There's a thread on the PurplePillDebate sub right now that deals with an article I know has been circulated within this community before - and it's worth looking over again.

It's a perfect example of why users in this community promote things like STFU and running personal experiments for a week (link 1 and link 2 for examples).

Here is a link to the article directly. I'll list a few quotes below:

Why would he not get the more healthy option? Did he even read the labels? Why can’t I trust him? Do I need to spell out every little thing for him in minute detail so he gets it right? Also, and the thing I was probably most offended by, why wasn’t he more observant? How could he not have noticed over the years what I always get? Does he not pay attention to anything I do?

One of the reasons I really like this article is because it has such good examples of what it looks like when you start to blow things out of proportion. Read that excerpt, then read it five more times. Pick it apart carefully and note how effortlessly the woman links the beef her husband purchases to how neglectful/unappreciative he must be overall. She convinces herself that because he didn't know what type of beef she bought - that was somehow definitive proof that he had been taking her for granted, was incompetent, and untrustworthy.

Hopefully that sounds as insane to you as it does to me. And yet...I completely understand that process, I have experienced that rushed sequence of thoughts that start on one small thing and quickly spin out of control. The image I carry in my mind when we talk about hamstering here looks a bit like this with a network of yarn connecting the most outlandish things together, and I think it's true in a lot of ways. How often have you had a friend connect one small thing and present it as proof of a much larger problem.

I think solipsism and the hamster are inexorably tied together. I think of solipsism as the wheel our hamsters run on, and if we're not careful, it's easy to get carried away.

How does it benefit me to constantly belittle my husband? The man that I’ve taken as my partner in life. The father of my children. The guy I want to have by my side as I grow old. Why do I do what women are so often accused of, and try to change the way he does every little thing? Do I feel like I’m accomplishing something? Clearly not if I feel I have to keep doing it. Why do I think it’s reasonable to expect him to remember everything I want and do it just that way? The instances in which he does something differently, does it mean he’s wrong? When did “my way” become “the only way?” When did it become okay to constantly correct him and lecture him and point out every little thing I didn’t like as if he were making some kind of mistake?

I like the questions that the author asks herself, and I think they're useful for anyone that's trying to develop a bit more awareness in regards to how they behave. They also provide a handy blue-print from which to work if you aren't really sure where to start or how.

General questions:

  1. What's your most recent 'hamster' moment?

  2. Do you catch yourself engaging in unproductive thought patterns?