Sometimes. I see emotions in 3 groups:
1. Internal (how we choose to think)
2. Para-external (things internal to us, but that we don't choose, sort of like stubbing your toe or getting a papercut, but only YOU experience it...not by choice!)
3. External (ex. someone criticizing us)
I suffer from anxiety & depression as para-external experiences. I don't choose to have them, as I'm not an anxious person by nature, but I
experience them. For example, I have 3 levels of depression:
1. Apathy (don't care)
2. Internal resistance (doing stuff & caring about stuff feels like an anchor on my heart, emotionally-speaking)
3. "Can't" mode. Sometimes just can't do stuff.
Do I like myself as a growing person with intrinsic value? Yes. Do I always feel connected to that feeling? No. It's hard to feel good about yourself & experience self-confidence as an emotion when your internal resources are randomly cut off intermittently & you engage in things like procrastination without understanding why. The example I use is riding a mechanical bull: when you're in the crowd watching, it doesn't seem like a big deal, but when you're the one riding the bull in the heat of the moment, it's an immersive experience.
I also dealt with a lot of shame growing up from undiagnosed ADHD. I developed an explanation called "glass cage theory":
1. You're stuck in a glass cage, seeing things going on, but not being able to engage
2. The door is unlocked, but the door handle is electrified, so it hurts if you touch it. This makes doing tasks extremely frustrating at times.
3. There are holes in the glass where co-morbid experiences (such as anxiety & depression) poke you like branding irons
I've heard it said that self-confidence comes from being able to trust yourself, and when you get stuck in the glass cage of low energy (i.e. ADHD), consistent execution can be
incredibly difficult to sustain. The hanging weights illustration in this comic explains it succinctly:
This comic is the best explanation I've ever seen of what it's like to live with ADHD:
Knowing that I struggle with the issue of cyclical & chronically low available mental energy helps me a lot, because I know I'm not choosing on purpose to have such a struggle in life. This is one of the reasons I like convenience items like the Instapot & Sous-Vide & 3D printing & neffing on social media...I don't always have the emotional mojo to dive into doing things more extensively. Sometimes I like to cook a really complex dish, but sometimes just the thought of having to go through the process of microwaving a frozen burrito makes me wanna yak, which is simply a result of low mental energy from time to time, so knowing the backstory & having an explanation really helps me to cut myself some slack lol.
I also deal with imposter syndrome a lot, which is an irrational feeling, not a logical way of living, same with my body dysmorphia, both of which are para-external experiences I don't choose to have & don't want to experience. Best we can do is the best we can do, and just deal with stuff the best we can along the way! So I think there are really 2 components to that question:
1. How we
choose to feel about ourselves
2. How we emotionally (external to our choices) feel about ourselves
As a human being, I try to make an effort to be nice, be helpful, contribute to society, etc. Emotionally, particularly with my ADHD, I suffer from emotional dysregulation. Like for many people with ADHD, we tend to feel vaguely guilty about
something non-stop, with no rational explanation, typically since we were kids, probably because we're so used to getting blindsided by stuff we forgot to do & then procrastinated on due to low mental energy that we're just kind of stuck with that chronic low-key anxiety all the time lol. So it's hard to like yourself when you constantly feel negative feelings like that on a regular basis, no matter how you
think about yourself.
Fortunately you can eat your feelings, which is why I'm now the Kitchen Overlord of ATOT lol.
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