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Anxiety: How to stop catastrophizing – an expert’s guide

SOURCE:  Linda Blair/Clinical Psychologist

A clinical psychologist suggests a three-pronged plan for tackling anxiety and approaching each day logically and positively

Let us start by considering why some people catastrophize – that is, on hearing uncertain news, they imagine the worst possible outcome. After all, it is not uncommon and those who catastrophize seem to do it a lot.

Catastrophizers tend to be fairly anxious people. Whether this characteristic is principally genetic or more the result of learning is unknown. High levels of anxiety are extremely unpleasant, so we look for ways to discharge those unpleasant feelings as quickly as possible. If a catastrophizer is told something inconclusive – for example, if they go to a GP and are asked to have tests – they look for a way to feel in control again immediately. They learn to choose the worst possible outcome because it allows for the greatest sense of relief when they are reassured.

Considering all possibilities is not a bad strategy if you examine them logically. However, unable to bear their distress, catastrophisers rush to external sources to calm themselves down: checking whether anyone else has “come through” the same problem; matching symptoms online to obtain a diagnosis and treatment options; asking a professional to tell them that they will survive. Once they are reassured, they feel better – in psychological jargon, they have “rewarded” this seeking behaviour. The next time they feel uncertain or threatened, they will ratchet up their anxiety with a catastrophic thought, then look outwards for reassurance even faster than before. In this way, catastrophising soon becomes a well-entrenched habit. The greatest problem with seeking others to alleviate anxiety is that it offers only temporary relief. There is always another source to check or another opinion to be had; as a result, catastrophisers feel anxious again increasingly quickly. The only way to break this cycle is to tame anxiety. After this, you can still seek advice. So, if you are a catastrophiser and you would rather not be, how do you go about making changes?

•Accept yourself. Anxiety is energy: if you are an anxious person, celebrate! However, why waste that energy feeling uncomfortable and preparing yourself for circumstances that will almost certainly never occur? Look for enjoyable ways to challenge yourself and use your energy more positively: taking regular aerobic exercise; learning something new; taking up a creative passion.

•Take control. Establish a regular “worry time”. Start by setting aside half an hour every day. Write down all your concerns in specific terms. For example: “I felt nauseated this morning. Do I have stomach cancer?” Assign a score on a scale of 0 to 100% to estimate how distressed this possibility makes you feel. Next, list all the possible explanations for your concern, then rank each one according to how likely it is to be correct. Make use of external sources if necessary, but stick with reputable websites and professionals. Finally, score your worry for the level of distress it is causing you now. Gradually, you will be able to reduce the amount and frequency of worry time.

•Use the “best friend test”. Ask yourself what you would advise your best friend to do about each concern, and take that action.

•Learn to self-soothe. Whenever you are overwhelmed by anxiety and feel you must seek reassurance, give yourself permission to do so – but not straight away. Establish an interval before you are allowed to act. Even two minutes is enough at first, because you are still exerting self-control. Breathing slowly in through your nose and out through your mouth, or taking some gentle exercise, will help. Gradually, you will find you can wait longer. When you get to the point where you can wait more than 20 minutes, most people find they no longer need to be reassured by others.

This three-pronged approach – using your “worry energy” to carry out new and enjoyable challenges, approaching your tendency to catastrophize logically and systematically, and learning to wait through discomfort – takes time. But if you invest the necessary time, you will start looking forward to each day knowing you can deal with uncertainty in a more positive, balanced way.

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Castimonia Paratus Retreat 2019 – ONE SPOT REMAINING!

The retreat committee met last week and decided to open up a few more spots for those who wish to attend. That being said, we now only have 1 spot remaining as of this morning! Please sign up ASAP if you are interested in attending.

Castimonia.org/retreat

Date/Time
Date(s) – 11/08/2019 – 11/10/2019
4:30 pm – 12:00 pm

Categories No Categories

Castimonia’s Paratus Retreat is a retreat for any man who struggles with any type of sexual purity.  Paratus, Latin for “equipped”.

