In life, we can be confronted with a variety of inner situations that just feel bad to be in, and which can be difficult to find a way out of. I call these “ailments”, because when we’re feeling this way it’s like we’re sick – debilitated, run down, not at our best. Of the ailments listed below, some of them have links that will take you to the page for that ailment. The ailment’s page contains links to resources that can help you to understand what is occurring in each case and what you can do to help yourself heal in that area.
Anger – A condition wherein we can feel unbridled, sometimes directionless explosive feelings, associated with something being wrong, objectionable, or unwelcome. Can often go suppressed, or be subdued through constant effort to avoid what would otherwise make one angry, which may lead to a serious, rather than light-hearted, attitude.
Anxiety – The feeling of apprehension that comes while moving forward, often felt with regards to certain unwanted outcomes in a given situation. Feels as though you are not at ease with the flow of life. Connected to impatience.
Denial – The condition wherein one deliberately thinks of something as true, despite evidence to the contrary existing within one’s mind or feelings. Evidence is deliberately ignored for the sake of preserving held beliefs. The primary cause of choosing to deny seems to be for the sake of positive consequences of holding the chosen beliefs, specifically positive, desired feelings.
Fear – The feeling of resistance that comes when a certain direction in life looks dangerous.
Idleness – A preference for inaction or inactivity, often marked by sluggish or slow-moving feelings. When one tries to act, it can feel like a struggle. Seems to be sustained by a constant drain on energy, such as harbored feelings of dissatisfaction.
Impatience – A feeling or irritation or anger that comes when there are obstacles in the way of accomplishing something that one wants to accomplish, or in the way of getting to a situation that one wants to get to.
Insecurity – A sense of imbalance that comes with not feeling confident in one’s self or one’s actions. Insecurity is also associated with pressure and an instinctual need to defend one’s self, such as from other people’s perceptions of you.
Negativity – The general feeling of seeing nothing or very little good or worthwhile in a given situation that is nevertheless there. Often seems difficult to get out of, because the reasons for negativity are easily justified.
Obligation – The sense that one must make certain types of choices, such that other choices or deviations from that are bad or wrong to make. It is usually accompanied by a sense of guilt, shame, or fear at the very thought of doing differently. Sometimes it can seem like one is powerless to act any differently, or it can become so ingrained that it is merely seen as “the way things are”.
Powerlessness – A feeling of not being able to do anything where one wants to do something. Feeling as though one is unable to come up with a good way of responding to a situation. All choices one can come up with at such a time seem like they aren’t good necessarily good ones.
Shame – A sense of being lesser than, or bad, wrong, objectionable in some way. Characterized by a sense of lowliness or guilt that can be tempting to try and escape from desperately, or to fix through elaborate changes in behavior.
Self-deceit (redirects to denial for now – basically the same thing) – Telling ourselves lies, often because of the positive feelings we get when we think those lies are true. Self-deceit can often be found when we deny facts, are traumatized by the truth of a situation and look for a way out of it being true, or when we respond very negatively towards criticism.
Self-Mistrust – An attitude towards one’s actions and capacity to make decisions that is distrustful, usually based off of past evidence of mistakes and in general a lack of progress towards goals that one thinks are important or are anticipating with impatience.
Stress – The normal, everyday sensation of a lack of peace. Similar to strife and anxiety.
Tension – A sensation of restraint or restriction. Can vary widely in intensity. Can manifest physically as well as on emotional or pre-physical levels.
Worrying – Largely a state of sustained anxiety towards the future or present, particularly with regard to perceived vulnerabilities.
Desire – An extension of fear, desire is the feeling of wishing to flee from a situation and into a different, desired situation. Can cause ourselves to behave disrespectfully and abusively towards others, as well as cause impatience, anger, and prolonged emotional pain. If followed, can cause us to destroy ourselves.
Emotional Pain – The feeling that some situation you’re in is “not OK”. Can go anywhere from minor annoyance to full-on agony.
Envy – Thoughts of desire or longing directed towards what can be perceived in life situations outside your own. Can spawn from negativity towards what’s in one’s own life, as well as a lack of honesty about the accuracy of one’s own perceptions. Can often involve unrealistic hopes.
Egotism – The thought pattern that involves thinking that you are in some way better than somebody else. Can be severely damaging to relationships with other people, and can justify many kinds of harmful behaviors.
Fakeness – Disconnection from our emotional stream due to not knowing how to deal with those emotions and purposefully shoving them aside. Seems to be the product of denial of emotions and “stuffing feelings”
Self-doubt – The sinking feeling that our choices aren’t based on the truth. Often comes with a lack of confidence.
Self-abuse – Mistreating ourselves, often due to judgement and dislike of certain qualities or behaviors we see ourselves exhibiting.
Self-hatred – Also known as self-loathing, or self-dislike, it is when we severely dislike certain things about ourselves that we can see.
Dissatisfaction – General cynicism, malcontentment, and dissatisfaction with life, often accompanied by blaming, annoyance, paranoia, pride, and expending a lot of effort to avoid certain things.
Panic – The extreme feeling of needing to stop yourself from heading down a course whose destination you seem to be swiftly traveling towards. It is like putting the breaks on life, where life is a train heading towards what looks like a cliff. Often accompanied by moments of apprehensive calm, interspersed with extreme panic when the situation you’re trying to stop resumes.
Overwhelm – The feeling of having too much coming at you at once, or too much on your plate. Often feels like the situation at hand is more than you can handle, and can be accompanied by confusion and panic when a way to handle it does not appear.
Indecision – How it feels when we’re trying to make a decision but seem to get stuck in the process of making that decision, and do not act. Often made stressful by Impatience.