Scratch. That. Sh*tty. Record.

You are not making a “choice” to talk to yourself like your bullies and abusers talked to you. 

You are responding to conditioning. 

You are running a pattern— a pattern so familiar that it feels “right.” 

Hell, you’re running a pattern so familiar that you’re probably not even aware it’s a pattern. It’s just “the way things are.” 

A lot of trauma symptomatology is like that. 

We do these things because we were programmed to, and we do them very effectively because we have a lifetime of practice at it— not realizing that we’re actually being unkind and unfair to ourselves. 

Then, when some dork of a therapist like myself comes along and tells you it doesn’t have to be like that, you’re skeptical as hell— because in your nervous system, there’s just no other way for it to be. 

After all, what would a day without shredding yourself for the smallest mistake realistically look like? 

What would a day without fantasizing about suicide look like? 

What would a day without denying and disowning feelings and “parts” of ourselves we feel shame about actually look like? 

We don’t know. Our nervous system never really considered the possibility. 

Or, maybe our nervous system DID consider the possibility— but we decided we didn’t “deserve” a day without kicking the sh*t out of ourselves. 

Or we decided that if we failed to kick the sh*t out of ourselves today, then we’d somehow be punished for it— that life would come along and kick the sh*t out of us anyway, so we may as well do it to ourselves first. 

Because then we’d be in “control” of our own ass kicking, right? Right? 

Or something. 

Changing that pattern starts with understanding we’re not making a “choice,” and we don’t need to feel shame about it. 

No one reading this woke up this morning and just decided to talk to themselves like their bullies and abusers talked to them. 

What actually happened was, we woke up this morning, and our patterns of self-talk and mental focus were what they were, what they have been for decades— and we did what every human does, we went along with our conditioning. 

That’s how conditioning works. 

Interrupting that old conditioning means scratching the record— and I’ll spoil the suspense, that’s uncomfortable as hell. 

Every human struggles to change patterns that have been deeply conditioned and heavily reinforced in their history. Just ask any smoker. 

The good news is, patterns can be interrupted and records can be scratched— if we’re willing to pay the price, that is. 

The price of interrupting these particular patterns is called “trauma recovery.” And it’s a hassle. 

It’s often inconvenient and uncomfortable and counterintuitive, and we often end up hiring a professional to help us do it if we can. 

But you don’t have to roll with your old conditioning indefinitely. 

People have been radically changing their patterns and lives ever since ancient times. 

You are not the exception to the fact that realistic change is possible. 

You did not choose your trauma conditioning— but you can choose to scratch the f*ck out of that sh*tty record, minute by minute, choice by choice. 

Breath by intentional breath. 

Breathe. Blink. Focus.