I used to write this section in our monthly Inspired Minds newsletter, but we figured it would be easier to read online, and all our blog subscribers would enjoy reading it too. At least I hope you do Read November’s Inspired Minds newsletter here.

Mark

Can you unlearn helplessness

Fear that you can’t do something when, in fact, you can, or feeling as helpless as when you were helpless, even now that you are not helpless, is a major and common part of the overall pattern of depression. But this kind of learned helplessness isn’t just common to people who fail to adapt and update to new people or circumstances. Psychologist Martin Seligman, who coined the term ‘learned helplessness’ back in the early 1970s, found that a previous experience of true helplessness could cause many types of animals, including rats and dogs, to carry that helplessness into new situation in which they are not really helpless. (2) When treating clients whose problems appear to be associated with learned helplessness rather than real limitation, I might tell the story of a bird locked up in a cage for a long time. One day the cage door is accidentally left open, but the bird is so conditioned by its captivity that it doesn’t understand it can fly out – not at first anyway…

This new session learned helplessness is aimed at helping people ‘fly free’ of their own learned helplessness. Actually, self pity can be a manifestation of learned helplessness. The self-pitier may have become so accustomed to feeling sorry for themselves that they don’t know when (or how) to stop. And have you noticed how some people seem to have all the advantages but still give in to self pity over their lot, while others never succumb to it no matter what?

The limits to feeling sorry for yourself

Our culture often seems to encourage self pity but, while we all need to understand sometimes that we’ve been ‘in life’s firing line’ and it’s not our fault, we also need to be able to cast aside this rather unattractive (and ultimately unhelpful) attitude, which is why we have produced stop self pity. After all, as Helen Keller, who had some real excuse for self pity, said: “Self-pity is our worst enemy and if we yield to it, we can never do anything wise in this world.”

No ‘can’ts’ and no feeling sorry for yourself here – it’s Super Mom!

Some people don’t even have time for self pity. It’s often said that women are better at multi-tasking than men. A woman can talk and watch TV at the same time and find the pepper pot while cooking a meal and composing an opera, but when a man is watching TV he is just watching TV - end of!

Gross generalizations aside, even if women are gifted by the number of focuses (foci?)  they can juggle at one time, still the enormity of all the different roles can be hard to manage – work colleague, mom, daughter, wife, cook, and so on, ad infinitum. The new super mom session addresses the need to take time out to deeply rest and to feel re-charged and inspired to manage different tasks as a mother with more confidence.

Mark’s Tip for the Top

Anything that will help me play better snooker (and beat my son!) is going to be a winner for me. So this month I’m opting for Super snooker because not only is it a great game to play, but the state of mind you can experience when you’re playing is a fantastic pleasure in itself.