When I live in the worlds of what “should be” and “shouldn’t be”, all that ends up happening is that I feel bad.
I feel guilty and ashamed about my ability to get things done and waste a lot of energy doing mental gymnastics in a fantasy world.
@hmm_cook My wife and I try to remind each other that "Should" is a dirty, bad, no good word in our home! My therapist also likes this policy!
Sometimes Should Thughts are important, like "I should phone 999 about this fire."
But a LOT of the time, it's someone else's voice telling us what "should" be, or who/what WE "should" be.
And "should" can hold us back from dealing with what actually "is". Sometimes, we don't want to face what is, so we avoid it with should. It's so complex!