Acting Crazy?: The Sanity in Seeing Our Insanity

When working with people in therapy there comes a time for a number of insightful clients when they have an epiphany.  The epiphany I’m talking about is when they see how their own behavior is having a direct impact on their life. They realize that all this time while they have been blaming others for their misfortune, they have been overlooking the one factor that they actually can do something about- themselves.

It’s one of the most amazing things to watch when a person starts to get a real glimpse into their own crazy thoughts and actions.  Sometimes it takes weeks for someone to notice, for others it will happen the first time you reframe their story.  Whether you are on the fast track of insight or taking a more relaxed pace one thing is common among both groups: the feeling of despair when they start seeing their own craziness.

 

It can be terrifying to take a look at our own dysfunctional behavior. A fear of being somehow flawed keeps us in a state of denial that we have nothing to do with the havoc in our life.

 

There are a few things that have helped me from getting discouraged when taking my own inventory. If they help, use them. If they don’t help, don’t use them. If you don’t agree with a suggestion, or don’t understand the practical application, don’t do it.  Don’t ever do anything unless it makes sense to you.

 

Here are a few things that could help when you notice yourself acting in a dysfunctional manner.

 

The behavior has nothing to do with who you are.  When we notice that we have a behavior that is not helping us often times we can become very hard on ourselves. “I am so judgmental (lazy, mean, stupid, etc.). Bad Tara (or whatever name you call yourself), you should know better”. This is a common script we all play from time to time and if we are not careful we’ll begin to believe it.

 

The behavior you are not so fond of and are now having the privilege of seeing has noting to do with you. If that behavior disappears from your life would you disappear? No. Did you come into existence with that behavior? No.

 

The behavior is just an old pattern that you have been using for the time being.  The behavior has nothing to do with who you really are. You are not the behavior.

 

This does not mean that we are not responsible for our behavior.  Certain behaviors have certain repercussions.  It’s kind of like wearing a dirty shirt. The dirty shirt is not you. You can wear the dirty shirt or take it off.  If you keep the dirty shirt on and stink you may not get a lot of hugs but the shirt is in no way you.

 

 

The reason you are seeing your insanity is because you are coming out of it.  When we are fully submerged in something it is impossible to take a good look at it.  Think about living on earth. You have, most likely, lived on earth your whole life. You might feel as if you have a pretty good understanding of your habitat.

 

However, as familiar as you may be with the earth you would not be able to get a full complete view of earth unless you were viewing it from the outside, such as the view from a space shuttle. The same is true when we start to see our craziness.

 

If you are seeing your crazy behavior it means that you are starting to come out of it. We can only see our craziness when we step outside of it and take a look.

 

Many people when they see their crazy patterns become frightened and deny the behavior or justify it. “I would not be doing_____________ if they weren’t doing ____________________.” Denial causes people to go right back into the crazy.

 

Don’t be afraid of seeing your crazy, it means you are actually sane enough at that moment to recognize it.

 

Seeing your own dysfunctional behavior gives you an opportunity to heal and stop going through the same patterns.  “It’s enough to notice” was something that was taught to me by my mentor.  When I was first told this, “It’s enough to notice”, I was convinced that there had to be a second half.

 

This was not one of those lessons that I understood right away, but over time I have started to appreciate it’s simple wisdom. The lesson didn’t fully register until I was able to see it in action in my own life.

 

Back a little while ago I went through a time when I was afraid of not getting married. My boyfriend and I had gone through our fair share of ups and downs but were finally in a place in our relationship that was great. We were both happy everyday.

 

 

I was watching a number of my friends and family getting married and thought, why not us? When I broached the subject of marriage with him he looked confused.  I had never really been interested in getting married. As a little girl I did not dream of my wedding day like most little girls, so to hear me ask about marriage was something that came out of the blue.  He didn’t say “no” but rather encouraged me to think about why it was all of the sudden so important to me.

 

So I when off on an exploration to find where my desire to get married was actually rooted.

 

In phase one of this search I was very concerned with being “right” or looking good. I kept coming up with answers like, “I love you and that’s why I want to get married”.  Now, there is one thing I know about love. This one thing has played out over and over again and I have not yet been able to disprove it.  This fact is: LOVE NEEDS NOTHING.

 

Love is whole and complete on its own. Love does not need to be noticed or appreciated. Love lacks nothing so to say that I want to get married because I love you is not completely true. If fact, it would be completely false.

 

One other thing I know that helped me on this quest was that behavior is rooted in one of two places: LOVE or FEAR.  If my desire to get married was not coming from love it had to be coming from fear. This is when I started that second part of my journey.

 

Seeing what we are afraid of is very challenging. Seeing our fears is hard; it can makes us look not so hot.  We might start to notice our insecurities, or how judgmental we can be.  We may start to notice our true motivations.

 

If something is not rooted in love you can be sure it is coming from fear. If my motivation for marriage was not coming from love than I knew it was coming from fear.  The question I had to start asking was: what am I afraid of?

 

As I started to uncover my own fears about not getting married and challenging them, they disappeared and with it my desire to get married.

 

Are you in a pattern of dysfunctional behavior?

 

-Am I judging my partner for not doing something good enough?

-Am I giving to them with the expectation of getting something in return? (I’ll watch the kids, if you give me sex. I’ll go to work as long as you see me as the hero when I get back home.  I’ll make dinner as long as you thank me.)

-Am I hanging on to resentment?

 

Whether you have an expectation for your partner or are in the middle of judging them, ask yourself if it is giving you the type of relationship you really want.  Start to note how your behavior may be affecting the relationship.