How to stop hating yourself

by Maddy Myers

For most of my life, I have struggled with negative self-talk. I don’t remember when it started, but by the time I got to middle school, I told myself on the regular that I was a failure, that no one liked me and no one ever would, and so on. As an adult, that’s led to imposter’s syndrome as well as me consistently devaluing my own successes and accomplishments as soon as they happen. If I complete a project or get a big promotion, I’ll instantly tell myself it doesn’t count or that it doesn’t matter. Every year, I dread my birthday and New Year’s, seeing both as opportunities to examine all of the things I haven’t yet achieved and how much time I’ve “wasted.”

Intellectually, I know that this is wrong. I’ve written articles I love, helped other writers grow, and even recorded a solo full-length album while working a full-time writing job back in 2017-18. These days, I host two podcasts per week on top of a full-time editing job. I’m in a happy long-term relationship with a fascinating, beautiful woman. I have some seriously awesome best friends and a solid circle of acquaintances. The list goes on.

Yet, even with all of that, I was still beating myself a lot -- until recently. I’ve changed a lot about my self-care routine this past year, and it’s been a huge help, but this blog post isn’t going to be about how regular bedtimes and a different drug cocktail have helped me turn my life around -- although that stuff has certainly been useful, and I’m lucky to have the resources to make those changes. This blog post is actually going to be about the One Weird Trick that my psychiatrist told me about in our most recent appointment. It’s made a huge difference for me in terms of how I approach negative self-talk, so I’d like to pass it on for the benefit of people who might need it as much as I did.

My psychiatrist’s tip actually reminded me of one of my favorite posts on the internet, “Why Procrastinators Procrastinate.” It’s an old article and it certainly has its issues (it opens with a bizarre take on “obese people” and “overeating,” for example), but its larger framework has stuck with me. In addition to struggling with self-hatred, I also struggle periodically with procrastination, and in my experience, both of these bad habits allow each other to multiply endlessly. I’ll procrastinate something for a bit, then barrage myself with negative self-talk about how I didn’t get it done sooner, which will make me even less motivated to dive in because I’ll be feeling bad about my abilities, and so on. The article I linked acknowledges that aspect of procrastination and does so in a funny and relatable way.

The most interesting part of the article is its evocative description of the difference between the people who don’t suffer from chronic procrastination, and the people who do. The person who doesn’t procrastinate is depicted as a “rational decision-maker” at the helm of a ship’s wheel inside of a human brain, directing it forward on a steady, well-planned course. Then there’s the chronic procrastinator, who actually has the same exact “rational decision-maker” at the helm in their brain -- except there’s also a sneaky little monkey in the room, bouncing around, tempting the decision-maker with all manner of distractions and indulgences and excuses to stop working.

For a long time, I viewed this framework as both a humorous and useful way to think about my worst impulses. I saw those impulses as being outside of myself, like some pesky little animal who kept on bugging me and waylaying my best interests. But this wasn’t actually a useful framework to get me to stop procrastinating, nor did it stop me from insulting myself over it. Although the original article has a follow-up with some tips on how to stop procrastinating (such as, break your big-picture tasks down into manageable steps), I never found it to be particularly illuminating. When I got stuck in a bad cycle, I’d find that I couldn’t start any task, no matter how small, because I was so busy inwardly yelling at myself. Well, both at myself and at my procrastination monkey. 

It turns out that yelling doesn’t work. But I wasn’t sure what I should do instead.

I described this ongoing problem to my psychiatrist, who gave me the tip that’s changed my entire approach to negative self-talk. He invited me to view myself as both an adult and a child. My child self is still a part of me, still a fundamental aspect of my personality. She’s smart and curious, and she loves to “play pretend” or to hole herself up in the attic to read fantasy novels for hours on end. Then there’s my adult self. She’s smart and curious, too, but she’s also better at long-term planning and prioritizing what matters. She’s had enough life experiences, both good and bad, to see the big picture clearly. Except she’s got to put up with child me, who’s still a part of me and hanging around all the time -- and she doesn’t want to do any work. She hates school and authority and any type of ruleset that she perceives as being unfair or pointless. She just wants to have fun!

child me

age 13, or thereabouts, sitting on the edge of an armchair

You’ve probably already noticed the key difference between this framework and the previous one. Instead of dealing with an obnoxious monkey -- an uncontrollable, wild animal wreaking havoc on my innocent brain -- I’m dealing with a young child. And it’s a child for whom I have a lot of affection. I remember how unhappy and unfulfilled I felt back then, as well as the extent of my curiosity and creativity -- the admirable qualities that made me into the adult I am today. I can’t blame my inner child for wanting to log off work and get in some playtime. Honestly, she makes some damn good points. Sometimes she bugs me, but even when that happens, I have to admit she’s making a decent case.

That’s why I always endeavor to respect her. Instead of the monkey that I had insulted and derided -- by extension, insulting myself -- I now approach my inner child with the care and love of a cool babysitter. My psychiatrist put it this way: if you were going to convince a child to stop playing Super Smash Brothers and do their homework, would you insult them? Would you hurt them? I sure hope the answer is “no,” because those techniques wouldn’t work at all. They would traumatize your child, and also, their homework wouldn’t get done. Okay, maybe the work would get done -- but at what cost, especially in the long term? Positive reinforcement has been shown to work a hell of a lot better, no matter how old you are.

