Today I discovered at least one of the major sources of my impatience. There is a force in me that wants to avoid negative situations – physically, emotionally – and is constantly on the lookout for when they might occur. He doesn’t care much about my fancies, or imagination or any of that crap. He just thinks “ok, what’s the next task I need to do in order to avoid humiliation, or physical discomfort, or disappointment…?” and he goes to great lengths, trying to boss me around to get me to do these things. He likes when I have very low self-esteem, because then I don’t get funny, dangerous ideas in my head that might put me in a bad state.

So I took a stand against this rather negative mean guy, and basically argued that

1. I didn’t have to abuse myself in order to look out for my well-being,
2. In looking out for my well-being, I could just listen for signals that said “Hey, I’m hungry” or “oh, I’m getting cold” or “I’m feeling uncomfortable”, etc. and just respond to them rather than adopt a plan of some kind to fend off the hunger or discomfort from ever occurring (like: “3 meals a day at precise times, gotta make those portions right! Oh and 8 glasses of water. That’s what experts recommend… gotta do it…”)
3. If not abusing myself caused those previously repressed parts of me to overwhelm me, and cause me to do crazy things, I would allow this guy to abuse me again. He got excited at this, but I told him I have no intention of ever letting him abuse me. He got the point. Basically, I feel as though if I stop abusing myself I can hear those inner feelings better, and thus respond to them, and know why they might act in unhealthy ways, if they in fact do.

This whole thing strangely resembled the conversation Harry Potter has with Lucius Malfoy at the end of Book 2, when Dobby earns his freedom. This may just be my overactive symbolic imagination, but I feel like there’s a reason why stories resonate with people, and I’m experiencing those reasons in my own little ways. And everyone with little disgruntled negative people inside them can do the same, too! Hurray!