Ever experienced this?

Hi everyone,

I have, since I was a child felt bad as the light were lowered in a room and it was all cosy and mabye there was candle-light. Like when you are at a party with your parents or whatever. I still feel like this a lot, I get really uncomfortable and full of anxiety, my heart starts beating fast and I feel sad on the inside.
A psyciatrice I had once thought mabye I felt like that because I felt like I dissapeared, like no one somehow would take notice of me or see if something happened to me. A bit like a nightmare.
I can buy that but I would just want to know if anyone of you had ever experienced it. I have never heard of it before.

I don't understand.

What don´t you understand?

I understand what you said but I do not know anybody who has thought in the same way.


As we grow up our brain is moulded. Something in your childhood must have given this fear to you. I do not think that it is important to know exactly what incidents in your childhood have caused this fear but I think you should start realising how irrational the fear possibly is.


Next time, do not just accept the fear - Challenge it. Think around it and think past it. I mean, will anything bad actually happen when the lights are dimmed/lowered? With that thought in mind perhaps it will be a less anxious moment for you in the future.

Chucky wrote:I understand what you said but I do not know anybody who has thought in the same way.


As we grow up our brain is moulded. Something in your childhood must have given this fear to you. I do not think that it is important to know exactly what incidents in your childhood have caused this fear but I think you should start realising how irrational the fear possibly is.


Next time, do not just accept the fear - Challenge it. Think around it and think past it. I mean, will anything bad actually happen when the lights are dimmed/lowered? With that thought in mind perhaps it will be a less anxious moment for you in the future.

You are right and I know that is how I am supposed to think but it is difficult because it is not like I actually think something bad is going to happen. It is just a feeling of distress and unease. Feelings are hard to make dissapear...

Feelings are hard to make disappear because of the way that the brain operates. When we do something (or feel something) repeatedly it will become permanent in the brain. A part of the brain will actually grow to accomodate this and then it becomes impulse.


So, it's great that you know that there won't actually be a bad thing that will result from the lights lowering. But it is up to you to challenge the electrical-nerve-impulse that travels through your brain when the lights are lowered. You have to 'think' your way out of this one.


Next time it occurs you can try by first dismissing the fear in your head as irrational, and then focussing on something else such as your friends.