If you are wondering about whether to attend this retreat, ask yourself these questions:

  • Do you know the meaning of intimacy?
  • Do you struggle with being intimate with your spouse or others?
  • Are you fully equipped for the spiritual battle that is raging around us right now?
  • Are you a man who strives for biblical sexual purity and intimacy with other men?
  • Are you a man who struggles with maintaining that sexual purity or being intimate?
  • Do you want a circle of brothers helping you in your sexual purity and intimacy journey?

Join us for a weekend dedicated to equipping adult men of all ages, all walks of life, and various levels of struggle with the tools necessary to wage this spiritual battle and emerge on the other side as the sexually pure men that God intended us to be.

At the Paratus Retreat, we will discuss strategies for equipping ourselves with tactics necessary for battling the enemy. We will discover the true meaning of brotherhood, fellowship, and intimacy. The leaders of the Paratus Retreat will set the example of vulnerability and accountability. We hope to pave the way for all men to be fully equipped to wage war against Satan’s tempting assaults and emerge VICTORIOUS.

The ultimate affirmation for all men is to hear at the end of days, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”

A wise man is strong, And a man of knowledge increases power. For by wise guidance you will wage war, And in abundance of counselors there is victory.
Proverbs 24:5-6

Start: November 8 – 04:30 pm
End: November 10 – 12:00 pm
Organizer: Castimonia Restoration Ministry, Inc.

Email: Retreat@Castimonia.org
Website: http://castimonia.org/retreat
Venue:

Cat Spring Retreat Center
14852 Hall Road
Cat Spring, TX, US, 78933

To view information on the Cat Spring Retreat Center, please visit this website:

http://thecatspringretreat.com/index.html

*Refunds are as follows:

Full refund minus fees up to September 15th.
50% refund minus fees after September 15th and up to November 1st.
No refunds after November 1st (retreat credit only).

Retreat fee includes meals and lodging at the retreat center from Friday evening to Sunday morning.  You will be required to bring bedding and toiletries for the beds and bathrooms at the retreat center.

If you need a scholarship or are coming from out of state, please contact retreat@castimonia.org for info on a reduced or free admission to the retreat!

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3 Unrealistic and Detrimental Expectations About Marriage

SOURCE:  Margarita Tartakovsky, M.S. /PsychCentral

There’s no shortage of unrealistic expectations about marriage. Which we can pick up from our families, from friends, from fairy tales, from television and movies, from magazine articles. And these supposedly true beliefs can sabotage our relationships, creating a whole lot of misunderstanding and chipping away at our connection.

Unrealistic expectations “set up couples to fail,” said Clinton Power, a clinical relationship counsellor. “When you expect that your relationship is meant to be a certain way, and that expectation doesn’t happen, this can create feelings of anxiety, sadness, and despair.” It can spark resentment, which can ruin relationships.

Below are three unrealistic expectations—and the truths behind each one.

Unrealistic expectation: Happy couples continue to feel the same intense feelings of love. “Falling in love is often called a ‘temporary psychosis’ for the very reason that when you are ‘head over heels’ in love with another person, you are often blinded to some of their differences and quirks,” said Power, founder of Clinton Power + Associates in Sydney, Australia. You love everything about your partner, and want to be with them. All. The. Time.

There are physiological reasons for this. According to psychotherapist and relationship expert Melissa Ferrari, “Oxytocin, dopamine and serotonin dance with the sex hormones estrogen and testosterone, fueling our desire and keeping us on a ‘happy high’ of love and lust.”

But eventually, these electric effects dissipate. And what’s left are two people dealing with the reality of day-to-day life, Ferrari said. “And this is where the hard work starts.”

After the honeymoon period is over, it’s totally normal to enter a period of conflict, Power said. For instance, the quirks you once found adorable, like your partner regularly running late and losing things, are now like nails on a chalkboard. Now it’s a significant source of tension. After all, you take pride in your punctuality, and you have a penchant for organization. Which your partner keeps messing with.

The good news is that conflict isn’t inherently a problem. In fact, it’s actually an opportunity, Power said. When you’re experiencing conflict, you “learn to negotiate and manage your differences” and “how to successfully soothe one another when one or both of you are upset.”