I haven’t completely beaten procrastination or negative self-talk. There are some more tips that my psychiatrist has given me that I’ve been trying, such as immediately rewarding myself with self-praise whenever I start a task (it feels corny, but it does help). More importantly, though, I’m spending a lot less time insulting myself. I’ve realized that a lot of the impulses about myself that I find annoying are actually reflections of my own inner child, and that’s a side of myself that I value a lot. In other words, these aren’t my “worst impulses” at all, or bad habits that I need to stamp out. They’re just a reflection of the childlike passion and sense of joy that I wish I still had -- and, hey, turns out I do still have it. It’s been inside me all along. I want to cherish that and encourage that, not squelch it with constant haranguing about the importance of getting all of my chores done.

My brain will always be a work in progress. But at least I’ve found a way to hate myself slightly less, lately. I hope it helps you, too, whoever you are.

23 Questions We Had After Watching The Trailer for The Boss Baby

by Samantha Allen and Maddy Myers

Immediately after we watched the trailer for Dreamworks’ upcoming animated film The Boss Baby, Samantha whispered into the darkness of the theater: “I have a lot of questions.” Maddy had questions, too. As best as we could tell, this was a movie about a seven-year-old named Tim who is jealous of the attention his parents are giving to a talking baby (voiced by Alec Baldwin) who runs a corporation that wages a shadow war on puppies.

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The Bayonetta Reading List

by Maddy Myers

This past weekend, I attended the third annual GaymerX convention, and I appeared on a panel called "Bayo Studies Year One" with my delightful peers Todd Harper, Gita Jackson, and Katherine Cross. We discussed the writing that the four of us have done about Bayonetta, and I thought it'd be helpful to include a list of all of the pieces to which we referred. Enjoy!

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Sing It Louder: Harassment Does Not Help Anyone's Career

by Maddy Myers

This past September, I wrote a long response to a friend about the idea that sharing stories about the harassment of marginalized people will help them, or their careers, in some way.

I do understand how the visibility of a harassment campaign like Gamergate does help naive people become more aware of internet harassment and how it works. But that isn't the same as saying it helped the people who've been harassed.

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Siren For Hire: A Post-Mortem, and Reflections On Twine

by Maddy Myers

A friend of mine is working on a talk about game-making systems and accessibility, and she asked me some questions. My answers were so long that I thought I may as well republish them here, since they include some details about Twine, Siren for Hire, and my other games that I haven't ever written down anywhere else. Enjoy!

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Siren For Hire: My new game

by Maddy Myers

I don't make games very often. I've made two Twine games before, and they were intended to be short, comedic fun. But I've always wanted to make longer games about more serious fare. I have a lot of ideas. I've never finished any of them  ... UNTIL NOW.

This is a text adventure that I have been working on for a few months now. It was inspired by me watching Sailor Moon and thinking "this is uplifting and inspiring and everything, but there's no way a magical girl team would get along that well in real life."

So I made Siren For Hire. Don't get me wrong; I'd love if fictional magical girl teams always got along as well as they do on Sailor Moon. But from what I know about people, activism, and specifically women who try to work together under extreme circumstances ... let's just say Siren For Hire is closer to how I think it might go.

Here's the description I gave the game on its store page:

Siren For Hire tells a story of magical girls living in a future Earth governed by a Dragon who doles out powered gemstones to the deserving. But who "deserves" super-powers? Meanwhile, hacker cults and protestors find their own ways to fight the gemstone supremacy ... but no one seems to want to question the Dragon.
The game's protagonist, Lycaonia, must navigate the impossible balancing act of earning an ethical living as a heroine, protecting her friends, and above all, taking care of herself.

I'm Maddy Myers (maddymyers.net), and I made this game: the writing, the drawings, the design and development.
Caelyn Sandel (
inurashii.xyz) helped with editing and play-testing.

It's a dark game at parts, but I don't think it requires a specific content warning. There's swearing, bitterness, loneliness, and misery -- but nothing graphic. There's some drug use. Some references to death. But, dear reader, it is all going to be okay.

Please enjoy my game about seven women who love each other but who also can't fucking stand each other, most of the time. And who have the deck stacked against them in every respect.

Bullying and the enforcement of "normal."

by Maddy Myers

I met Katie in elementary school. I was in fourth grade, she was in fifth, and we both attended the same after-school program. We invented a role-playing game together based on the tabletop games that our male friends played. We liked Magic: The Gathering and Dungeon & Dragons for the pictures and the aesthetic, but we both wanted more freedom. So Katie and I made up our own game, which I now realize was a live-action role-playing game.

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Apology

by Courtney Stanton

This is a guest post by Courtney Stanton.

I want to say something to games folks, specifically the queer and indie games community (roughly, what is now known as altgames). I want to say something about how I know I did harm, how I made things harder, not easier for people sometimes.

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