Re: Dating/crushes and AF/chronic Illness

What comes first, the chicken or the egg?

While I can appreciate the sentiment, living with AF is not normal. For me, I don't have any difficulties talking to women, dating, etc. But, my body sometimes will get an extremely abnormal rush of fight-or-flight hormones in certain situations. Not only does this make the situation difficult to endure, but it usually results in a crash afterwards. Because of this, AF people usually tend to go psychologically inward and not socialize as much. It's one of those vicious cycles.

So, I disagree that he's creating fear. He's simply responding to a bodily condition, a syndrome.

If years of meditation have taught me anything, it's that I am not my body. These responses I (and I suspect "we") talk about are not emotional responses. They are physiological responses. My body does what it does while I "stand back" and watch. I experience it because I am still tied to my body.

So, when the adrenals are signaled to spit out whatever hormone they spit out, no amount of visualizing in the world is going to stop that from having an effect on the body. Personally, I've become able to separate my conscious self from that, and let me tell you, it's one wild ride to experience from the observation deck.

So, while I do truly believe in the "thoughts are things", and "we create our own reality", etc, etc, I think AF is just not so simple.

But, I totally agree with not beating yourself up about any of it. If anything, I've learned to have fun with it. I just let people around me know what's up and they're fine with it.

Cheers. Tweet