Depression does some tricky things to your self image and self assessment. Something I still struggle with is a balance point between my desire to be honest with myself about my weaknesses and failings while not falling into a cycle of severe negative thinking about myself. Let’s take a look down this rabbit hole.
When my marriage was over one of the things I had to stare bluntly in the face was the way that I had recoiled from my spouse and became distant. It was a series of bad choices that I had made, either consciously or subconsciously I honestly don’t know anymore. It’s taken a lot of time for me to to understand that regardless of intent, it happened and I have to own that now. At the same time however, anxiety and depression cranked my self-assessment all the way to an ’11’. I began wondering if I was simply emotionally abusive, was I a severely negligent person when it came to others. For a good long while after the divorce was finalized I simply felt that I was a massive toxic ball of emotions that nobody should be around. Fast forward the tape and while I still think I have my toxic moments, I know that I am always working towards a more even approach to things. I may not be warm and fuzzy but I don’t think I’m a severely toxic person (at least not by intention).
Getting into that rumination and overthinking spiral is a common thing for me and one of the small tools I made use of was journaling just what was going on in my head when I had those bouts. Writing these excessive thoughts down gave me pause to process but also a chance to take a look back again later to see just where my head was at. Seeing it written out also helped me to take a step back and view things in a more rational and dispassionate way. If there was something that I caught myself writing about frequently enough I’d turn that into a behavior that I’d work to adjust or simply be more mindful of.
One of my more annoying behaviors I suspect evolved from my chosen profession. As an IT person, my role is almost always about solving someone’s problems and being critical about all the things that could go wrong. While that may have worked for my day-job in many ways that critical behavior in my personal life took the form of excessive negativity and criticism. I’m sure for my ex-wife that was a daily nuance and something that chipped away at her constantly while we were together. Realizing how often I had written about it it’s something that I continue to work on to this day. I keep my criticisms as constructive as I can, I try to actively hold off on advice unless asked. If I feel like I should voice something I take a step back, think upon it more from perhaps the other persons perspective. Only if it’s urgent or critical enough do I then interject. It may seem rather simplistic, but it’s something that I realized I had to adjust in myself. While I still catch myself and my knee jerk reaction to provide my opinion and advice, it’s a pattern I actively try to break in the hopes that I will be more thoughtful in the future.
