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Based on another thread, I really started thinking about how I used to view relationships and how I view them now. Rather than dive in and kill that thread, I figured a seperate thread would be best.

1) I used to believe all relationships were a form of warfare. I used to quote Sun-Tzu and all the cliche garbage when discussing them. In college, I was a guru who offered great advice to a number of people who had great success. Me? I was lonely all the time.

Now, I am extremely uncomfortable around women who find me attractive, or at the least, interesting. If I make them laugh, I relax a bit but once the performance ends, I'm very uncomfortable and need to make an exit.


2) My original beliefs about people, specifically, women, were based on fear. Fear of just about everything from abandonment to fear of being seen for what I percieved myself to be. My negative self-image overwhelmed me. Therefore, all relationships were warfare.

Now, I'm at the point where I recognize that individuals act on their own accord and not by some carnivorous hostility. And while I don't see women as hostile by nature, I'm finding my reactions and beliefs are still not quite balanced and healthy.

3) My attituide towards women, in general, was not healthy and still isn't to this day. I was hoping writing this out would somehow help me sort through it, but I'm finding that it is more complex than I originally thought. I cannot spend the rest of my life living as if I'm in a bunker and constantly defending my emotions, etc. Ever try to pet a dog that wants to bite you? I know how that dog feels. Now I need to sort through the hows and whys and fix it.

4) I can speculate on a number of various reasons for these attituides and fears, but I'm starting to find out that there's just more and more the deeper I go. Here's a short list I can come up with about now. I'm uncomfortable with "blaming" somebody but I will say that my reactions were wrong/unhealthy.

My mom's kinda twin sister sexually abused me.
my mom played a lot of head games with me.
mom almost drowned me.
mom never defended me from my drunken dad.
I defended her from him. Was never acknowledged by her.
My inability to socialize in a healthy way was most often reflected by repeated failures with women.
My withdrawl from all human contact further alienated me and created animosity from me towards them.

I'm trying to detach myself and be methodical about this. There is no war, nobody is coming after me and nobody will destroy me if I fall for them. My reactions are to blame for my own lonliness and those reactions come from unhealthy attituides.

Wow. You've really put a lot of thought and effort into this. That's awesome.

I know that I didn't understand about healthy relationships for a LONG time. Even today I can still fall back to old patterns. I wanted power and security and guarantees that NOTHING bad would EVER happen again. I wasn't willing to really trust. I wasn't wiling to be open and honest. I wasn't even really willing to commit. Let's face it, if they're going to lie to me and cheat on me and hurt me, why should I put anything into it? They should just love me absolutely. THEN maybe I'll give them a chance.

But those same old patterns were actually self-fulfilling prophecies. If I'm looking for abandonment and disrespect and hostility and abuse I WILL see it - whether it's there or not. When I look at the people in my life through the lens that my mother "gave" me, it's impossible to believe in anyone. Sooner or later, the people in my life did respond to my mistrust and paranoia and clinging and defensiveness, and I was usually "proved" right. I got what I gave.

I'm doing it differently today, and the results are wonderful. I can still fall into the old patterns, but I can see them for what they are now. When I can see what I'm doing like that, it becomes easier and easier to bring it back under control. It can be scary as hell to let the walls of my fortress down...But its really no more scary than facing my life alone inside the walls.

It looks like you are really doing some work on this. That's good stuff. We built those walls a long time ago with help from those who hurt us, and it's going to take time to chip them away. But you're doing it.

I agree with Minx, wow! It's nice to see you opening up on the board, Terrabus.

Just a thought...

I've studied a bit of The Art of War myself. I like it a lot; I find it useful in everyday situations where there is no war. But Sun-Tzu was a Taoist. Do you study that as well? Have you looked into the methodology behind the words?

He said "One hundred ounces of silver spent on intelligence can save one thousand spent on war" and "If ignorant both of your enemy and yourself, you are certain to be in peril" as well as "All warfare is based on deception". From a Taoism perspective, I take this and much of his writing to mean that preventing the war is far more profitable than creating one in more than simply monetary ways. I see that you are learning this within yourself, great work so far. What I'm wondering is...can you not use what you know about tactics and strategy to defeat this 'new' enemy, the emotional issues? The methods Sun-Tzu writes about are sound, but recognizing the enemy is key.

One last quote from Sun-Tzu:

"You have to believe in yourself"

Very profound words in his teachings.......IF viewed from the healthy perspective, IMHO.

I'm digging through this as best I can. I'm not sure which direction is first. There is some confusion.

I don't spend much time with Asian philosophies much anymore. I don't look at myself in those terms because I cannot alienate myself from myself again. Instead, I work on accepting myself in totality and then go from there. It's a tough road but important. This is killing me.

I have chipped away a bit more and found a few more layers and some attituides I have held.

1. I would never join a club that would have a guy like me as one of its members. Any woman that finds me attractive is, by default, sub-standard herself and not worthy. Or, she is simply pretending to be attracted to me so she can take something from me or use me.

This negative thinking is extremely self-centered. I cannot think of anything more self-centered than this. The assumptions of another's motivations are also hugely twisted.

I can't even begin to see the remedy for this.

2. Sex attracts me to women. Women hurt me. Therefore, sex is wrong. And I am wrong for wanting sex because a) I'm not worthy and b) it would set me up for future pain and misery.

This makes sense to me, but there's something else, too. I can't really put my finger on it. If anybody else can help me work through this, I would appreciate it.

3. Dehumanization. I was convinced I wasn't human for a long time. As I realized I was human, certain parts never seemed to fall in line. I can't figure this one out. Perhaps it is alienation from myself? The dehumanization is really the base layer here, but where to go from there is confusing to me.

I remember when I made this "discovery". I told my therapist and I was really excited about it. I think I scared the poor guy because it sort of let him know I was sicker than he might have thought. When I told a friend (a female, oddly enough) she said, "good, now maybe you'll give yourself a break."

I'm not going to write this off with a flipant statement. Instead, I'll just say that eventually, I hope to find a rational solution.