kaberett | Things I've learned from counselling #6

I have a parrot named Virginia.

She's invisible and she sits on my left shoulder, and she nips my ear when I start heading down unhealthy paths.

If I were less rubbish at...: nip. If I weren't so useless...: peck. I'll never be good enough...: full-on biting.

Virginia was also the name of the first counsellor I went to voluntarily, and for all her faults (and oh boy, did she have them): she gave me a parrot.

Virginia-the-parrot isn't just negative reinforcement, of course, but she reminds me that I don't have to frame things negatively.

In 2010, I didn't know how to frame desires and wants positively. It was all "if I were less crap at ... then ..."; the fantasy of being thin, applied to all my perfectionist-child self-hatred. When Virginia-the-counsellor suggested that I try framing things positively instead, and stopped me halfway through every sentence to rephrase, I mostly ended up staring blankly at her for thirty seconds at a time, trying to work out how on earth I was supposed to say something self-hating in a self-compassionate way.

And that's roughly when I learned that, actually, my life tends to go rather better - and I tend to be rather better - if I don't frame my goals in terms of current negative self-perception. It works rather better if I can say "Okay, I'd like [X good thing] to happen, and to do that I need to take [concrete actions Y and Z]" - even if [y] and [z] are tiny - than if I set up the goal as impossible from the get-go because of my perceived negative qualities.

Virginia-the-parrot's been quiet, lately, but every now and then I get an approving tug on my hair.

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pteranodon

Fuck, you are so fucking awesome <3

kaberett

♥

tim

Have I mentioned that most of these "things I've learned" posts make me wonder what you're doing in my head, but also contain insights I haven't reached yet myself? Because... yeah. (That's positive, in case it's not clear :-)

One of the things I meant to put in this post, but got distracted from including, is the bit where: pretty much the best compliment, ever, is when people tell me they've had a "what would kaberett do?" or "what would kaberett say?" moment. So: I recognise this is... more like a first cousin of that, but: thank you, thank you, thank you. :-)

Well, if I can actually *remember* to apply the contents of this post and a few others you've written, then I'll have a "what would kaberett say?" moment and I'll be better for it. But that's on me :-)