Unrealistic expectation: Happy relationships remain the same. We assume that the person we married will remain exactly as they are, and thereby so will our relationship. This expectation might even be subconscious, but it rises to the surface in the form of surprise: Your spouse starts exploring a new career path or passion or moving away from something they used to love (and you still do), and you’re taken aback.

Maybe you even think, this isn’t the person I married. And maybe they’re not.

“[P]eople grow and change over time, and this means that the relationship changes,” Power said. He shared this example: A couple starts dating when one partner is only 19 years old. This younger partner receives a big promotion—and begins traveling more and more and spending more time at the office, building their dream career. The other partner, who’s at home, misses them and becomes increasingly bored. So they start going out more. Both partners are upset at their new reality because they feel disconnected from each other, drifting further and further apart.

“The issue is they haven’t accounted for some of the individual changes they are each going through. The relationship can’t be like it used to be, because they are different people now than they were when they first met.”

Unrealistic expectation: Partners are responsible for each other’s happiness. We tend to have expectations about what we’ll “get” from our partners, Ferrari said. And when our partner doesn’t give us what we think we should be getting, resentment emerges, and starts settling in. (“Over time, resentment can evolve into contempt, which is coined ‘the sulfuric acid of love’ because it will erode a marriage.”)

Ferrari works with many, many couples who expect their partner to meet their happiness quota. For instance, they expect their partner to earn enough money to give them anything they want. “That places pressure on your partner to make you happy about something that you could be aspiring to yourself.”

Plus, it’s very different from trying to understand your spouse in a profound, meaningful, vulnerable way, and fulfill their unmet needs. This might look like giving your partner a big, long hug every time you come home because you know that physical touch helps them to feel loved. This might look like making it a point to thank them for their kind gestures, because you know that as a child, they regularly felt unappreciated. This might look like talking calmly through conflict because they grew up in a volatile home.

The above is about being considerate and getting to know your partner. It isn’t about doing something for them that they can do themselves. It isn’t about taking responsibility for satisfying their needs. It is about supporting them.

It is about helping them to heal past hurts, Ferrari said. Which can “help them greatly psychologically, particularly in terms of confidence, feeling loved, safe and secure…” And that is incredibly powerful.

Explore the expectations you have about relationships—about what healthy, connected marriages look like, about how you and your partner should behave, about what you should “get.” Then explore where these beliefs stem from—and whether they’re genuinely true. Because many of our expectations are not, and many of them can interfere with our relationship.

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The Necrosis of my SOUL

Originally posted at:  https://shamingroom.wordpress.com/2017/11/22/the-necrosis-of-my-soul/

The liberal media paint a glossy picture of pornography and masturbation. In my life time there were at least a few people who advocated the usefulness of masturbation and porn, that it helps to relieve stress and sexual frustration.

My first experience with porn was a life changer. The first time I saw a naked picture of a women, my eyes felt glued, my soul was transfixed and it felt like an electric current passed through me. I was hooked.

Since then, I have spend countless hours toiling towards exposing my self to porn. Almost all of my decisions were influenced by trying to steal an opportunity to watch.
In the process, I would look out for every opportunity to isolate myself from others, so that I can spend my personal time fantasizing, reading and watching pornography.

Maybe it was this that drew me to loneliness and Isolation. I did it because I wanted to be alone. I am not sure, but it was probably the start of my bipolar disease or episodes of depression. Because there is a price you have to pay after you watch porn and masturbate. It’s called guilt. Maybe It’s easy for others to just shirk aside such acts as normal, but that was not to be for me.

Guilt and loneliness transpired for years and years all through my teens. By the time I was in my twenties, I was actively depressed, but never knew the name for it.

Why do people some people feel guilt while others can walk about with out even feeling a tinge of it. My friend could anything he pleased, but not feel guilty about it. He was not intolerant or not an antisocial, but just not bothered about the norms that society imposed.

