Tag: feeling invisible

C E N

As many of us know and experience personally, people tend to look back into their own histories and recall things that happened to them as a child that impacted who they have become. But Jonice Webb, Ph.D., has written a book called “Running on Empty” which focuses, instead on what she calls “Childhood Emotional Neglect (C.E.N.)”, what we as children didn’t get or have happen to us that we needed as children.

I saw this on a social media post and it immediately resonated with me. I am going to copy and paste what the author herself wrote on social media – with apologies to the author – because it tells you what this book is all about:

Do you really think you have to settle for feeling “invisible” or “empty”, like you don’t really belong or feel valued as a person? NO, YOU DON’T! In fact, it’s just the opposite! You can find your voice and connect with the things that make you uniquely yourself…Getting to know who you are at your core… instead of trying to meet everyone else’s expectations! If you’re thinking, “Okay… how can I actually do that?” It all starts with acknowledging how “what didn’t happen for you as a child” has deeply influenced your life. Most people point to things that “happened” to them as children for why they feel dissatisfied or disconnected in their adult life. But it’s not necessarily because of what happened to you as a child. It’s about what failed to happen for you as you were growing up.

I call it Childhood Emotional Neglect or CEN. CEN is a parent’s failure to respond enough to a child’s emotional needs. It’s a failure to notice, attend to or respond appropriately to a child’s feelings. And as an adult, this can cause us to have difficulty understanding and trusting our own emotions and feelings as well as others’. And that is what my book, Running on Empty, is all about. It’s about discovering how our parents, even well-intentioned ones, can leave our emotional tank empty and how that impacts our lives as adults. It also gives you life-changing tools to reconnect with your feelings to become the connected, whole and fulfilled person you were meant to be. I lay the entire process out for you in my national bestselling book, Running on Empty, for only $10 instead of the normal $19.99 + I’ll ship it to you for FREE. And If you pick up this book now, for a limited time I am also giving you $200 in free bonuses: Bonus #1: Childhood Emotional Neglect Questionnaire Bonus #2: Emotion Words Cheat Sheet Bonus #3: Pandemic Survival Guide for the Emotionally Neglected It’s time to get past feeling “invisible” or “empty” and start expressing varied emotions and having fulfilling, long-lasting relationships with those you care about.

I’m past the age (long past) of reading self-help books, but if you’re still adrenalized about your own self-growth journey, this may be a good choice to pick up. On my own, I will process the idea of CEN in my head and use what it teaches me on my own. So, if you want to consider the book, here’s the link:

https://www.cenrecovery.com/roe-us-ord-2step

If you choose to read this book, please share with me how it helped you!

Invisible

I recently put a tweet on Twitter that said that I wonder, if I disappeared, how long it would take anyone to notice. Okay, my Twitter following is teeny-tiny, but I’ve been trying to post there more in order to grow my social network, and it seems that I end up ‘hearting’ or responding to other’s posts but seldom get any indication that mine have been noticed at all.

My circle, away from social media, is even smaller than my circle on social media. I have just less than 100 followers on Facebook, but then again, I only follow people whose happenings and goings on are of interest to me. My followers on Twitter are easily less than 20. In real life? My “followers” – those with whom I’m engaged in meaningful contact with – are 2. I have more friends than that, for example, I consider my nail tech as a friend as well as a service provider, but we only are in contact outside of social media when I’m there getting serviced! My hairdresser doesn’t do ANY social media, so I have contact with her only when I’m there for a haircut. I adore my chiropractor but we have contact only at my appointments.

My brother, one of my two real-life “followers”, posts in his blog every day. I’d know immediately that something might be wrong if he went a day without a post. With my sporadic postings to my blog, he’d not necessarily equate not seeing a post with anything serious.

My bestie, my other real-life “follower”, hears from me two or three times a week via email, and I hear from her about once a week with a possible text now and again. We only live a mile apart, but she’s got a husband (who needs to be fully wrapped in bubble-wrap) who has somewhat consistent medical appointment demands, and a 25-hour/week job with our police department (administrative) and all of the other things in her normal life to deal with. If more than three days go by and she hasn’t heard from me, she’ll text me and email me both asking, “Are you okay?”

My upstairs neighbor, Jeri, will knock on my door if she hasn’t seen me out and about or at least that my car is parked in a different place in a couple of weeks.

Ouch! I don’t want this to be true, but is it?

I’ve chosen this more ‘loner’ lifestyle and honestly, I prefer it. I’m suddenly conscious that I often go out of my way to make sure others know I’m thinking of them. With nothing important to say, I can write paragraph after paragraph in an email to my brother or bestie. I use social media to let the people I know out in the cloud that I’m paying attention to them. I even send the occasional ‘no special reason’ greeting card in the mail! And I guess I feel invisible because I don’t get very much of that coming in my direction. Only I know how many times, in my career span, I’ve thought about sending myself flowers at work for my birthday or, heaven forbid, Valentine’s Day, just to show others that I was special and important to someone!

And I come back to something I acknowledged in a previous post about “giving most what you need to get in return”. Apparently, that’s still not working for me…

P.S. After my tweet, I got two responses, both from people I know from the same Twitch stream. Both were loving and kind; one made me feel better enough to get teary-eyed from the words.