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Cognitive Dissonance V

I am the Commander

John Pistorius

Just out of high school, at the age of eighteen, I believed my life was right on track. I was following in my dad’s footsteps and planned to enlist in the military after the holidays. Then, as a passenger in a fiery auto crash New Years Eve 1976-77, my destination was forever changed.

Instead of boot camp, I found myself in a hospital. I was too busted up to realize the stark contrast that the new evidence presented to my goals and beliefs. I believed back surgery to fuse vertebrae together dashed any hope that I had for getting into the military. It changed my ideas about the amount of pain a person can tolerate, and ended my relationship with my girlfriend.

By age twenty, in 1978, I was learning to renovate old homes with few clues about what I was going to do with my life. Four thugs gave me direction when they beat me unconscious and sent me to the hospital with my face broken. After surgery and a month of hospitalization, I returned to my ‘life.’ I was deeply affected and withdrew into the arms of a woman who would later become my wife.

In 1980, after spending the entire day with me, my best friend, age 21, was killed minutes after leaving my home. I was called to the scene to identify his mangled, lifeless body. Massive head trauma and blood loss swept him away in the blink of an eye.

In 1983, at age twenty-five, I was married with children and my goals were set. My career was developing. I saw a bright future in buying and renovating old homes in the South Side of Pittsburgh. And then again, in an instant, my life was forever altered when I was hit by a car driven by a man who was drunk.

Why share this?

I don’t want sympathy or pity. Don’t even go there. I’m telling you these things to substantiate my claim of understanding the process of overcoming pained states of mind.

Each of these incidents caused a great deal of Cognitive Dissonance. Not that I understood it then. Nevertheless, in retrospect, I can understand it now. Each time, I was forced to view my life from a different perspective. New evidence boldly contradicted my current belief or outlook, thereby causing a pained state of mind. The challenge was to overcome the obstructions to my ability to live life peacefully. It was my choice. I was able to overcome the visible evidence that gave me grounds for believing the existence or presence of something else by directing my thought energy away from my inabilities and onto my abilities.

I could have stopped living when my life was changed by these events. Instead, I adapted. Part of my ability to adjust came from my adoption of confident, constructive thinking techniques. I thought my way out of these battles. The difference between my ideas, beliefs and opinions and new evidence that confronted my beliefs was the barrier that I rigorously fought.

Ok, I realized that I was not going to have a military career. So I started working in construction. I watered my attitude and thinking with my ability to learn new things. Then, after the thugs jumped me, I decided to settle down, marry, and raise a family and I went back into construction. After my best friend’s death, I realized the line between life and death was much finer than I had ever imagined, and I became almost reclusive. After the drunk driver running me down, I started buying and renovating homes using my limited knowledge of construction and seeking information from others.

Goals-Beliefs-Choices

I believed that I was on track with my goals. Each time I faced new evidence that gave me grounds for believing something contrary to my accepted position, I chose to accept or reject the new information.

When the orthopedic surgeon told me that my spinal injury was not going to permit me to be in construction, I chose to disagree with him. Instead, I worked to strengthen the muscles that support the spine. The construction work strengthened my back.

Plastic surgery repaired the damaged bone in my face that resulted from the attack in 1978. So the predictions of ugliness and deformity were overcome by excellent surgeons. That was all it took to overcome that batch of new evidence.

Cognitive retraining and the deliberate planting of statements which affirmed my abilities were the fertilizer to my positive attitude. This combination of professional assistance, attitude adjustment and thought planting amounted to digging in, planting, fertilizing and watering my thought garden. And it propelled me forward with resolve after the car ran me down in 1983. It didn’t happen overnight. The process of overcoming the stark contrast in my thinking was one that fluctuated, sometimes dramatically.
 

More Dissonance

And then, in 1986, just when I thought that I was right on track, my wife decided that she would be happier with someone else. She claimed that the 1983 accident had changed me beyond her recognition. I wasn’t the guy that she married. She claimed that her husband died and she was left with someone who looked like him but didn’t act like him. This was the same year that my parents bought their pet shop.

