“Man's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions.” Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
I experienced this in a big time way when I started counseling. The more I learned about how I functioned that I could control how I felt, behaved, and thought, the less I was able to go back to how I was. After integrating I was very concerned about splitting again since I know how powerful that is for a survival skill. The last 4 months has really put me through my paces and I continue to find that my mind is staying integrated. This quote put in straight terms what I am starting to realize. Now that I have learned new ideas from counseling, I can never go back. Not only that, I don't want to go back. Living integrated is hard but it is also very rewarding. I watch myself use more control over myself than I have ever experienced. I no longer feel like people can make me do things. I make choices, sometime to please someone else, but I don't HAVE to make those choices. I feel that the major change in how I feel about myself now compared to before integration is now I feel like I have choices. Switching happened and usually without my knowing why. For a while before integration, I started to control the switches but that was usually an exercise in futility. Now I can be happy, sad, angry, frustrated, excited, curious, and a whole lot of other things that simply weren't always available before. I am continuing to learn and as I learn my mind is being reshaped hopefully to a healthier self. Good, bad, or indifferent counseling has changed my thinking forever.
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