I tried to clean up my act, but I couldn’t. I would spend time going to church, listening eagerly to pastors and priests. It didn’t matter to me if they were orthodox or protestants, anything that would release my soul from this evil that was eating me from the inside out.

Religion did not work, so I covered my pain by medicating myself with what else I could get my hands on. Some times alcohol, sometimes pot, other times pills to put me to sleep.

Even with all of this going around me, I still managed to do well in studies and manage a profession. All of my decisions, the gadgets that I brought, the places that I chose to live were all influenced by porn. It was my mistress or master. It would rear its ugly head when things didn’t go it’s way.

The age of the internet had arrived and suddenly the flood gates of porn opened up. Everything was free. I would take a week of from porn and it would come back at me with vengeance. The guilt of that would drown me in sadness. This would be followed by drugs to drown the sadness. The cycle repeated relentlessly, forever…

It’s a miracle I am still alive and that I am writing this.

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Spurgeon Can Help Your Depression

SOURCE:   Brian Albert/The Spurgeon Center

The fact that you are reading this article indicates with a high degree of certainty that you have been depressed. If this is the case, you should be encouraged to know that you are not alone. The one we dub the “Prince of Preachers” was just that because he was also the “Prince of Pain.” When articulating his own depression, Charles Spurgeon spoke with brazen clarity:

“The worst cloud of all is deep depression of spirit.”

“The worst ill in the world is a depressed spirit.”

“Of all things in the world to be, dreaded despair is the chief.”

“Depression is . . . the shadow of death.”

“Depression is . . . my horror of great darkness.”

These were not mere pithy, little sayings doled out to be quotable. Rather, they were forged in a lifetime of brute experience. From the age of fifteen to his death in 1892, Spurgeon was never fully liberated from “Giant Despair.”

Overcoming Extreme Heaviness

In his sermon “Our Leader Through the Darkness,” Spurgeon provided his understanding of depression, which is crucial in grasping his spirituality and our own despondencies. He asked his congregation, “Do you know what exceeding heaviness means?” (“Exceeding heaviness” was a Victorian label for depression). Spurgeon took his grasp of despondency one step further by linking the malady with spirituality. Spurgeon said, “depression of spirit” is “deep” when “accompanied with the loss of the light of God’s countenance.”

Depression was not merely “dullness, inertia, pessimism, and deep unhappiness,” as many of his Victorian counterparts believed. To be depressed, according to Spurgeon, was to feel God’s presence removed from life, which led to “extreme heaviness.”

For Spurgeon, Jesus was the “nearest, dearest, closest, most intense and most enduring relationship that can be imagined.” He consistently proclaimed that the “essence of spirituality is found in Jesus.” Little wonder, then, that Spurgeon declared, “To be forsaken of God is the worst ill that the most melancholy saint ever dreams of.” He chose the same superlative to describe depression. The worst ill is “to be depressed of spirit” and “to be forsaken of God.”

The “Whys” of Life and the “Prince of Peace”

In the heat of history’s darkest day, Jesus also understood what it felt like to be forsaken by God. On the cross, the “Prince of Peace” took our sin (2 Corinthians 5:21) and became the “Prince of Pain.” Jesus broke the afternoon silence with a scream that Spurgeon called “the bottomless cry.” Jesus asked, “Why . . . me?”

The “whys” of life stump us. They are often the core question in our depression.

“Why did my baby die?”

“Why did a maniac fire into a crowd of people?”

“Why does Planned Parenthood prosper?”

“Why did I get cancer?”

“Why does my ministry languish?”

Jesus and Spurgeon take the “whys” one step further and recall Christ’s dying words, “God, why have You forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46).

When depression intrudes into our lives, we want to know why. We want to know why a particular circumstance has caused our malady. Spurgeon and Jesus both experienced depression because they believed God had forsaken them. And this, above all, was a “prelude to hell,” one that was completely “unendurable.”

Yet Jesus, our Prince, took hell for us. Spurgeon’s struggle with depression is more closely linked to Jesus’s depression than we initially conceived. Perhaps that’s why Spurgeon was called the “Prince of Preachers,” because he knew the “Prince of Pain.”