Throughout the following six years, using some very intelligent lawyers, she dismantled my income, my real estate and my self-confidence. I was able to overcome so much adversity before, but somehow this was the toughest battle of my lifetime. In retrospect, I believe it was because divorce opposed my core values. My parents have been married for almost fifty years. When we married, I thought that I was going to be married to her for the rest of my life. Then, in short order, I was facing very real circumstances which refuted my core belief.

She was so angry about losing her husband in that accident. She wanted to punish me for taking his life and his place in hers. Therefore, no matter what I conceded to, she kept pushing for more. This was a stark contrast to the mild-mannered woman that she projected herself to be. Mosquitoes are friendlier.

My ex-wife was relentless in her punishment. Almost like the thugs, who years earlier had kicked me when I was down, she just kept pursuing me. It was as if she demanded that I fight back. Yet I did not have the will to fight. Even if I had possessed the desire, I was without funds. I only wanted it to end. I was so tired of her attacks. How could I overcome this opponent? She knew my weaknesses and was adept at sharing them with her lawyers. Together, they were relentless. The stress reduced my ability to function in my defense.
 

Chains of Thought

All through my life, when I thought about my future, I had disconcerting thoughts which were partially influenced by well-meaning people who told me that I would ‘always be’ something or other. Those ‘all’ or ‘absolute’ statements had an effect on me because I trusted the people who made them. They were the experts.

Doctors told me that I would always ‘be’ something or other. Surgeons told me that I would ‘never’ do certain things. Because of cognitive impairments, therapists told me that I must remember that I would ‘always’ be slower. I had no evidence to refute their claims, yet, their ideas did not fit into my beliefs about me. As new evidence emerged that was contrary to their statements, I was challenged. I rebelled against their ideas, yet was still plagued by the nagging that they presented. The thoughts that they had planted confronted me and required energy to refute them, and that was a waste of resources. So I started seeking relief from every source possible.
 

New Tools Developed to Excavate Dissonance

During the six years of the divorce battle, I sought techniques and strategies to overcome these nagging negative thoughts which were stealing my effectiveness. I built an arsenal of tools as soldiers to overcome these formidable thought opponents of mine. And the war took on new meaning and direction. New people entered my life. Some of them were trained to help me fight the ideas that were beating me. I did not always win every battle, but my win-loss ratio improved. With every win, my confidence improved. And I came to realize that I really could accomplish this task of changing my opinions and beliefs. My mental acceptance and views on particular ideas, thoughts and subjects began to be transformed.

I learned to be the governor of my thoughts. Often, my convictions were overturned and I was pardoned. With each release, I was inspired to free my mind from additional obstructions to clear thinking.

I learned to not be anxious about tomorrow and I’m still learning to have peace by living in the moment. This moment is all that we really have, none other. It is the eternal moment, when you finally come into harmony with reality. It is the only place where we have any control over the only thing that we have real control over, our attitude.

Each time a tragedy occurred I fought back. I’ve repeatedly lived through the process and have developed a deep understanding about overcoming the pained state of mind called Cognitive Dissonance. I learned by experience that it is possible to overcome Cognitive Dissonance by uprooting and burning the weed thoughts and shooting down and burying the thought soldiers that defend them. I learned to plant deliberate, precise thoughts to fight the battle from within my subconscious mind. And I taught myself how to water and fertilize those ideas with others that reinforced their growth.

Armed with a legion of new evidence, I was confronted with a challenge that extended beyond the surface. The deep-seated beliefs which I was not yet able to erase were lingering in the dark recesses of my thought garden. Like hidden monsters, they would come forward to fight at any moment to defend core beliefs. They had to be overcome, yet they proved to be elusive. Nevertheless, I came to realize that they belonged to me too. That was a real turning point. These were my thoughts even if I had accepted them from others.

Next time: Tools to overpower the monsters and Self-Command.

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