Maybe this explains why we miss and love them so much when they leave
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Maybe this explains why we miss and love them so much when they leave
I am heart broken that my husband decided to leave our marriage again- i miss him- miss my friend, my lover- but rationally, he was not a very giving person- selfish, immature, cruel-- now that he's gone, i think, why didn't i love him enough, maybe i wasn't cute enough,hot enough- but this was interesting froma text about cognitive dissonance - maybe i am heartbroken the marriage didn'twork to justifiy all of the wasted effort-- maybe honestly it wasn't that great- maybe (gasp) he wasn't that great/we weren't that great
Cognitive Dissonance: Progress on a Pivotal Theory in Social Psychology
Edited by Eddie Harmon-Jones and Judson Mills
The Effort-Justification Paradigm
Dissonance is aroused whenever a person engages in an unpleasant activity to obtain some desirable outcome. From the cognition that the activity is unpleasant, it follows that one would not engage in the activity; the cognition that the activity is unpleasant is dissonant with engaging in the activity. Dissonance should be greater, the greater the unpleasant effort required to obtain the outcome. Dissonance can be reduced by exaggerating the desirability of the outcome, which would add consonant cognitions.
In the first experiment designed to test these theoretical ideas, E. Aronson and Mills (1959) had women undergo a severe or mild “initiation” to become a member of a group. In the severe-initiation condition, the women engaged in an embarrassing activity to join the group, whereas in the mild-initiation condition, the women engaged in an activity that was not very embarrassing to join the group. The group turned out to be rather dull and boring. The women in the severe-initiation condition evaluated the group more favorably than the women in the mild-initiation condition. This paradigm is referred to as the effort-justification paradigm, and it continues to be used fruitfully in research (e.g., Beauvois & Joule, 1996).
Cognitive Dissonance: Progress on a Pivotal Theory in Social Psychology
Edited by Eddie Harmon-Jones and Judson Mills
The Effort-Justification Paradigm
Dissonance is aroused whenever a person engages in an unpleasant activity to obtain some desirable outcome. From the cognition that the activity is unpleasant, it follows that one would not engage in the activity; the cognition that the activity is unpleasant is dissonant with engaging in the activity. Dissonance should be greater, the greater the unpleasant effort required to obtain the outcome. Dissonance can be reduced by exaggerating the desirability of the outcome, which would add consonant cognitions.
In the first experiment designed to test these theoretical ideas, E. Aronson and Mills (1959) had women undergo a severe or mild “initiation” to become a member of a group. In the severe-initiation condition, the women engaged in an embarrassing activity to join the group, whereas in the mild-initiation condition, the women engaged in an activity that was not very embarrassing to join the group. The group turned out to be rather dull and boring. The women in the severe-initiation condition evaluated the group more favorably than the women in the mild-initiation condition. This paradigm is referred to as the effort-justification paradigm, and it continues to be used fruitfully in research (e.g., Beauvois & Joule, 1996).
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What kind of degree do I need to have to understand all of that?
My take on it, it takes two to make a marriage and two to break it. Even though we want justification that we did or are doing the right things, sometimes that doesn't happen. We have to admit our part of the problem. Negative thinking like "I wasn't good enough at ..." isn't part of the problem. The problem(s) are how we reacted and behaved during this marriage, not how we could have done better for the other half. Take responsibility for yourself, and he owns his responsibility. And as my therapist says...don't play the blame game. (And my thought, don't get caught up in the blame game either ..... meaning, don't let other half place unwarranted blame upon you)......
Just my thoughts at the moment, it may or may not relate to the original post, because in all honesty, I didn't really understand most of it.
My take on it, it takes two to make a marriage and two to break it. Even though we want justification that we did or are doing the right things, sometimes that doesn't happen. We have to admit our part of the problem. Negative thinking like "I wasn't good enough at ..." isn't part of the problem. The problem(s) are how we reacted and behaved during this marriage, not how we could have done better for the other half. Take responsibility for yourself, and he owns his responsibility. And as my therapist says...don't play the blame game. (And my thought, don't get caught up in the blame game either ..... meaning, don't let other half place unwarranted blame upon you)......
Just my thoughts at the moment, it may or may not relate to the original post, because in all honesty, I didn't really understand most of it.
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I know we miss and love them, but how did you manage to understand what you quoted. WOW!
