“In Al-Anon we learn how to conquer our own self-defeating attitudes.” (ODAT, 11 April)
What are my main self-defeating attitudes?
Materialism: the belief that the material is the ground of
existence.
Victimhood: treating others as responsible for my welfare or
lack thereof.
Self-infantilisation: treating myself as powerless over
people, places, and things, lacking in agency, helpless.
Self-pity: feeling sorry for myself because I haven’t got my
own way.
Self-dramatisation: calling frustration ‘grief’, others
leaving me as ‘abandonment’, others’ unwillingness to listen to me as their ‘taking
away my voice’, others’ decision not to interact with me as ‘ghosting’, others’
disagreement with me as ‘gaslighting’.
Doom-mongering: project negative courses and outcomes.
Atheism: disbelief in the existence of God or a refusal to
trust in the power and providence of God.
What are the antidotes?
Spirituality: the belief in the supremacy of the
non-material over the material.
Responsibility: taking full responsibility for my beliefs,
thoughts, actions, feelings, and life.
Growing up: recognising my power and its proper bounds in
all areas and then exercising it.
Gratitude: fostering and expressing gratitude for everything
that is good.
Factuality and sobriety: state the facts without spin or
exaggeration.
Optimism: recognising that everything is good or works to
the good.
Faith: recognising the existence of God and trusting God’s
ability to guide and empower me always.