Ridiculed

[EvilAngel]

I don't know a good way of dealing with being ridiculed. 

I was ridiculed constantly throughout secondary school. People liked to make me feel stupid. They would pounce on any opportunity to devalue and embarrass me, and they seemed to enjoy it immensely. 

It didn't just happen occasionally. It was every hour of every schoolday. I found it extremely hurtful. My self-esteem was slowly eroded over the years. 

Now I'm in my thirties, I am hypervigilant in social situations. I am sensitive even to the slightest remark from friends or family. In a room full of laughing people, I often feel like the butt of the joke, even if there is nobody explicitly saying anything bad about me. To me, everybody in the room looks like a bunch of evil hyenas, laughing mockingly. If they look at each other with a knowing smile on their face, it feels like they're implicitly communicating how ridiculous I am. 

I don't know what to do about this. People tell me not to take things so seriously. But the truth is that I'm sensitive, and it hurts when people laugh at me, so to laugh at myself would be inauthentic. I have always taken things to heart, and I don't think that's something I can change. 

The problem is that if you bring this subject up to people in real life, you risk making a situation awkward, where people feel like they're not allowed to make jokes or laugh in your presence. 

It's a catch 22 and I don't know what to do. Any advice would be appreciated. 

Edited October 25, 2019 by EvilAngel

[JustThinkingAloud]

I’m sorry that you had a rough childhood. Kids can be so mean! Luckily, most of them grow out of it and the ones that don’t aren’t worth your attention. It’s the great people in your life that deserve your focus. They aren’t perfect but they do as much as they can while taking care of their needs.

I don’t think you can fully remove the trauma of your childhood. But you can store it away and remove the triggers that keep bringing it up. I’d keep reminding myself that it’s my views and my memories that make the situation uncomfortable, not the people around me. I’d keep analyzing why they are laughing to keep proving to myself that they are not ridiculing me, they are just having fun and mean no harm. I assume that you’re around people that are treating you as good as they can.

Unfortunately, changes don’t happen overnight. You need to keep working on it and keep recognizing and celebrating every little progress you make to change your views and to keep your motivation up. It will improve but it’s hard to undo 20 years of thinking but hey, there’s always hope and anything can happen!

All the best and good luck!

[Surfingthewave]

@EvilAngel I'm sorry that you suffered from ridicule in your childhood. 

What are you doing to work on your self esteem?

Have you read around this topic? 

Do you struggle with self belief, anxiety and confidence issues? 

If so meditation, visualisations and positive affirmations could work for you here. Changing your thought stories in situations can really help. For me I put myself into situations where I knew people were looking at me and became aware of all the thoughts, feelings and sensations it brought up. 

After time it really helped. What do you with something you fear? You walk directly into the fear. 

[LeoX8]

@EvilAngel How much important is the opinion of others for you?

Realize this and also the others things you feel important. Then you can decide what to "listen" to and accept the costs of doing that

[tsuki]

On 25.10.2019 at 11:41 PM, EvilAngel said:

It didn't just happen occasionally. It was every hour of every schoolday. I found it extremely hurtful. My self-esteem was slowly eroded over the years. 

Were you being targeted by specific individuals, or was it always happening?

I don't mean to imply that you deserve it somehow, or that your feelings are false, but maybe you were sensitive your whole life and kids simply took advantage of that?

Maybe your problem is not your sensitivity, but having an expectation that you're somehow supposed to be more sociable like "everybody else"?

[Zigzag Idiot]

18 minutes ago, tsuki said:

Maybe your problem is not your sensitivity, but having an expectation that you're somehow supposed to be more sociable like "everybody else"?

Good point @tsuki

This makes me consider,,,,, from Gems of Wisdom-

BEARING UNPLEASANT MANIFESTATIONS

“One sign of Being is the capacity to bear the unpleasant manifestations of others. Why is this a sign of greater Being? The answer is that you cannot do this unless you have seen in yourself what you dislike in others...When you have just criticized someone, go over what you said carefully and apply it to yourself. This neutralizes poison in you.” V. 1, pp. 168, 176 

OVERCOMING THE PAST

“The overcoming of the past is one great line of personal work on yourself. Most people have such a great register of unhappy moments which they have nourished so much...The whole of the past must be cancelled eventually. In other words, you must have nothing against anyone.” V. 3, p. 811

OVERCOMING THE PAST II

“It is quite useless to forgive: you have to cancel. And this is always done by finding the same thing in yourself, and you will always find it if you are sincere...You must remember here that you may not have said something unpleasant externally yourself but you have thought something and consented to it.” V. 3, p. 812 

[CMacD]

I feel similarly and I haven't found the answer, the trauma might not be as deep as yours but I hate how I'm not the wittiest person on earth and in many exchanges of insults I always feel I've "lost". So much so that sometimes I wish I was just in a powerful criminal gang, or had a reputation for having done 10 years for manslaughter so that people would be scared to talk **** to me.