F*ck Feelings Page 3

  Becoming a More Positive Person

  Negative feelings, particularly anger, self-pity, and envy, are painful to feel and also to hold back, since unleashing them makes you a jerk who’s a drag to be around. It’s like having to hold in a full bladder all the time, except it’s your mouth, and if you let it go, it could release things so hurtful, mean, and unjustified that you’d prefer having a wet crotch.

  So when it comes to becoming more positive and less negative, many people would like to cleanse themselves of negative feelings, remove the temptation to act like a dick, and ease the strain of constant self-monitoring and self-restraint that often makes them tense and cranky and causes them to be dickish despite themselves.

  Unfortunately, many things that promise relief from negative feelings aren’t good for you and won’t really make you a better person, even if they make you feel better. You can be justified in attacking someone, physically or verbally, but the satisfaction it brings is limited; it often leaves you with a bad feeling in the long run and gets you more involved with someone you’d like to stay away from.

  You might also try to become more positive by withdrawing from whatever causes you to feel negative, but that’s not so hot if it requires you to shed responsibilities, abandon people who need you, or dull down your personality. You may wind up with a serene smile but you may also have betrayed your own standards of behavior.

  That’s why your primary goal is not to get rid of negative feelings and feel better, but to block them from controlling your behavior while you continue to act like a decent person.

  Don’t stigmatize negative feelings; even pacifists, yogis, and nursery school teachers get road rage under the wrong circumstances (e.g., in downtown Boston). Some people have bad tempers or are chronically grouchy while others are stuck in situations that happen to hit their weak spots and drive them nuts. Either way, if you chastise yourself for having nasty feelings when you really can’t help it, you usually make them worse. After kicking yourself, you’re that much more likely to kick someone else.

  Besides, your nasty, demonic side may be part of the spark that makes you creative, funny, and energetic. While that side may not be easy to control or live with, you can try to use that negative energy in good ways. Becoming more positive doesn’t mean becoming sweetly angelic, but rather, decently demonic, or at least decent enough that your friends don’t all tell you to go back to hell.

  Here are signs that your nasty side is taking over:

  • Instead of driving with your hands at ten and two, you’ve always got one middle finger at twelve

  • The glass isn’t half-empty or half-full, it’s just a toilet

  • You think the “stand your ground” laws were invented just for you

  • You often use the phrase “I’m just being honest,” then say something that just makes you sound like an asshole

  Among the wishes people express when they want to improve themselves by reducing bad feelings are:

  • To stop hating someone (spouse, child) who doesn’t deserve it

  • To be less angry and more kind in general

  • To stop pining for what’s lost and get over it

  • To stop being controlled by fear

  Here are three examples:

  My father-in-law is not the worst person in the world, but I can’t get over the feeling that I hate to be in the same room with him, and I have to, because my family lives with him right now. We could never afford to live in a nice house otherwise, and it’s great for our kids, but in the meantime, he sits in the living room every night, watching his TV, bossing his wife around, spouting his hateful political rhetoric, and insulting me at every opportunity, and I want to kill him. Complaining to my wife doesn’t do any good because it just makes her feel helpless, and then she defends her dad’s behavior and I feel worse. I wish he were dead. My goal, if you don’t know a hit man, is to stop hating him.

  It’s been two years, and I haven’t been able to get over my divorce. My ex was an asshole who betrayed me terribly and I know I’m better off without him, but for whatever reason, it still hurts. I really loved him for a while there, and I still can’t get over the memories or stop tearing up when I think about him. The kids, who are teens now, are doing better than I am and ask me when I’m going to start dating again, but I can’t imagine a time when I’ll ever be interested. My goal is to get over loving him and feel better.

  I wish I wasn’t so insecure. I’m always shy and I get very nervous before networking events, which are a requirement for my work, and my least favorite part of a job I otherwise love. I shake and break out in hives. My brother has always been more confident, but I can’t really blame my parents, because they’ve always encouraged me. It’s my own fault. I thought it would go away as I got older, but I’m thirty, and it’s just as bad as ever, particularly when I get promoted and have to meet new people even more. My goal is to be less nervous and instead have some confidence in myself.

  If people could control the way they feel, then persistent negative feelings would be a legitimate sign of failure and a target for self-improvement. Also, nobody would cheat on their spouses, enjoy scary movies, or eat their weight in frosting, but that’s neither here nor there.

  Since negative feelings are just a fact of neurology and genetics, it’s what you do with them that counts. The people in these examples are more successful than they think, because success here is not measured by whether they feel better, more loving, less angry, etc. It’s measured by all the good things they are doing and have done in spite of the negative feelings they can’t get out of their heads.

  There’s probably a positive, evolutionary reason for having negative feelings you can’t get rid of; they may warn you of danger, give an extra bite of sadness to your songs or poetry, or help you stay attached to your tribe. Whatever advantage they provide, it may have been more helpful in a jungle than in the big city, but either way, if it helps the species survive, it tends to persist, regardless of how much pain it causes you as an individual.

