Does acne make you feel bad? Even downright desperate?
From the countless emails I get I know many people agree.
In this post I’ll show how and why this happens, and more importantly, how to turn this around.
Usually the story goes like this:
- You look into a mirror and notice new pimples. Or perhaps you hear some remark about your acne.
- Think of everything you’ve done to cure your acne.
- You start thinking how unfair this is. No matter what you do nothing helps.
- You feel frustrated, trapped and desperate. You feel like a victim.
- When you feel really bad, you do something that makes you feel better. Watch TV. Eat. Drink. Surf the net. Check emails.
- Feel some relief and comfort now that you’ve distracted/ drugged yourself.
- Allow some time to pass and repeat from step 1.
The ’steps’ may look a bit different for you, but I’m sure you notice the pattern.
The general pattern/cycle runs like this.
Think of something you don’t like/want -> feel bad -> comfort yourself
This pattern is very, very common. Almost everyone runs some variation of this (maybe regarding their finances, job, relationship, health, etc). It’s highly addictive, but not very smart.
The reason it’s not smart is that it doesn’t fix the underlying problem. Comforting makes you feel better temporarily, but you are no closer to breaking the cycle.
This kind of pattern is very destructive. I know many acne victims go through this almost every day. If you don’t break it, you could easily blow years - even decades - of your life going through the same cycle.
Now, if you feel bummed, don’t worry. This story has a happy ending. I’ll show you how to break that cycle (and you don’t have to buy anything). So please read on.
You want to break this cycle for two reasons:
- It makes you feel miserable
- If you don’t, you’ll never get clear
I think you already see the first point is true.
Let’s see how this cycle keeps you stuck with acne.
First, feeling bad in itself makes it difficult to get clear. Negative emotions have an effect on the body. They can break your health. I’m sure you’ve heard the saying ‘worry yourself sick’.
Second, and more important point. Your brain is like a high-tech goal seeking missile. It takes whatever you focus on and makes it happen.
So if you focus on feeling miserable and how you’ll never get over acne, your brain goes ‘ok, if that’s what (s)he wants, I can make it happen’.
And emotions turbo charge this whole thing. The stronger the emotions you feel the faster it happens.
Your brain doesn’t care whether you focus on positive or negative. It just takes whatever is going through your mind and makes it true for you.
I talked about this quite a bit at lessons 5 of Acne 101. In a nutshell your brain either causes you to behave in a way that makes what you focus on come true, or it ‘alters’ your perception in a way that it seems true to you. As far as your experience is concerned they are the same thing.
Don’t believe me? Look at books on NLP, certain branches of psychology or self-development. They all say the same thing.
You get more of what you focus on.
Most people believe external circumstances cause them to feel bad or focus on the negative. And it certainly seems like it, but again, it’s not quite the whole story.
Here’s how negative emotions happen.
Something happens -> your perception of the event -> negative emotions.
Your perception of the event is what you think of it. What you say to yourself (or the voice in your head) and the pictures you make in your head. Your perception is also called ‘internal representation’.
The second step flies past so quickly that unless you look for it, you’ll never notice it. But it’s there and you’ll notice how this happens when you start looking.
Here’s the important part.
You have total control over your internal representations. If you choose to exercise it.
So it’s not the event itself that makes you feel bad. It’s how you perceive them.
Let me give you an example.
Say you get a new pimple. What goes through your mind when you notice it? I bet you immediately start to think of negative stuff. Like how it makes you look ugly. Or how again nothing you do works.
So it’s not the pimple that makes you feel bad, but what goes through your mind about the pimple and what it means to your life.
So all negative, and positive for that matter, emotions are self-created. You do them to yourself.
I’m not saying you do them intentionally. Or that you want them. It’s just that the internal representations fly past so quickly you don’t even notice them. They are on autopilot, and your past behavior programmed that autopilot.
But even if you are not aware of this, you still do it to yourself.
And because you do it to yourself, you can stop doing it. Or you can start putting a positive spin on this.
That’s when the magic starts to happen.
