#this isnt judgy its in fact the opposite

[sndwave]

the overlap of leather and wood work stands at anime cons and ren faires is (un)surprisingly high

[kendrixtermina]

The „passions“ as specific experiences

I hadn’t put these on tumblr & it occurred to me that I probably should

After consuming a lot of books, videos, first-hand accounts etc, I’ve come to the conclusions that the „passions“ are in fact rather specific combinations of thoughts & emotions than in theory anyone could experience, but which the types for whom it’s the main issue experience quite powerfully & get chased about the landscape by.

Perhaps it’s better let’s use the term „lower emotional habits“ to get away from judgy religion sin talk. nowadays a lot of therapists like to use labels like "counterproductive" or "unhelpful" to avoid ppl internalizing anything in a judgy way.

Now I love a good cardinal vices gimmick & we could have a nice long interesting talk about how the trope has been taken up in Japanese media & there interacting with the cultural background of buddhism, but I think in this case Ichazo’s desire to fit his list of observed „chief features“ (which he derives from simply sorting ppl by what annoys them the most; it will surprise no one to learn that he was an 8...) trying to fit it into the gimmick created a bit of confusion potential like you always gotta explain that „oh, its meant in the old english or latin sense of the term“.

Plus my inner pedantic art critic is a bit salty that they didn’t think to use Despair (the 8th deadly sin in orthodox christianity) for the 6 to complete the set of slightly confusing terms.

So I’m thinking, let’s get some specificity in here & try to compile what it actually, concretely is based on experience reports, just for specificity’s sake & to perhaps help ppl with their self-observation.

1 – frustration with things not being how they should or could be. Some are actually pretty conscious about how this motivates them to work hard & always do better, but it can also turn to stress & resentment or being aggrieved that reality isnt utopic

2 – that hit of gratification when someone says „Wow, I couldn’t have done it without you.“ Not that unlike with the 3, this isn’t just about good regard in general, but about having special significance to particular ppl. being tempted by the idea of being "indispensable"

3 – ppl report rather strong gratification when they’re admired/ praised, but also that they can be too focussed on what they „should“ be feeling/performing in such a situation that little attention is left over for their actual feelings or preferences.

4 – negative comparison. But not just or not necessarily of the self with others, but also general ‚if only…‘ scenarios, wishing things had gone differently, lamenting past losses, imagining better alternate scenarios, or even just against ones own idea of how one should be.

5 – the kneejerk refusal. That sometimes quite hostile ‚eugh, no!‘ kinda feeling when you’re suddenly talked at, asked to participate in something or even contemplating a task that you „have“ to do. Sometimes there’s a spike of dread, like ‚oh no what will I have to do now?!‘ or ‚It‘s too much, I can’t.‘

6 – that thing where as soon as you get settled on an idea, or encounter the slightest sugestion of another possibility, you immediately go ‚...but what if I‘m mistaken??‘ or ‚...what if it all goes wrong?‘ and the building anxious charge that sometimes comes with it.

7 – It’s a thought pattern where you just *must* have or do this one additional thing & feel like if you did have it then you’d finally be happy – but often you may just start craving the next thing. The LaHue guy has a very evocative video on this where he describes it as almost like the world curving and all paths twisting towards whatever Must Be Had. Implicit here is some anxious assumption that if you didnt get it that would be really bad.

8 – A tendency to amp up the intensity when encountering obstacles or opposition to one’s pursuit of pleasure and goals, be it interpersonal conflict or just „conquerring“ the stains on the floor. The difference to the 7 thing is that the 7 would be content if the nice things just fell in their mouth whereas for the 8 there’s some ‚thrill of the chase‘, anxiety or anger or even pain gets registered as positive excitement, so it has almost a little bit of a self-destructive component. What is being craved is not just gratification, but a sense of triumphing over obstacles.

9 – this is one of the harder ones to grasp, cause it’s less ‚active‘ in a sense. It’s when you’re thinking of doing something for your own development, like going after a goal, stating an opinion, drawing attention etc. and at the first serious obstacle you’re like, ‚ah, screw it, it‘s not really worth it’. Not worth the effort or the ruffled feathers or the discomfort in thinking about it, or whatever it is.

Yeah it’s not being lazy and it’s not „avoiding instrospection“ either – though it might be avoiding thinking about particular things that are to do with your goals, impulses and wishes and have discomfort associated.

What I find really interesting is how some types are built around chasing highs whereas others are rather structured around reacting to something unpleasant.

Note also that for the impulse types its a response to an obstacle to your will, for the feeling types its to do with self-evaluation, and for the mental types there’s a quality of tension to it, of fearing a bad consequence.

Like, for example, the 9 one - Of the common analogies inertia is probably the best, like a little rock rolling back into the valley if it wasnt pushed with enough force to overcome the hill.

The 1 will just stubbornly keep rolling gravity be damned and will argue that the stupid hill shouldn’t be there, the 8 will push the rock extra hard on the second attempt and send it flying…. Seeing the structure yet? Its really cool… even if it a map of what’s ruining our lives.

You can derive the triadic characteristics from this, 9 gives up but also tries to be ok with its current situation, 8 goes boom! But pursues what it wants…

Or with the heart types – 2 is chasing a feeling of positive self-evaluation (& trying to get it from others), 3 is proactively assuming a particular way of being evaluated that works for the situation, 4 is reacting to a negative self-evaluaton.

My latest attempt to get control of my life consists of mentally labelling the voice that says „No, no, I dont wanna, fuck you“ as my Inner Goblin and as the one that’s like „I can’t! I can’t! It’s too much!“ as the Inner Victorian Maiden in an attempt to maybe take them less seriously or remind myself inerrogate the soundness of their claims. They’re very persuasive sometimes tho, it can feel like a survival threat, this is all pretty deep-rooted automatic shit.

If it was wholly illusory, it would be too easy – sometimes I really don’t wanna or really can’t, so the trick is in distinguishing rather than kneejerk defaulting.

Same goes for the others, probably – enjoying being praised, for example, isn’t always bad. If you got it fairly & didn’t twist yourself into no painful contortions to get it, why shouldn’t you enjoy it?

So there’s the complicatedness.

[violentviolette]

I think I've been acting like my abuser how do I know if I'm right or being self hatey

start with just neutrally/objectively listing out ur behavior and actions, then work backwards. why did u do that action? was the reason internal (how u feel) or external (a direct response to someone else's actions)? were ur actions reasonable or unreasonable?

then check each of ur responses against its opposite argument to check for bias. be ur own devil's advocate essentially. so if u decide ur response was reasonable, why? how? what were the objective facts that made it so? if u double texted them were the texts only 2 or 5 mins apart therefore not giving them enough time to answer before u got upset, or were the texts 20mins apart and even then are there any other possible reasons they might be slow to answer like they're at work or eating dinner or left their phone in the other room?

for ex. someone says something upsetting to u and u get mad at them and yell at them. is this disordered?

first step, was ur reaction disproportionate to the situation? did they call u an asshole and u said fuck u or did they say something that maybe could have been judgy and so u told them they're dragging u down and ruining ur mental health by being so mean to u all the time?

is there a better way u could have communicated ur feelings? were u unnecessarily harsh or cruel? was ur goal to talk to them about ur feelings and be heard or was it to make them feel shitty cause u feel shitty?

hopefully that makes sense, this isnt everything but it's the basics of what I do when I'm trying to check my behavior and make sure I'm on track