In which I am a negative bubble-bursting crank
[Note: "You" is general. I don't mean you personally. There is no one person who set this off, and the person who comes the closest is my 19-year-old self who almost got involved in a certain glorified pyramid scheme, since I was reminded of that recently, and my last-year self who could have easily wrecked my chosen career before it got off the ground because of the Epic Fail. Also, a couple of items could be ED/self-harm triggers, maybe possibly, so warning just in case.]
Point the first: You will NOT, repeat NOT, "do anything" to achieve your goals. And if you actually will, you are a sociopath and I want nothing to do with you. That's about as ridiculous as the wide-eyed cute submissive girl who goes to her very first kinky shindig and insists that she has no limits.
You HAVE limits. Everyone does. You owe it to everyone, especially to yourself, to be HONEST about what those limits are. For example, I'm assuming that you're not willing to murder your way to the top. I'm also hoping that you don't believe that crack dealing, armed robbery, or embezzlement are excellent paths to wealth. :)
Point the second: Likewise, there probably isn't one consistent thing you want more than anything in the world. If you genuinely want something more than anything in the world, on a consistent basis, you can probably have it. But, well, let's say you want to lose weight "more than anything in the world" - you're not going to chop a limb off to do it, are you? I hope not! I'm guessing you want your arms and legs more, actually.
Point the third: You know that item on the Evil Overlord list, about having a five-year-old child of normal intelligence as a trusted advisor, and not proceeding with any plans if you cannot overcome the child's objections to the plans? Speaking as the parent of a perhaps slightly brighter than average five year old child, this is actually a damn good idea.
And yet there is so much advice out there to ignore all negative feedback, and to kick "negative people" out of your life. Even when those "negative people" are pointing out very clear flaws in your plans. Flaws like:
- Dude, that's illegal. Seriously, you could go to JAIL for that.
- You do realize you've only scheduled yourself for five hours of sleep a night, right?
- You end up in serious physical pain after walking two miles. How exactly is walking five miles a day, every day, going to work?
- Actually, NOT everyone wants to buy what you're selling. Or can afford to. Why are you budgeting for everyone to say yes?
- You don't know how to make widgets. If you make your own and do it wrong, you're going to have exploding widgets everywhere. EXPLODING WIDGETS, I say!
- You might want to do the math on all that extra overtime or that second job, if it's going to kick you into another tax bracket or push you over the income limit for something and thus just cost you more money.
- Are you sure your spouse is OK with watching the kids every night/maxing out the credit card/changing the family vacation plan from NYC to Nowhereville or vice-versa/moving to another country? Hadn't you better ASK first?
Point the fourth: Everything in the previous point goes double for using "negative thought stopping" on yourself. Yes, when what you're dealing with is recognizable Depressed Logic ("I'm the piece of shit the world revolves around!") or over the top internal criticism, stopping THOSE thoughts - or if you can cope with this (which sometimes I can't) mocking them the hell out of existence - is fine.
But the "negative thoughts" that someone who is encouraging you to "be less negative" is complaining about might just be the thought "THIS PERSON IS A SCAMMER" - and might just be absolutely correct. Or they might just be a very important reality check, that even if something is not an actual scam, it's also not the right path for you to go down just because it was the Best Thing Ever for someone else. Or they might be a clear signal that "hey, this isn't working and I need to stop and re-evaluate."
Sort of like how pain is not necessarily a sign of weakness, nor is enduring it a moral victory - it's a signal that something is up that you might want to look into. Especially if it's NOT the same old pain from the same old thing that's bothered you for years. If it's bothered you for years, you know how to live around it, and just how far you can push and where the "you will REGRET this!" point is. And "negative thoughts" are a bit like that. If it's the same old self-defeating crap, that's one thing. If it's something new - pay attention now, or risk paying a very unwanted price later.
Point the first: You will NOT, repeat NOT, "do anything" to achieve your goals. And if you actually will, you are a sociopath and I want nothing to do with you. That's about as ridiculous as the wide-eyed cute submissive girl who goes to her very first kinky shindig and insists that she has no limits.
You HAVE limits. Everyone does. You owe it to everyone, especially to yourself, to be HONEST about what those limits are. For example, I'm assuming that you're not willing to murder your way to the top. I'm also hoping that you don't believe that crack dealing, armed robbery, or embezzlement are excellent paths to wealth. :)
Point the second: Likewise, there probably isn't one consistent thing you want more than anything in the world. If you genuinely want something more than anything in the world, on a consistent basis, you can probably have it. But, well, let's say you want to lose weight "more than anything in the world" - you're not going to chop a limb off to do it, are you? I hope not! I'm guessing you want your arms and legs more, actually.
Point the third: You know that item on the Evil Overlord list, about having a five-year-old child of normal intelligence as a trusted advisor, and not proceeding with any plans if you cannot overcome the child's objections to the plans? Speaking as the parent of a perhaps slightly brighter than average five year old child, this is actually a damn good idea.
And yet there is so much advice out there to ignore all negative feedback, and to kick "negative people" out of your life. Even when those "negative people" are pointing out very clear flaws in your plans. Flaws like:
- Dude, that's illegal. Seriously, you could go to JAIL for that.
- You do realize you've only scheduled yourself for five hours of sleep a night, right?
- You end up in serious physical pain after walking two miles. How exactly is walking five miles a day, every day, going to work?
- Actually, NOT everyone wants to buy what you're selling. Or can afford to. Why are you budgeting for everyone to say yes?
- You don't know how to make widgets. If you make your own and do it wrong, you're going to have exploding widgets everywhere. EXPLODING WIDGETS, I say!
- You might want to do the math on all that extra overtime or that second job, if it's going to kick you into another tax bracket or push you over the income limit for something and thus just cost you more money.
- Are you sure your spouse is OK with watching the kids every night/maxing out the credit card/changing the family vacation plan from NYC to Nowhereville or vice-versa/moving to another country? Hadn't you better ASK first?
Point the fourth: Everything in the previous point goes double for using "negative thought stopping" on yourself. Yes, when what you're dealing with is recognizable Depressed Logic ("I'm the piece of shit the world revolves around!") or over the top internal criticism, stopping THOSE thoughts - or if you can cope with this (which sometimes I can't) mocking them the hell out of existence - is fine.
But the "negative thoughts" that someone who is encouraging you to "be less negative" is complaining about might just be the thought "THIS PERSON IS A SCAMMER" - and might just be absolutely correct. Or they might just be a very important reality check, that even if something is not an actual scam, it's also not the right path for you to go down just because it was the Best Thing Ever for someone else. Or they might be a clear signal that "hey, this isn't working and I need to stop and re-evaluate."
Sort of like how pain is not necessarily a sign of weakness, nor is enduring it a moral victory - it's a signal that something is up that you might want to look into. Especially if it's NOT the same old pain from the same old thing that's bothered you for years. If it's bothered you for years, you know how to live around it, and just how far you can push and where the "you will REGRET this!" point is. And "negative thoughts" are a bit like that. If it's the same old self-defeating crap, that's one thing. If it's something new - pay attention now, or risk paying a very unwanted price later.