I am reading with my jaw dropped, then cracked up over HolyQows first line question. LOL
Not laughing at you lil, laughing at self, I need an interperature(sp?).
caring hugs
I am reading with my jaw dropped, then cracked up over HolyQows first line question. LOL
Not laughing at you lil, laughing at self, I need an interperature(sp?).
caring hugs
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Originally Posted by lillian 
In the severe-initiation condition, the women engaged in an embarrassing activity to join the group, whereas in the mild-initiation condition, the women engaged in an activity that was not very embarrassing to join the group. The group turned out to be rather dull and boring. The women in the severe-initiation condition evaluated the group more favorably than the women in the mild-initiation condition. This paradigm is referred to as the effort-justification paradigm, and it continues to be used fruitfully in research (e.g., Beauvois & Joule, 1996).
Maybe some of us can relate to this because we are getting something out of trying to control or fix what we really can't. We keep trying to justify our efforts.
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In other words I'm an over achiver ?
That's why there's gang initiations or sorority initiations even thou it's unhealthy.
or THRESHOLD
or a dAMN RAT getting shock in the Skinner box , but it still push the botton cuz it's hungery
Or i play my freaken guitar until my fingers bleeds to obtain callous becuase my desire to master the instrument
or an addict serching for an ultimate rush combine with the dangerous life style.
That's why there's gang initiations or sorority initiations even thou it's unhealthy.
or THRESHOLD
or a dAMN RAT getting shock in the Skinner box , but it still push the botton cuz it's hungery
Or i play my freaken guitar until my fingers bleeds to obtain callous becuase my desire to master the instrument
or an addict serching for an ultimate rush combine with the dangerous life style.
Last edited by SaTiT; 03-11-2007 at 12:14 AM.
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Originally Posted by lillian
...maybe i am heartbroken the marriage didn'twork to justifiy all of the wasted effort-- maybe honestly it wasn't that great- maybe (gasp) he wasn't that great/we weren't that great
Hmmmm....talk about food for thought....."Maybe honestly it wasn't that great...he wasn't that great/we weren't that great"!!
After reading this and thinking about my previous relationship, I think you hit the nail on the head! I can make excuses....his lack of skills, my lack of skills, his choices, my choices, and so on and so on......Maybe it all boils down to just this...."it wasn't/he wasn't/we weren't all that great! Makes me wonder if the rest of the stuff was just a fantasy I so desperately wanted and tried sooooo hard to make work, when it didn't have a shot in hell of working! Yup....I think that's it!
As far as wasted effort....I guess it depends on how you look at it. If you keep making the same mistakes over and over, with no insights gained, maybe it was wasted effort. However, if you/we have learned something from it, and choose not to repeat the same mistakes, then maybe it wasn't wasted effort at all! Just throwing some food for thought back at 'cha (trying to return the favor I guess)! ;-)
Thanks Lillian!
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When my ex-wife filed for a divorced it ripped me into pieces.
I didn't think i was going to be able to love anyone again.
She had a bumper sticker on her car.
" it takes a bitch like me to love a ******* like him".
I saw a bumper sticker behind a truck oneday...years later.
" a divorced is better than murder"
I didn't think i was going to be able to love anyone again.
She had a bumper sticker on her car.
" it takes a bitch like me to love a ******* like him".
I saw a bumper sticker behind a truck oneday...years later.
" a divorced is better than murder"
Becoming a Butterfly
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Lillian, you rule. That's very good stuff. Bigger applications than just the relationship stuff too. Sometimes it seems like modern life itself is just one big congitive dissonance to be dealt with. No wonder everyone's on prozac or a drunk lol
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It makes sense to me in a convoluted way, but that's why I'm HERE. I've learned that there are people out there who can say "oh gosh, that behavior isn't appealing to me at ALL. I don't want to be around it, and that's the end of it." They aren't even remotely attracted to drama, chaos, addicts, alcoholics or all those other fun, intriguing and exciting people like I am.
I'll bet they don't take the scenic route, and I'm fairly confident they don't ride the rollercoasters at the amusement parks either.
I'm not saying it's good or bad, it just IS. And I, being the card carrying codependent that I am, will overlook at LOT of very unacceptable behavior and keep my focus on the good that might just still be inside that person I love.
That's a codependent view of cognitive dissonance, which I truly understand at every level.... and where I spend a lot of my time.
Cat
I'll bet they don't take the scenic route, and I'm fairly confident they don't ride the rollercoasters at the amusement parks either.
I'm not saying it's good or bad, it just IS. And I, being the card carrying codependent that I am, will overlook at LOT of very unacceptable behavior and keep my focus on the good that might just still be inside that person I love.
That's a codependent view of cognitive dissonance, which I truly understand at every level.... and where I spend a lot of my time.
Cat
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The Way I Read That Stuff . . .
Is that it requires denial, plain and simply. In order to convince one's self that something painful is worthwhile one has to shut off or otherwise accomodate some of the feelings that the experience is eliciting.