Breaking the pattern
You have two options for breaking the pattern.
- Catch yourself in the moment and refocus on something positive
- Schedule time everyday to think and imagine what you want
Let’s start with catching yourself in the moment. It simply means when you are focused on something you don’t want, such as how the new pimple ruins your life, you stop and force yourself to focus on something positive.
I’m not going to lie to you. Without meditation practice and reasonably good self-awareness this is difficult. For most people focusing on negative happens automatically. They are not driving the bus, simply sitting as passengers.
If you can do this, great. And you can with little practice. The way to do it is to keep it constantly on top of your mind. Let’s say you focused on the negative, felt bad and didn’t catch yourself. Just remind yourself to do it the next time. Maybe post notes around your house to keep this on top of your mind.
After the fact, it also helps to visualize (imagine) how you would have liked the situation to go. So imagine yourself in the situation and starting to feel negative. But instead of going down that path you stop yourself. Imagine focusing on positive and how that makes you feel better and how the situation turns into something positive.
By doing this over and over you train your brain to respond differently in the situation. You reprogram the autopilot.
Here’s another thing I recommend you do.
Visualize your life as you would like it to be. For example visualize how good your life would be without acne. Imagine all the things you could do. How much better your life would be. How much happier you would be. How you could get and do all those things you now can’t. See yourself with perfect skin.
Dwell on it. Obsess over it.
Don’t worry about practicality. Just fantasize. But fantasize in a particular way. Make it feel like it’s happening right now for you. Don’t project it into the future (so it’s happening at a future date). Visualize and feel it happening right now. Make it associated. See things through your own eyes; rather than watching a mental movie of yourself.
A good way to do this is to set aside 20 minutes every evening before going to bed. Do this sitting up so you don’t fall asleep.
Close your eyes or stare off into space, and think about what you want to experience in your life. Whatever you think about is fine, as long as it feels good to you.
The key is to find something that feels really good. Simply visualizing without emotions is not going to do you any good. So take as long as it takes to find something that excites you. Something that makes you feel good.
Bare minimum, do this exercise for 20 minutes at a time every day for a week. That’s seven days, not just five days. If you skip a day, start over from day one.
As you do this over and over you reprogram your mind. The autopilot that used to draw your focus on negative start to find positive things.
Your whole focus shifts. You will notice that you spend even more time thinking about what you want and less time worrying about what you don’t want.
Remember earlier we talked about how your brain makes the negative thoughts real to you? Well, it works in reverse also. Now your brain takes the positive images and feelings from your mind and starts to bring them to your reality.
You’ll start to get new ideas. You get attracted to new activities and things that help you move towards your goal. You may find books that contain solutions to your problems.
You start to get inspired to take action that moves you towards what you want. If exercise felt like struggle earlier you’ll do it happily now - as an example.
Whatever you do keep visualizing every evening. As you keep doing it, you’ll notice that life gently guides you towards the things you visualize.
So instead of instructing your brain to create more misery, acne and hopelessness you start creating hope, optimism and clear skin.
Clear Skin Coach has many more such exercises and takes this to a totally new level. It shows you how to build unstoppable motivation and eliminate struggle from getting clear. So the whole process is as easy and fun as possible. Clear Skin Coach comes as a part of the Clear for Life package.
But even this simple exercise, when done consistently, takes you long way towards permanently clear skin.
June 15th, 2008 at 7:13 am
great post Seppo, displays the true power of perception in creating your reality
June 18th, 2008 at 1:21 pm
[…] How to feel good even if you have acne […]
October 4th, 2008 at 4:47 pm
man,Seppo,you think exactly as i do..or i think exactly as you do
well,you know what i mean 
everything you do here helped me a lot..in perfecting some things.. but there’s always room for more improvements 
i just wanna say thanx 
don’t stop
July 16th, 2009 at 6:21 am
Yes, I totally agree. I’ll do it starting from today. Visualise what I want, how my skin is so clean, not oily, no white head and new acne anymore. A clear rosy skin soon……………