cares about me and my feelings, right? I’m just me. Apparently, I don’t matter.

Shrug.

Reader. If I don’t care about me and my feelings, who the hell will, and why would they? If you don’t care about you and your feelings, how are you going to keep yourself safe in your journal, find peace of mind, and make good choices about what happens next in your life?

Selective Listening happens when you have a variety of voices and opinions inside your head to choose from. Start adding some of the good shit to your collection right now. The very next time you read or hear anyone say anything remotely kind to you or about you, record it. Repeat it to yourself until you have it memorized and write it out in your journal. Don’t focus on why or how cringy it feels. Just do it.

Stockpile all good information, supportive words, and positive reinforcement you receive. It’s not going to work overnight like some kind of magic weight loss pill or a Mason jar of oats and almond milk, but it will work. And once you get the hang of it, you can hang on to it forever.

When you’re unceremoniously dumped out of your life, your future disappears in the blink of an eye, and the faith you had in yourself dissolves into thin air, you’re going to need to meet the argument in your head that you suck with a counterargument that you don’t. You’re going to need a chorus of voices proclaiming your okay-ness and, dare I say it? Awesomeness.

This is how you keep yourself from curling up in the fetal position and giving up.

I think your journal is the best place for this practice – it’s right there on the nightstand, you don’t need insurance, you don’t have to wait for an appointment, you can do something right now to soothe yourself, and it’s a good way to keep busy between therapy sessions.  

Here’s what happens in the argument stage. We look for patterns that confirm we’re the common denominator in all failed or problematic relationships and that we are just the worst loser that ever lived. We fixate on what we did wrong, why we’re just so wrong we don’t even belong on the planet, and how we’re so lame and stupid it’s no wonder love went away.

And we present this argument with conviction. We are serious about it with the eyebrows pointing in and everything. We are expert prosecutors when it comes to punishing ourselves with imagined crimes of inadequacy and incompetence. The best in the land!

Like that’s anything to brag about.

Why do we do this to ourselves? Here’s my theory, based on armchair skimming of science-y articles, the first third of a Positive Psychology specialization, and some thoughts that sound right:

Back in the day before the day, like 20,000+ years before the day, whatever day that was, it was absolutely essential to our survival to hyperfocus on what we did wrong, so we’d never repeat it.

Shit shit shit. What the hell is wrong with me? I just killed my sister. I know it was me. I’m such a loser! I didn’t pay attention when I made mom’s tea either. She was the third to die after drinking hot water with those leaves in it, but did I learn? Noooo.

I never learn! I’m such a fucking idiot. I can’t be trusted. Now I have to bear twice as many stupid kids because we’re down a woman. Dammit. It’s all my fault. It’s no more than I deserve. I don’t deserve to live!

I have to remember how dumb I am so I’ll be careful next time. I have to pay attention to which leaves I throw in the pot! If I kill one more woman in this tribe, I’m going to have do all the fucking cooking!

And it would serve me right. Clearly, I am not worthy of love, healthy relationships with my children, a comfortable income, a successful business, affordable health care, or a nice car.

Obsessing over patterns and mistakes was essential to survival when every single decision was literally life or death. But we don’t have to obsess over which teas are toxic and which are safe to drink anymore – we have the FDA for that – so now we obsess over which of our character traits or shortcomings cost us yet another relationship.

Because it was all our fault, right? Every time. Right?

I am an effusive friend, lover, and coach. On purpose. With purpose. I deliver strong statements of empowerment that are based on legitimate reasons, logic, and observation. I warn everyone:

Hey, I’m going to be the cheerleader you never asked for! I’m going to use spectacular words and exquisite phrases to describe your awesomeness, and I’m going to do it a lot. It will feel weird at first. I get it.

And I’m going to do this to you because you will never get rid of the negative voices in your head - ever - but we can bring in some new voices to give you options and a sense of balance when you need them.

These new voices are going to be noisy and obnoxious at first - like me! - because they need your attention to become familiar. It’s always better to have a choice when it comes to which voices you want to hear about yourself when you’re feeling low. Here, have a cookie!

