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About the
Catastrophizer Personality Subself
This common
subself tries
diligently to protect the host person by creating vivid, terrifying
thoughts and images about the worst possible out-comes of current or possible situations. The
well-meant rationale for tormen-ting its host person is something like
"If I don't scare you well enough to act,
you won't be prepared for the worst, and we all will suffer great pain!"
The thoughts and images this
protective subself
generates are often extreme, illogical and/or very unlikely. They
can graphically predict poverty, homelessness, murder,
"going crazy,"
getting "locked up," bankrup-tcy, having children harmed or taken away, jail, dying alone, or
discovering a terminal disease or compulsion like addiction - or simply
"Something really bad will surely happen if..." As with other Guardian
subselves, logical expla-nations will
not stop the Catastrophizer from trying to protect one or more inner
kids in its unique way.
This tireless subself may work alone
or with other common Guardian subselves like the
the
the
and/or the
(reality-distorter).
Their unswerving common goal is to
protect and soothe upset young
right now.
Patiently doing some form of
can gradually
convince the Catastrophizer to relax and trust that the resident
and other
will reliably keep the
young subselves and the host person safe enough. Symptoms of this happening are (a)
a marked decline in the severity, frequency, and emotional reactions from dire thoughts and images, and (b) a noticeable increase in these
As
progresses
this devoted subself
will typically agree to focus its valuable energy on more useful goals.
Do you
have a busy Catastrophizer subself?
more detail /
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