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WOMEN & SELF-DESTRUCTIVE BEHAVIORSHave you ever noticed a woman friend acting self-destructively and wondered why? Or perhaps you’ve observed a similar pattern in yourself and wanted to change it? When a woman is self-destructive, she engages in a pattern of behaving or thinking that is unproductive, as opposed to making self-enhancing choices. The good news is that you can grow out of personal destructiveness through increased self-awareness and some solid work on self-improvement. A Learned Pattern There are many reasons why a woman might fall into a self-destructive pattern. Many times, it is related to not having been given permission to have her feelings as a child. Or the woman’s parents may not have validated her feelings authentically during childhood. A parent may have demanded perfection, and therefore the woman can feel that she never quite measures up. And if there was violence or abuse in the home, she may blame herself rather than believing that her parents or another perpetrator would choose to violate her. What’s Underneath the Behavior Common self-destructive behaviors include:
Meanwhile, whatever the outward experience is, two patterns are likely to be going on inside the woman. These are self-loathing and negative self-talk. Self-Loathing It’s not comfortable to feel hatred for yourself. And so the self-destructive activities mentioned above become a route for avoiding feelings of self-loathing. The self-destructiveness enables a woman to gain distance from what’s really making her feel so terrible about herself. It allows her to escape a sense of powerlessness and helplessness. For a woman with a trauma from her early life, self-loathing can come from feeling at fault for whatever happened. She may internalize the blame, and hate herself for not being able to prevent the earlier event. Such an issue could be incest or some other form of physical abuse in her childhood home. Or a woman may feel overwhelmed by a current situation, and hate herself for not being able to handle it better. Negative Self-Talk Having uncomfortable feelings, including the self-loathing, can push a woman into negative self-talk. Not knowing what to do with difficult emotions, she will say things to herself in her mind like: “I’m so stupid… look at what I just did” or “I’m such an idiot... I never learn.” The self-criticism is undeservedly harsh. And it often leads her to feeling more down and inadequate, and more undeserving and ineffective. In some cases, the negative self-talk can get so bad that the woman will become clinically depressed or even suicidal. Growing Out of Self-Destructiveness How can you move beyond self-destructiveness? Here are five basic steps: 1. Take the bad and ugly with the good. One of the first things a woman can do is realize that we all have both good and bad sides to us. Take some time to think or journal about your personal strengths and weaknesses. Notice that other people have both positive and negative aspects to them too. 2. Learn to sit with your negative feelings. One day, I was a few minutes late for an appointment. The client was so upset that she picked up the clock in the room and threw it at me. I suggested that the next time this woman got triggered, she could take a few minutes to just “be” with her anger - rather than immediately choosing to act it out. Once the clock was thrown, she had only given herself more ammunition to fuel both her self-loathing and negative self-talk. But she could have chosen to act differently. 3. Practice mindful meditation when you feel out of sorts. Sometimes we have uncomfortable feelings that we can’t quite pin down specifically. Yet they could still push us into self-destructive behavior, self-hatred and mental self-abuse. Instead, at these times, it can be helpful to check in with yourself as you sit in a relaxed manner in a chair. Breathe slowly in and out (paying attention to your internal experience, not your external world) and ask yourself: “How am I feeling?” “What’s going on with me?” See what feelings and thoughts surface. What wisdom is there? What are you trying to tell yourself? 4. Allow yourself to “get out there” and take risks. There’s a saying that goes: “Don’t be afraid to do something. Remember that the common people built Noah’s ark, and professionals built the Titanic.” The only way we grow in life is to let new experiences come into our lives. Learn more about who you are by jumping into life and doing new things. To grow, you’ll need to take chances and permit yourself to make some mistakes. 5. Get professional help if you want or need it. Though it is safe to feel our feelings, some women prefer to get more in touch with themselves with the help of a therapist. A professional can teach you how to connect and experience your feelings during your sessions, so that you can later do this for yourself. A Common Problem Self-destructiveness does not affect just one type of woman. In my practice, I see it very often among my clients. The woman may be gay and have difficulty dealing with the hard time society is giving her for this gender preference. She may be a homemaker who feels inadequate because of not doing more. Or she could be a professional woman who is facing a setback in her career and is therefore getting down on herself. The woman may be struggling with leftover issues from her childhood, in addition to one of these other concerns. Yet though mindful attention, a woman can grow into healthier patterns. The work starts with working on self-acceptance, seeing your beauty as well as your warts. Then the lessons revolve around learning to accept your feelings. Next is developing skills to deal with feelings and situations in new ways. With time, you can leave much of your self-destructiveness behind. You can move forward in life, knowing that you can now support yourself in positive ways. © 2003 ANGER MANAGEMENT TECHNIQUES, P.O. Box 4144, Gaithersburg, MD 20885 (301) 963-2473
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Anger Control Through Anger Management Therapy |
