While living second-choice existences, it is possible we feel smothered, and that our lives, therefore, are likely not pleasant at all? If circumstances go as expected, then of course we are elated. But when circumstances don’t go as expected, then our lives are most probably not that great. And yes, this isn’t a pleasant state of affairs for us.
How do we counter it when we’re not feeling great?
Do we even recognize our patterns?
What are our patterns when things don’t go according to plan?
Do we even recognize that we have patterns when things don’t go according to plan?
Apart from us feeling terrible, possibly even about ourselves, and wanting to then do things to bring fun into our lives—things to make us feel better: these things, mind you, again are outside of ourselves, so this strategy merely treats the symptoms. And as said before, we are likely oblivious to our patterns and that we even do these things.
Oh, but wait. We might even search for things to keep us feeling good, just so we never get to the part where we feel bad. Either way, there is a dynamic of escaping built into our lives, just so we don’t feel the pain of when things don’t work out for us.
What are typical things we run to when we’re down and want to feel good, or things we do to avoid being quiet, to prevent the pain from setting in?
Look at the different things we do to keep us busy. Are these things serving us, or only keeping us from dealing with the source of the problem? Whenever we do things to keep us busy or to keep us from feeling pain, are we using these things as crutches because it seems easier than addressing the cause of why we’re feeling terrible or why we’re feeling pain? How many times have we said or thought the following? Oh, I could never be on my own, or, I want to have fun with my life, or, I don’t like spending quiet time on my own.
What are these activities, other than possible crutches to suppress the loneliness we feel? Were we to stop for a moment and experience what we feel, then we might stand a chance to know ourselves better and better. And in so doing, we might have the chance to see whether we run away from reality into a life of living with crutches to suppress what we’re really experiencing.
How much of this is going on in our lives? What could be the cause of this dynamic? Is it pointing to the fact that, quite possibly, we’re living second-choice existences, and the pain of doing so is so great, we run to crutches to suppress it?
But does it really help to suppress it? Is this dynamic of running for crutches symptomatic of the real cause: We’re living second-choice existences and thereby smothering ourselves—and to get away, we run to crutches?
Have you ever considered why, when we sit still for more than a moment, why it starts to become so difficult to remain still? Ever wonder why we keep ourselves busy continuously? Ever considered why we have unwanted habits we can’t shake off?
Could relying on these crutches be related to us living second-choice existences? That when we become quiet, or wish to shake off unwanted habits, it overwhelms us, and as a result, we employ crutchlike mechanisms to suppress our real feelings? And that we do this because we possibly think our life has no meaning or is just a meaningless struggle, the result of us not living our first-choice existences?
What are the chances that we employ crutches as a survival mechanism—to avoid the pain we inflict on ourselves by not addressing the dynamic of us living our lives to disprove our Factor-x and thus not living our meaning?
The question begs asking again—do the crutches help?
