CONTROL

Someone asked recently about this blog and what I have written here, if I practice what I preach. It's a good question, so I thought I'd answer it here. Everything I have written, do I incorporate it into every aspect of my daily life? No. Has it helped me? Yes.

Knowledge is power, but the full extent of that power isn't unleashed until you've experienced it. I'm an introvert and I spend a lot of time thinking to myself. Needless to say I have spent a good proportion of my life thinking about the stuff that's going into this blog right now. But thinking about this stuff doesn't take you very far. So far, everything I have included is fairly fundamental. Simply knowing it will not dramatically change your life, but it is important to lay down the foundations before you start laying the bricks, otherwise somewhere down the line your house will collapse. I've known all this stuff for a long time, but for those who don't I included it here so that they can build a solid base of which they can work on. That's what this knowledge has given me. Now I just need to play with this knowledge to devise an analytical plan before acting on it. I'm not acting on this stuff in any serious analytical way as of yet, otherwise I wouldn't have wrote about it so generically, but I will get there. So yes, I do believe in this stuff and it has positive effects for me, but I am yet to delve in to the real power it holds. Have patience.

Anyways, I have some more generic stuff on another important topic.

Control, you'll find, is often synonymous with anxiety disorders. If you fear the outside world, you try to control it. The more effort you put into doing this the more energy you are wasting on an impossible task. I'll tell you now, there's only one thing you have control over and that's your self.

You can log into a message forum for social anxiety and you'll be bombarded with topics of people frustrated with the way others react to them and treat them because of their SA. That's cool, we all get frustrated, but 99% of the time these people are directing the blame towards someone else. This is something we have all done at some point and will continue to do so in varying degrees. Now, I'm not going to be soft here, but you can shout all you want and the world around you will never change, if someone reacts negatively towards you because of your SA, then take responsibility for it. You could spend days, weeks, months, or years talking to that person, helping them to understand your SA, but as soon as your done you will bump into someone else with the same attitude. That's the way the world is, always has been and always will. Not everyone is understanding, and many will take advantage of you, but no amount of complaining will make any difference. If you continue to hold this attitude, then you will continue to have SA. Why? Because you're relying on external forces to change so that you can be more comfortable with the world. Unfortunately, that's not the way it works, it's the other way round. You're holding an idealist perspective that is not even possible, nevermind will happen. It's a dog eat dog world. In order to get the most out of it, you must salvage the responsibility for your participation within it.

Okay, you could make certain efforts to control your environment, and they may make you more comfortable temporarily, but if this is your approach you will never address the real problem, because the whole time you're doing this you're avoiding it. Not only that, but the control you've dictated over your environment is an illusion. It's not real. You've manipulated certain aspects around your life to fit into your own needs, but you don't actually have control over them. One day they will turn around and bite you on the arse. What happens then? All of this security you have built up is imagined, and rather than building up a really solid foundation of security, what you have done is given away all of the power you hold to deal with the elements that will turn on you. I've always liked this quote, by who I don't know:

'Security is mostly superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding Danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.'

How true is that, 'security is mostly superstition'?. I don't care who you are, I'm sure you can agree that whatever walls we place in our defence we will always face danger. It's inevitable. You can express some amount of creative force to avoid danger, but essentially it is a part of life that we must confront. It will always be, and none of our efforts will change that. If you're looking for stability, then find it within yourself. The external forces will always be unpredictable, they will always be uncontrollable, and you will find yourself repeatedly bumping into them. Take responsibility for your own actions and not those of others. If you can do that, you will begin to sail freely.