An Exercise For Forgiveness

[sage]

Brrr...it's SO COLD in the northeast right now! -7 degrees this morning.

Positives from yesterday...

1. h was very enthusiastic to see me when he got back from study group last night...very affectionate, etc.

2. h sat on the couch with me instead of sitting in the recliner. A VERY big deal as it gives us a chance to snuggle. He made sure to tell me how much he loved doing that AND asked me to remind him to sit with me!

3. h is getting his first set of grades tonight (law school). I'm meeting him after school and we've been joking that we'll either need to go to some divey bar for tons of drinks (bad grades) or a nice bar for tons of drinks (good grades). He told me last night that NOTHING would impact our date night. That he was SO looking forward to spending a night out with me!

I'm reading a really interesting book called "Learned Optimism" by Martin Seligman. It's about how people react to setbacks and negative situations and is focused on how to break pessimistic thought processes.

He says that there are three crucial elements to how we react to bad things happening: permanence (whether we believe that bad things happening to us are permanent), pervasiveness (whether we think that bad things happening in one area of our lives implies that all aspects of our lives are bad) and personalization (whether we view the causes of bad things happening as internal to us or external).

Interestingly enough, I scored well on the permanence and pervasiveness parts...I apparently don't view bad things as eternal (more than the average person) and I don't let bad things happening in one area pervade the rest of my life.

When I reflect on this...I'd say this is true about me.

Probably not a shock to ANYONE who reads my threads but I scored rather poorly on the personalization aspect. Apparently I tend to feel largely responsible for the bad things that occur...

When I was doing the forgiveness exercise over the weekend and I identified one of my grievances towards my mother as her "self-centeredness" I had to apply that attribute to myself, too. I think that my self-centeredness manifests itself differently than my mother's ... she thinks the world revolves around her (or should) but is unwilling to take responsibility for actions and results (sweeping statement...bear with me)...I think the world revolves around me in the negative sense...that the things I do or don't do cause bad things to happen...different driving thoughts but similar outcomes.

I remember h saying to me "you think everything is about you".

I guess it's partly about feeling responsible and partly about CONTROL...if I'm the root cause then I can fix everything right? Been there, tried to do that!

So...I'm just sort of babbling...the book is interesting...not sure it goes further than that!

The weekend looks GOOD! GO PATS!

Sage