Then when we're offered reminders things aren't the way our altered perceptions would have them, we're faced with the emotions we'd suppressed or otherwise intellectualized.
One way we learned to accomodate stuff as children in dysfunctional homes was to make up beliefs, and those structures still exist within our psyches.
Those beliefs still have survival value for us, and they exist below the level of conscious, ready to spring into play when they are called for.
I promise, for me, my codependency stuff is knee-jerk automatic, and I think this explains it . . .
Then when we're offered reminders things aren't the way our altered perceptions would have them, we're faced with the emotions we'd suppressed or otherwise intellectualized.
One way we learned to accomodate stuff as children in dysfunctional homes was to make up beliefs, and those structures still exist within our psyches.
Those beliefs still have survival value for us, and they exist below the level of conscious, ready to spring into play when they are called for.
I promise, for me, my codependency stuff is knee-jerk automatic, and I think this explains it . . .
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Here is a definition of cognitive dissonance that is a bit easier to understand
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance
I'm very familiar with the terminology used and still had difficulty understanding the quote listed about it in this thread. Remember the quote is about effort/justification which includes the concept of cognitive dissonance.
It is good material but I think a bit advanced for the non professional ..like me.
In my words... "cognitive" denotes of the mind or thoughtfulness and "dissonance" is lack of harmony or to a greater degree disharmony.
I would describe it as feeling badly when going against one's good conscience or on the flip side doing something right when the thoughts/feelings say the opposite. The action/thought does not match.
It describes what the addict, or anyone else trying to change may feel when they struggle and 'fall' or relapse.
I hope that helps a bit.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance
I'm very familiar with the terminology used and still had difficulty understanding the quote listed about it in this thread. Remember the quote is about effort/justification which includes the concept of cognitive dissonance.
It is good material but I think a bit advanced for the non professional ..like me.
In my words... "cognitive" denotes of the mind or thoughtfulness and "dissonance" is lack of harmony or to a greater degree disharmony.
I would describe it as feeling badly when going against one's good conscience or on the flip side doing something right when the thoughts/feelings say the opposite. The action/thought does not match.
It describes what the addict, or anyone else trying to change may feel when they struggle and 'fall' or relapse.
I hope that helps a bit.
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the cognition that the activity is unpleasant is dissonant with engaging in the activity.
Hmmmm.... eleventeen syllables to say the equivalent of...
"just put the drink down, stupid" Or, in our world... "just leave him".
Doesn't work for the alcoholic and doesn't work for us. We are the proof of that.
I'm not sure I can quite get my head aground the idea of the worse we are treated, the more we believe we have entered into a good thing. A better analogy for me is that we all like to think we backed a winner. No one wants to believe they bet on a losing horse. Or to let go of the idea of a winning horse.
Perhaps my man is a wonderful, intelligent, loving, caring person... who drinks, cheats and beats me. I have to let go of my love of his possibilities and look at the actuality of what is.
The post definitely made me think about it, though.
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my personal take on it is you are trying to apply psychologic principles/theories to explain your feelings. a couple of problems, psychologic theories/principles are usually based on logic and reason. what occurs in chemical addiction to the addicts thinking is not based n reason or logic but "insanity" if you will. the other problem is you cant apply sane logic to insane/unreasoned thinking as in an active alcoholic. even medical pros treating chemical addiction will say the substance must be detoxed from the person before psychologic treatment can be applied.
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Life often requires that we do something unpleasant to get what we want. For example, we might work at a job that we hate but we go there anyway to earn money. In a darker example, a woman might prostitute herself even though she hates it because she needs to earn money.
But how does a person do something they hate? The value of what they are getting needs to outweight the horribleness of what they're doing. How do you manage to work in a slaughterhouse? By deciding that taking care of your family is important. How do you deal with a workplace where you boss abuses you? By deciding that his/her abuse is not as bad as going bankrupt.
Sometimes the reward that we get for the unpleasant act - well, it's really not enough. Yeah, we work on our marital problems because lifelong marriage seems like a lofty goal. But maybe the truth is that the marriage isn't really worth the suffering it causes you. Those lofty goals sound nice but your day-to-day life is pretty hellish. How do you live then?
You go into FREAK MODE - cognitive dissonace! Your heart needs to exaggerate the reward you're getting, or supposedly about to get, in order to sustain you through the daily unpleasantness. This usually expresses itself through delusions of how great the love is, or the sex is, or that you're made for each other, or that he's about to get sober and you can finally have the world's most perfect relationship, that kind of adolescent crap that those of us over age 22 don't wear so well anymore
That's my take anyway.