Not to be dramatic, but, once upon a time, Selective Listening saved my life. I was sinking fast in the quicksand of self-loathing, trying to breathe under the suffocating weight of all the ways I failed at life (483,678 and counting), while also being handed a pair of 50lb weights to hold over my head as the tide started coming in. I was in so much emotional pain, it showed up as physical and mental pain. I could not make it stop. Beating myself up had never hurt that bad. I was really good at it because, you know, experience.

Did I call a friend for help? Of course not. Who would want to be bothered by me and my stupid problems?

But then, suddenly, and in spite of me, the words of a friend popped up out of nowhere. Right in the middle of all that pain, I heard this gentle reassurance that I was loved. They were words I’d seen and heard her share with other people in pain and I just knew she would say them to me, too. And then another friend’s words popped up to join hers. And another’s. And after a few minutes, I found myself listening to what I knew my friends would say to me if I called them. It’s what I would say and had said a million times to each of them, so I really did know it was safe to believe them.

I chose to hear about the cookie. And it changed everything.

Listen for cookies in your life. Hold onto them. Choose the cookie when you journal! Choose the cookie and keep choosing the cookie and bake your own cookie and improve the cookie recipe and just, for the love of all things good, keep choosing the cookie.

When I choose the cookie, the argument / counterargument from above goes like this:

Of course he dumped me; I’m not worthy of love.

He ended the relationship because his feelings changed. He loved me at one time; I am worthy of love. His feelings changed, but the fact that I am worthy of love did not (it has taken years - decades - to be able to say that).

Of course he didn’t think to discuss it with me; I don’t matter.

His inability to broach the subject with me is about him, not me.

I never mattered.

That’s not true; it just feels that way. I can go through my memory and find all kinds of real evidence that I mattered, in extraordinary ways, and felt it in my bones.

This is proof that I will never matter, never be loved, never be worth even a basic conversation.

No, it’s not. Again, his inability to broach the subject is about him, not me (nice try, negative voices, thinking you could get in from a different angle. I’m on to you).

Choosing the cookie frees me up to write further in my journal about how I can be proud of the way I showed up in that relationship, proud of what I brought to the party. I loved to my full ability. I gave love and I received love, I allowed myself to be blissfully happy while making someone else blissfully happy. I will never un-know that. I can take that with me into the future.

I was a good thing in his life for a long time. I just wasn’t right for him, not long term.

Which means, ultimately, that he wasn’t right for me, not long term.

I’m not ready to look at that with any kind of equanimity right now, but I trust myself to get there. It’s going to be okay.

I used to live on the edges of some very dangerous, very deep holes of negative beliefs about myself. When I talk about how to journal your way out of dark places, I do so from experience.

Do you think I want another person on this planet to get stuck in a dark hole of self-loathing without a flashlight and a way to get out? No sir, I do not. That’s the beginning, middle, and end of why I’m writing this series.

So. This is what works for me. I let myself hurt and I let the mean voices have their say (because they don’t scare me anymore; they’re very weak from disuse). And then I allow myself the counterargument. That is to say, I give myself the counterargument. I take each negative belief by the scruff and shake it clean.

The counterargument can be really hard to formulate the first few times. It’s something a lot of us want to push away and hide from, for weird reasons like:

• we’re not supposed to think good things about ourselves (only narcissists think good things about themselves)

• we’re not supposed to think we did nothing wrong (bad things only happen to bad people therefore, we were bad and did the thing wrong)

• we’re not supposed to divide responsibility for failure with someone else or put it back in their lap (only emotionally immature people blame other people when things go wrong)

But the counterargument is about finding your way back to reason. Reason is where it’s possible to weigh reality with disappointment with hope and find a balance between hurting and feeling better. Ideally, that balance is a temporary thing. You want the scale to slide towards feeling better, right? So, keep choosing the voices that lean that way.

I mean, you could choose to listen for the bullshit “proof” that you are a waste of space, or you could choose to listen for the chance to have a cookie. Which one do you want? Chocolate chip or snickerdoodle? Ooh! Or a Mega Stuf Oreo?

Forgive yourself the slip-ups, the moments of weakness, that slide you into darkness for a minute. Meeting those old arguments about how lame you are with counterarguments about how unique, special, and even awesome you are takes a lot of practice. So be patient with yourself as well. Just keep practicing.

I have more practical advice along these lines coming in a couple of weeks. If you need them now, email me.