While it is no one’s fault to suffer from conditions like alcoholism PTSD or depression, it remains true that unhelpful trains of thought play a role in perpetuating them. Let’s take alcoholism as an example. It is common for someone with alcohol use disorder to think to themselves, “I’m a damaged person and my life is never going to get better.” This thought leads to other unhelpful ones such as “in that case I’m entitled to drink to get some relief” or “nobody really cares about me so I might as well drink” or even “my life stinks and I’m no good for anyone so I might as well drink myself to death.” Notice how each of these highly problematic and self-negating thoughts justifies more drinking. Drinking is the very coping mechanism that harms the alcoholic emotionally, socially, vocationally, and physiologically. What if instead, the person suffering from alcoholism told himself something like, “I was traumatized often as a child and for that reason I have always struggled as an adult. My life has been really hard, but all that alcohol has made it ever worse. Maybe I don’t deserve to suffer my whole life and it’s time I gave myself a chance to feel better without alcohol.” This is a self-compassionate alternative thought that is much more realistic than seeing oneself as forever damaged and doomed by childhood traumas that could actually be healed in therapy. Thoughts reflect who we are and make us who we are. It is always possible to create a new more helpful set of thoughts about oneself and one’s predicament. For example, instead of thinking “I deserve to drink this bottle,” he could think, “every drink I take is a damaging blow to my health that keeps me feeling out-of-control and ashamed. What if I started to walk every day and drink water? That way I could start to fix my health instead of destroying it like I have done in the past.” He could take a piece of paper and pen to write down the names of others, even just one person, who demonstrated care for him. He could so the same with even one person he helped in his life. This exercise would demonstrate the falsity of his global assumption that absolutely no one ever cared about him and that he’s never done one good thing for another human being. More accurate thinking could lift his spirits just enough to open a crack of light in his perception of his utter worthlessness.