But how does a person do something they hate? The value of what they are getting needs to outweight the horribleness of what they're doing. How do you manage to work in a slaughterhouse? By deciding that taking care of your family is important. How do you deal with a workplace where you boss abuses you? By deciding that his/her abuse is not as bad as going bankrupt.
Sometimes the reward that we get for the unpleasant act - well, it's really not enough. Yeah, we work on our marital problems because lifelong marriage seems like a lofty goal. But maybe the truth is that the marriage isn't really worth the suffering it causes you. Those lofty goals sound nice but your day-to-day life is pretty hellish. How do you live then?
You go into FREAK MODE - cognitive dissonace! Your heart needs to exaggerate the reward you're getting, or supposedly about to get, in order to sustain you through the daily unpleasantness. This usually expresses itself through delusions of how great the love is, or the sex is, or that you're made for each other, or that he's about to get sober and you can finally have the world's most perfect relationship, that kind of adolescent crap that those of us over age 22 don't wear so well anymore
That's my take anyway.
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The easy way for me to understand it is that the words and the actions don't match up.
I've had a lot of that in my life, starting at a very early age... so my rationalizations are quite well developed.
this of course, is a brilliant way to explain it as well. AND it made me *snork* my coffee onto my computer screen
I've had a lot of that in my life, starting at a very early age... so my rationalizations are quite well developed.
"just put the drink down, stupid" Or, in our world... "just leave him".
Doesn't work for the alcoholic and doesn't work for us. We are the proof of that.
Doesn't work for the alcoholic and doesn't work for us. We are the proof of that.
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Originally Posted by BigSis
I'm not sure I can quite get my head aground the idea of the worse we are treated, the more we believe we have entered into a good thing. A better analogy for me is that we all like to think we backed a winner. No one wants to believe they bet on a losing horse. Or to let go of the idea of a winning horse.
it amazes me how we all go through the same thing. for some reason, i'm still thinking my A is "better," she's different and she's going to make it, even though she's clearly choosing not to. for some reason, it hurts me to let go, thinking that i'm the only person who's going to help her be happy and sober again... and without me, who's going to be there for her?
i feel so much sympathy and compassion. it just breaks my heart that this disease has taken over the body of someone who could be so great one day...
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Originally Posted by InThisForMe
i it just breaks my heart that this disease has taken over the body of someone who could be so great one day...
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is "cognitive dissonance" not perhaps being used as a form of rationalization or helping to cope with a very difficult situation?
howz about "you simply love that person so much" and you've struggled, hoped, coped, prayed, not to mention a wide array of emotions; in order to stay afloat.
I suppose the alcoholic displays dyscognitive "diss" onance ?
howz about "you simply love that person so much" and you've struggled, hoped, coped, prayed, not to mention a wide array of emotions; in order to stay afloat.
I suppose the alcoholic displays dyscognitive "diss" onance ?
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Excited misery?
Would you also compare this to something an old-time alanoner once told me?
She said that living with an alcoholic is like 'excited misery'. I agree whole-heartedly! BUT....is it something that I enjoy? NO!!!
It is something that I tolerate because I made a mistake, and circumstances don't permit me to move out right now? Yes. RIGHT NOW!
I have seen and continue to see SO MANY people stay in unhealthy relationships because they feel stuck, either due to children or finances. Looking back, I realize that I should have never allowed him to walk back into my life. I can honestly say that I am, once again, working on myself and trusting God to open another door for me. God willing, I will get away from this relationship again. The next time, I will not answer the phone or the door. Life is too short to suffer any longer.
Speaking from my own perspective, I do not enjoy the screaming and yelling. I do not find any pleasure living in fear. I was vulnerable and naive and I kept hoping for a change. This is just my opinion. Maybe there are some who enjoy the excitement....not me!!!
She said that living with an alcoholic is like 'excited misery'. I agree whole-heartedly! BUT....is it something that I enjoy? NO!!!
It is something that I tolerate because I made a mistake, and circumstances don't permit me to move out right now? Yes. RIGHT NOW!
I have seen and continue to see SO MANY people stay in unhealthy relationships because they feel stuck, either due to children or finances. Looking back, I realize that I should have never allowed him to walk back into my life. I can honestly say that I am, once again, working on myself and trusting God to open another door for me. God willing, I will get away from this relationship again. The next time, I will not answer the phone or the door. Life is too short to suffer any longer.
Speaking from my own perspective, I do not enjoy the screaming and yelling. I do not find any pleasure living in fear. I was vulnerable and naive and I kept hoping for a change. This is just my opinion. Maybe there are some who enjoy the excitement....not me!!!
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