REWRITE THE SCRIPT this Valentines Day

Rewrite the Script

“There is no such thing as good writing, only good rewriting”.

Robert Graves.

In Paul Murray’s novel Skippy Dies, Howard, the main character has an existential crisis. “‘It’s just not how I expected my life would be,’” he says. When his friend asks what he expected, Howard reflects, ‘I suppose—this sounds stupid, but I suppose I thought there’d be more of a narrative arc.’”

This story, and this line, in particular, struck a nerve with me when I first read it. I too had come to think of my life as a story, and in 2020 it began to feel like I was living through a romance novel. In lockdown that year I reconnected with an old schoolmate of mine. We hit it off right off the bat, and what began as reminiscing about our childhoods quickly blossomed into romance. But just as I began to think I knew where the story was going, full of hope and renewed passion, our nine months together came to an abrupt halt when he was diagnosed with cancer and died only a few short weeks later. He passed away on Valentine's Day. Needless to say, this was far from the narrative arch I had imagined for us.

But what I have come to discover in the last year since his untimely death, is that although the facts of someone’s life, presented end to end, don’t much resemble a narrative to the outside observer, the way people choose to tell the stories of their lives, to others and crucially to themselves, almost always does have a narrative arc. In telling the story of how you became who you are, and of who you are on your way to becoming, the story itself becomes a part of who you are. And so it has with me. I have come to know so much more about myself and him through this, albeit very brief, narrative.

Life rarely follows the logical progression that most good stories do, where the clues come together, the doctor speeds in and saves a life with only moments to spare, and the climax comes in the third act where the two are wonderfully reunited. So it would seem incongruent to frame life’s chaos in a narrative manner until you remember where stories came from in the first place. Ultimately, the only material we’ve ever had to make stories out of is our own imagination, and life itself.

In essence, storytelling, whether it be fictional or nonfictional, realistic or embellished, is a way of making sense of the world around us.?

How we make sense of the world around us can be dramatically influenced by two role-players in our life. They are our commentators, our co-narrators, in the exercise of telling our story. One voice is critical, the other affirming. One might think of them as they are often depicted; an angel and devil, each sitting on your shoulder. However, in keeping with Greek Myth which arguably has had the greatest influence on our modern comprehension of storytelling, I have dubbed the first voice Criticus, and the second Advocus, to pay homage. I have also given them these persona’s as a way to externalize them and help you and me to determine the amount of control they exercise over our lives. For one thing, externalizing the self-accusing voice makes it easier to make the critical voices ego-dystonic, something that you eventually can reject as “not me”. T

Criticus’ Origin Story

The critic is born during those early years of engaging with others. Throughout childhood, your parents or caregivers teach you “right from wrong”,? distinguishing the difference through either inviting or forbidding gestures, or both. By design, these gestures are meant to frighten and reject or comfort and approve. The impact of those gestures will proportionally have an impact on how we view life since consciously or unconsciously, we see our parents as the source of our safety, so parental approval is a matter of life and death. Losing this support is a terrible risk to take, as it creates a feeling of ‘not okay' and will present itself in your adult life at every chance it gets.?

The Pathological Critic

The term pathological critic was coined by psychologist Eugene Sagan and it describes the inner voice that attacks and judges you. The critic plays the role of pointing at you when things go wrong, hence the use of the word ‘patho’ meaning disease or experiencing a?‘lack of?ease’. The insidious nature of the critic serves to erode your sense of worth.

What is important to note about the critic is that irrespective of how distorted their perception is of you, somehow you tend to believe ‘them’. Also, ‘they’ communicate through descriptive terms and words representing deep feelings, and actions from the past, as well as imagery playing on reruns, which seem to have the ability to teleport you right back to that moment of humiliation.?

By their very distorted nature, they are perceived as having more control of you than they really do, but this apparent independence is an illusion. With practice, you can learn to refute what the critic says and tune him out before he has the chance of poisoning your self-worth.

Introduce Advocus

The advocating or healthy voice is your ability to think realistically about a given context, by emphasizing and strengthening your position to talk back to the critic. It is easier to fight something that is perceived as external when you also have an external ally. Hence we name your champion “Advocus”.

By creating a dichotomy between the critical voice and the advocating voice, you are best positioned to confront your critic. And so it was with me that this year was enhanced by allowing my Advocate to represent me and who I am in spite of the lies and deceptions that my childhood critic would spew out at me, specifically, “you lose everyone you love.” The word lose implies I possessed something to begin with and am now deprived of it, which I didn’t, as love is experienced not owned.?

QUESTION?

Next Steps/Action Steps?

Monitor your critic. For one day, stay as vigilant as possible for self-attacks. Count the number of critical statements you make to yourself. You may surprise yourself as to how frequently your internal monologue turns to negative self-appraisal. On days two and three, take it a step further, and instead of just counting the critics' attacks, keep a notebook handy and write them down.

QUIET!

After having done this exercise you have one more thing to do. On a piece of paper, draw a line down the middle. On one side put the heading, Helps me to avoid Feeling, and on the other side put the heading, Helps Me Feel or Do. Now, for each critical thought, write down the function of that thought. In other words, how is it reinforced either positively or negatively, how it either allows you to feel or do something good or avoid feeling something unpleasant?