  Assuming you’re going to have to live with negative feelings, develop standards for behaving well in spite of them. No, you shouldn’t expect yourself to force smiles so much that they break your face and scare children. You should, however, invite feedback about your behavior from those you trust, so you can be confident that your actions and words don’t hurt people or interfere with your positive strategic goals and, most important, make you act like an asshole.

  If you’re self-critical about your negative feelings, you may be tempted to live with people who dislike you as much as you dislike yourself. Naturally, this could set off a vicious cycle that brings out your worst behavior and justifies continuous self-punishment. Instead, seek people who aren’t much bothered by your negativity and who appreciate your positive side. You may be frustrated by their lack of understanding and attention to your supposed worthlessness, but the results will be better for everyone in the long run.

  Whether you are forced to live with hate, yearning, envy, or fear, respect what you do with your feelings, not what they do to you. Don’t let them distract you from your usual goals of avoiding unnecessary conflict at home, making a living, and being a good friend.

  The more you remember your goals and respect your restraint, the less power your negative feelings will have to shape your actions and reduce your self-respect. You can’t control your negativity, but you can keep it from controlling you.

  Quick Diagnosis

  Here’s what you wish for and can’t have:

  • An improved heart free of hate, envy, fear, and general ugliness

  • A way of managing relationships that will prevent or resolve bad feelings

  • A way to love the ugly feelings right out of yourself

  Here’s what you can aim for and actually achieve:

  • Build standards that are not distorted or compromised by negative feelings

  • Act decently in spite of the way you really feel
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  • Respect the way you act decently when you feel malicious, bravely when you’re frightened, determined when you’re tired, etc.

  • Bear the pain of living with ugly feelings rather than attacking yourself for having them or attacking others to escape them

  Here’s how you can do it:

  • Get to know your inner asshole so as to reduce the likelihood it becomes outer

  • Every time it gets control, emerge with new lessons about your standards and the triggers that get you to lose control

  • Avoid those triggers as best you can, even if it means a longer drive to work that avoids the freeway

  • Find accepting friends and an accepting coach

  Your Script

  Here’s what to tell someone or yourself when you have ugly, nasty thoughts and feelings.

  Dear [Me/Family Member/Guy Who Cut Me Off],

  I can’t deny that I have [angry/envious/completely vicious] feelings for [you/my child/my fuckhead boss], but I have other feelings as well, and my feelings don’t matter as much as doing the [work/taxes/college application/right thing] without [insert act of rage], and this I can do. I have doubts about my ability to use [yoga/psychoanalysis/watching Too Cute] to achieve more positive feelings, and I am not sure I would like to give up my list of hated [relatives/celebrities/salsas at Chipotle] or be more blissed out and less wrought up than I am. Let me know if you think I have acted badly. Otherwise, I believe my current method of managing my feelings is best for me.

  Did You Know . . . That Trying Too Hard to Control Nasty Feelings Can Make You Even More Nasty?

  Negative feelings, like the Mafia or LinkedIn, only increase their nagging pull the more you try to break free. If you try to eradicate them entirely by punishing yourself, doing penance through good deeds, and influencing others to do the same, you might think you’re on the path to salvation and that good is winning over evil.

  The problem is that, to those who are truly obsessed with eradicating evil, it’s infuriating to meet people who won’t join the cause. You wind up filled with so much of that same ol’ familiar hatred that you want to tell them in a most strained, cheerful-yet-pissed, singsongy, scoldy manner that you would love to stab their faces with the foot of a bar stool.

  So beware the excessively virtuous, who never raise their voices except in anger at bad people, whose oversized smiles give you the creeps and show too many teeth, and who use the same, overly cheerful, sugary-sweet tone to speak to adults and children. Helping others is the only thing it’s okay for them to talk about, and they’re ready to help everyone, especially the unappreciative, disgusting idiots who never appreciate their efforts, never heed their advice, and irritate them so much, they have to act even sweeter. So if they offer you help or advice, be a smart idiot and politely decline before running for your life.

  Stop Fucking Up

  There are few things as frustrating as feeling too disorganized, unmotivated, and/or unfocused to accomplish even the smallest task. You can blame a noisy work environment, the wrong colored pen, or the need to watch TV in a timely, spoiler-free manner as the source of your distraction for only so long until you start blaming yourself.

  Procrastination, avoidance, and disorganization cause delays and failures that provoke shame, criticism, and even legal issues. If you’re at the point where you’re amazed you finished reading two whole paragraphs before watching Game of Thrones, then this section is for you.

  Some people with these problems may act as if they don’t care, or take pleasure in creating expectations they can’t meet and then lying about them, but in reality, they usually care deeply but have become accustomed to cover-ups, apologies, and endless self-defense. They often hate themselves and declare themselves secret self-enemy number one, knowing they’re at fault even when they always seem good at blaming others.

