Affirmations
Some parts of me have nothing but bad things to say. I am weak. I am incompetent. Life sucks and I’ll never change it. These parts are reflecting the worldview of a trapped child who has no escape. They are justified in their thinking/feeling and they need to express their hopelessness in their journal writing, in session with their therapist, and with trusted, compassionate friends.
Other parts of me were either created to balance the hopeless parts, or they have grown up and have a wider view of the world. They see that I’m competent, that I’m not trapped, that I am changing my life circumstances, one step at a time.
Stuck in the Painful Past
Sometimes these parts are at war with each other. Especially when a hopeless part is up front, the rest of me has difficulty finding the way through a web of steel-plated cobwebs that serve to keep me stuck. It’s like we’re permanently ensconced in the painful past that gave us no options for happiness or a healthy life.
We’re in the Present
Only we’re not in the past. We’re in the present, presumably not in actual danger, with plenty of evidence that we’re so much more than our hopeless ones believe.
Affirmations
When I was in the psychiatric hospital thirty years ago (good Lord, was it that long ago?!), they taught us how to write affirmations. I give the staff credit because we were not a DID ward, nor did I know I had DID, but they knew that some of our voices would have trouble embracing our good, our strength, our perseverance.
Dialogue Between Hopeless & Hopeful
So they told us to fold our paper in two. On one side, we were asked to write our negative self-talk. On the other side, we were encouraged to respond with affirmation. It might look like this:
I am weak and can barely get through another day. I am strong and have survived the unsurvivable.
I am small and don’t deserve to live. My heart is large with bravery and compassion.
You can see how this becomes a dialogue between our hopeless parts and our adult parts who have a more realistic picture of who we are. Our hopeless parts need a voice, but so do our adults who can help to parent and console the hopeless ones. We are not one or the other but both/and: both small and large, hopeless and hopeful, weak and strong, and everything in between.
Affirming Others
In our writing-in-place workshop last week, we wrote affirmations about the people in our workshop, without naming names, but lifting up the positive qualities of others on our zoom screens. It was amazing how easily we could affirm others but how hard it was to affirm ourselves. Another way to practice self-affirmation is to begin by affirming others. As we articulate the positive we see in our friends, it gives us words to claim some of the very same qualities in ourselves.
Whether you think/feel it right now or whether you’re “faking it till you make it,” you are good, you are competent, you are worthy, you are brave, you ARE making it, you WILL get there someday. Embrace it. Embody it. Enjoy it.
Self-Care
Every day, write an affirmation of someone else. See how easy that is? Now, substitute your own name for the name of the person you affirmed. Read it aloud. How does it feel? Could it be true? Ask your insiders who believes your affirmation. Thank them for affirming you. Let them teach the others that your affirmation is true.
When you affirm yourself, you are not being disloyal to your hopeless ones. You are not minimizing your abuse. You are building a bridge for all of your parts to walk over — eventually — into the goodness and grace that is you.
August Date Change!
Social Hangout will be moved from August 17th to the 24th due to a change in JJ’s schedule. We had a lot of fun last month. Join us this month 😀!
Also, please use the main, traditional zoom link for writing-in-place workshops on August 9th and 23rd. We apologize for the confusion as we navigate our growing relationship with Zoom!
Remember …
Social Hangout is August 24th!
Anthology Submissions!
DW is receiving submissions for the 2023 Anthology from DW subscribers. Please send your submission, along with the completed Submission Form and signed Permission to Publish to Gabby, no later than September 16, 2022. For more information about the anthology submissions, contact Gabby.
DW Subscriptions
DW moved to a subscription-based group at the beginning of June. We invited you to use June, July, and August to submit your subscription for $10 monthly, $100 annually, or full scholarship (no questions asked). As we enter August, we want to remind you that anyone who has not subscribed by the end of this month will be removed from the workshop and activity email list (not the newsletter). If you haven’t subscribed yet but are still attending workshops, go to our Dissociative Writers website and sign up now!
Group Easy Community Platform
DW has decided to move to a community platform called Group Easy that offers us a secure way to email one another, post calendar events, store organizational documents, upload and download writing submissions, and more. Sometime in the month of August, subscribers will receive an email invitation you to join Group Easy. We encourage you to take advantage of the invitation. We will offer brief tutorials at the end of each workshop to help people become comfortable with Group Easy. We hope all subscribers will sign on sometime in the month of August or September. By October, we will transition fully to Group Easy and give it a two month trial. At the end of November, we will decide if Group Easy is serving our needs or if we wish to terminate our use of their platform. We want to assure everyone that we will offer as much support, including personal tutorials if needed, to help people become comfortable with this new community opportunity!
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I affirm with my mind that I have the power to heal myself.
My mind chooses the thoughts that create my future moment by moment.
~ Louise L. Hay
Lyn