Values and consciousness

[Guest guest]

All,

Apologies if what I'm about to delve into here has

been covered...I try to check out most posts, but

there are a lot of them!

I have the tendency to ramble also....I'll try to be

brief!

I've been involved with ACT since last December, and

have the good fortune to be working with a great ACT

therapist. I've recently completed SCH's workbook

(only took 8 months...those values chapters are

intimidating!) and have to admit, I'm still having

some trouble " wrapping my head around " some of the

approaches unique to this great arena.

One of my main struggles is this: when I'm fairly

successful at defusing from the myriad thoughts that

hit me every day (admittedly, that's not often, and

many times I can't even catch them before they become

general anxiety and malaise), I come to this

crossroads of " consciousness " , if you will. I can say

to myself... " gee, I'm having the thought that I'm

overwhelmed and don't know where to start to [clean my

apt, etc etc etc] " ...

So I can recognize, at that point, the goal is to

" move in the direction of my values... " . I get that.

But where I'm getting hung up is (and please forgive

me if I'm oversimplifying, just not " getting it " , or

playing devil's advocate a bit too strongly) ....where

does the " thinking self " end and the " observing self "

begin?

There's a fuzzy, super-fine line there for me. And I'm

riddled with perfectionist traits, which means a ton

of all-or-nothing thinking keeps reappearing. My

therapist says, " do it shitty " ...which is great! Kind

of this blind, faith-filled diving in, if you will. I

can do it sometimes.

I have such trouble moving in a " conscious " valued

direction without getting bombarded in all the ways to

actually, specifically do that. Does that make sense??

I may value a clean living space, but it's the

nitty-gritty I get beat down by. Where to start? How

much time? What is " clean " ? I usually end up chucking

it and avoiding. That part is clear as crystal.

Obviously, SOMETHING is better than nothing. If the

best thing I can accomplish is washing one spoon, can

I accept that? Seems impossible!

The values and commitment part I am totally in line

with...simply put, I am having the hardest time

separating the " dirty noise " from the necessary

" cognitive activity " I actually NEED to move towards

my values.

Nuff said! Any insight would be fantastic. Thanks all.