Fear and dependency are also linked to control. (Which by the way, Schaef stresses throughout this book, that control is only an “illusion.”) When we are fearful, we are at our greatest need to control. The same for when we are dependent on someone or something outside our selves we cannot give up trying to control.
The dualism that set off light bulbs in my head were the ones around self-centeredness. The times when I have felt I didn’t exist, my being wasn’t being acknowledged I was at my most self-centered. “Everything happens to ME. Everything is directed for or against ME. At the same time, we feel as if we don’t exist, that we are not real.” Being the center of the universe is a coping mechanism from way back.
Also with self-centeredness is self-negation. “It is not possible to give up our self-centeredness unless we also stop ignoring ourselves, and we cannot stop ignoring ourselves unless we stop perceiving ourselves as the center of the universe, around which everything else revolves and by which everything else is defined.”
Another self-centered trait I related to was guilt. “Guilt in and of itself is a remarkably self-centered activity.” Why else would I be guilty of everything if I didn’t believe the world was here for me and me alone!
One of the biggest vulnerabilities (shortcoming, character defect, stumbling block) for me is feeling shame for just about anything and everything. Hearing that it is related to being self-centered gives me an entirely different understanding about it. “When we are ashamed , it is because we believe that many other people and events are dependent on us or related to us, and we have somehow let them down.” Now what is that if it isn’t self-centered?
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