  The brighter and more capable they are, the more certain they are that their bad behaviors represent bad choices and a failure to accept and discharge responsibility, and that they could do better if they were better motivated, more reliable, and more honest. Often, their parents, teachers, and supervisors agree that accepting responsibility for their failures seems like the necessary first step toward recovery.

  While accepting that you have a problem is in fact the universal first step, accepting responsibility for having it is not. Brain wiring can cause well-motivated, smart people to procrastinate and drop the ball, and nature gives them no choice. The fact that you’re not responsible for having a problem, however, never relieves you of responsibility for working with it and finding ways around it, and often requires you to overcome deeply ingrained bad habits and attitudes. It’s impossible to change your instincts or make distractedness, impulsivity, and scattered thinking go away; you can, however, become a good manager of the impulses to procrastinate, avoid, lie, and cover up.

  Then again, most “faulty” brain wiring, like that which makes tracking and finishing tasks difficult, is probably helpful in terms of Darwinian survival in situations that don’t involve sitting in cubicles or writing term papers. Having a mind that shifts attention quickly or persistently stays off topic may actually help in chaotic situations where you need to spot someone sneaking up on you. It also seems to empower salesmen; in fact, it’s hard to find a salesman without ADD. Distractibility is not so hot, however, when you’re staring at a monitor, or really anywhere but in sales, the jungle, politics, the jungle, etc.

  So don’t hold yourself responsible for irresponsibility when it comes to being a slacker, assuming you don’t really want to be one. Push aside the shame, assess yourself objectively, and learn what’s necessary for good management. You can’t change your brain, but with the right tricks, extra time, and determination, you can get stuff done, no matter what’s on TV.

  Here’s how you can tell you’re not to blame for your brain:

  • There are several “to do” lists in your pockets, more than one of which includes “organize ‘to do’ lists”

  • You’re better at saying “I’m sorry” than a Canadian, and do it more often

  • A lost schedule probably wouldn’t matter, as it was with the “to do” lists

  • The only way to get you to a meeting on time is to tell you it’s an hour earlier than it really is, and then you need to be walked there with horse blinders on

  Among the wishes people express about improving their disorganization and dysfunction are:

  • To be more responsible

  • To stop forgetting appointments

  • To stop avoiding work

  • To appease someone who wants them to stop avoiding work

  • To figure out how to face the pile of shit on their desk before the boss sees it and shits on them

  Here are some examples:

  I don’t know why I’ve always been a fuckup, but I’m pretty sure the boss is going to fire me, even though he’s my dad. I underachieved in high school, even when teachers went out of their way to encourage me and offer extra help. Now I’m working for my dad and I don’t want people to think I’m there just because I’m his son, but they’re right, because I never get tasks done. I hate screwing up and apologizing so much that sometimes I can’t bring myself to come to work in the morning, which just makes things worse. My goal is to grow up and make better choices.

  I hate to admit it—in fact, I never admit it—but I’m a liar and can’t stop myself. I started lying about my homework when I was little, even though I always got caught, but I just couldn’t control it, even after I was punished and publicly humiliated. In college I told my parents I was doing fine when I’d stopped going to classes, and it would have saved them a fortune in tuition if I’d just told them the truth and dropped out instead of waiting to get called out on my bullshit and kicked out of school. Now I’m living at home and I sometimes look for work, but I have no hope for the future. My goal is to be an honest person I wouldn’t despise.

  I have no excuse for how little I’ve do
ne with my life. Everything I’ve tried, I’m interested in for a year or two and then I stop being interested and, before long, find something newer and shinier that I’m sure I’ll want to make a better career out of. That, of course, lasts for a short while before something even newer and shinier appears to lure me away from my last job, and the cycle repeats itself. I should be motivated to follow through on one career path because I need the money and I’m not getting any younger, but when an idea gets into my head, there’s no room for logic, perspective, or anything else. My goal is to settle on one career path, any path, before I’m so old I should retire.

  If you had a problem with, say, constant barfing, you wouldn’t settle for feeling like a loser while resigning yourself to a life spent within ten feet of a toilet or in reach of a paper bag; you’d see a specialist, quit gluten if you had to, or at least become a master of puke jokes. That’s why the first job as a chronic fuckup is to put aside shame and blame and find out if part of the trouble is a weakness in your mental equipment.

  Most people avoid this step because it’s painful to know that something about you doesn’t work right, but doing so will save energy you’re wasting on self-blame and apology and will give you ideas about better things to do than kicking yourself.

  Incidentally, the line between bad mental equipment and bad behavior is often blurred by the fact that bad mental equipment usually causes people to behave badly. This is either because they’re innately more angry and impulsive than they can manage, or because they become bitter about their inability to stop themselves from fucking up, which ups the anger factor even more. So the fact that some fuckups act like Assholes (see Chapter 9) doesn’t necessarily mean they’ve made worse choices than the better-behaved fuckups, or that they have more control over their choices. It just means they struggle more and their behavior may be even harder for them to change or control.