August 16/15
Re-starting of this blog after hiatus of 6 years.
 
Christine Baldwin proposes that the kind of story we construct of our lives plays a fundamental role in how we live our lives. She states “We all need a story to stand on: a core belief that affirms who we are, which we won’t relinquish no matter what.” She goes on to describe how we create the “story” of our life by selecting certain memories and then linking them together to form a coherent narrative. A life story that is affirming and supportive is a positive and adaptive one; one that is undermining and critical of the self is negative and maladaptive. According to the cognitive psychotherapy approach, an extremely maladaptive life story could actually contribute to clinical depression.

Although we cannot change one iota of what happened to us in the past, we can change the kinds of memories we link into our self- narrative. Baldwin writes “When we link evidence of inadequacy, our lives take on psychological pallor; when we link evidence of worth, our lives take on psychological vitality.” Later she states “We create these links, and we can unlink them: we call this changing our mind.”
 
Since writing my life story 6 years ago as described in my last post, quite a few changes have occurred in my life. I will describe these briefly as they lead to my re-launching of this blog.   Science continues to play a central role in my life as it did 6 years ago, indeed as it has since early childhood. However as a practicing clinical psychologist in helping persons with Asperger's  syndrome, I discovered that I too was on the autism spectrum continuum.  And I found out that my relatively intense and rather narrow interest in science is quite common among professional scientists. Indeed I have  encountered at least two other scientists with Asperger's in my clinical work. My Asperger's explains my life long difficulties in social interactions e.g. making chit chat at parties.  I also found out that I was on the ADHD continuum, as about 25% of persons with Asperger's are, which explained my difficulty in staying focused on something long enough to complete it.  It is only through my intense interest in science that I persisted and obtained two Ph.D.'s.

Today my new life narrative includes that fact that I will consciously take time to treasure the joy which science brings into my life and weave it even more tightly into the tapestry of my life story.  Hence the re-launching of this blog.  At the same time I have more self-compassion about not being the most socially adept person, and not winning any Nobel prizes.  As Baldwin points out,  “We all need a story to stand on: a core belief that affirms who we are, which we won’t relinquish no matter what.”

Copyright © 2015 by Dr. Brian S. Scott