The one that worked for me was to rid myself of Borderline Personality Disorder entirely. In fact, this is the only ‘treatment’ possibility whatsoever that can do anything at all to address the chronic emptiness felt by sufferers of Borderline Personality Disorder.
“But wait…” You say, “I didn’t think ridding yourself of the disorder was an option.”
I know you didn’t, and you should ask yourself why that is. Maybe you need to stop trusting the sources of information that led you to believe such a thing.
I had Borderline Personality Disorder for at least 35 years completely unaware. It was as deeply woven into the fabric of my life as it is for anybody. Remarkably, I managed to eliminate it from my life, and I now enjoy good emotional health, authentically. The process took me about seven years, more or less, and the greatest obstacle to my achievement of this was the same sources of information providing all of the misdirection and lies that have you wondering what sorts of ‘treatments’ you should be looking for to help you live with chronic emptiness.
The chronic emptiness you’re referring to is a symptom of Borderline Personality Disorder. As I have explained in my work a million times, nobody ever fixed any problem by focusing on, and addressing, the symptom of a problem.
Let’s say you have terrible headaches because of a brain tumor. The headaches are problematic, but they aren’t the problem. When you take Aspirin, have you addressed the problem? No, of course you haven’t. You’ve merely treated the symptom - temporarily. Has your problem gone away?
You already know the answer to this. Why anybody on the internet thinks the formula works any differently for things like Borderline Personality Disorder is a real study in human psychology.
If chronic emptiness is a symptom of Borderline Personality Disorder, the correct question to be asking is what is the cause of Borderline Personality Disorder, and how do I address that? Because you see, if you never identify and address the underlying cause, anything you do to ‘treat’ your chronic emptiness is ultimately a waste of time, attention, and effort. Just like taking Aspirin for a brain tumor, the problem is not going to go away, and whatever relief you get will be temporary, fleeting, and artificial.
Every single person with Borderline Personality Disorder lives with two subconscious, or unconscious, foundation certainties. These are underlying misperceptions that they live with, whether they are aware of it or not:
1. My feelings are inherently irrelevant and shameful, devoid of inherent worth.
2. If my feelings are inherently irrelevant and shameful, devoid of inherent worth, then so am I.
Notice, these two beliefs involve things of an inherent nature, and it is this perception about their inherent nature that causes the greatest amount of chaos.
Something that is inherent is that way naturally. Nothing external has to make it that way. So for example, ice is inherently cold. ‘Cold’ is an inherent aspect of what makes ice, ice. ‘Cold’ is the inherent, natural state of ice. It always has been, and it always will be. No external factor will ever change this, and in fact, nothing at all will ever change this. For ice to not be cold would mean you now how something else, but whatever it is, it ain’t ice.
Do you see, inherent aspects involve inseparable features of what makes a thing a thing.
So when I say that folks with Borderline Personality Disorder live with an erroneous, subconscious, underlying perspective that they themselves and their feelings are inherently irrelevant and shameful, devoid of worth - this is a big deal. It means that they perceive this as the natural, inherent state of the very nature of what they are as people, as well as the very reality making up their feelings.
When I say that they view their feelings and they themselves as devoid of inherent value, this is a huge deal. It means that they perceive their own natural state, and the natural state of their feelings, as being completely without any value whatsoever. In order to have value, something external has to provide it.
Nobody who lives with the false, underlying certainty that they are naturally devoid of inherent value, and that any sense of value they will ever get to experience is dependent on external things, can ever truly feel anything other than empty.
What is the opposite of feeling empty, and where does it come from?
The opposite of feeling empty is the feeling of self-sufficiency and contentment. It is simply a naturally-occurring result of living with the understanding that you have inherent worth, which as you may have noticed is the exact opposite foundation belief system than the one folks with Borderline Personality Disorder walk around with.
People who live with the fundamental underlying certainty that they and their feelings have inherent worth do not walk around feeling empty. Feeling empty is not a naturally occurring product of such a belief system. Consider some of the naturally-occurring results that simply come with knowing that you and your feelings have inherent value, and compare them to what you know about what it’s like to live with Borderline Personality Disorder:
Emotionally-healthy people who live with the foundation perception that they and their feelings inherently matter…
Do not depend on anything external in order to temporarily experience a fleeting sense of value.
Are able to maintain contentment no matter what is going on around them, because…
…they themselves are generating their own sense of worth from within themselves.
They don’t need others to ‘complete’ them, because they complete themselves.
They don’t view negative experiences in life as being ‘confirmations’ that they are worthless. Because of this they…
…don’t perceive everything as personal affronts.
They are self-confident and relaxed.
They experience lives of relative peace and genuine contentment.
They have no compulsion to compensate, or ‘make up’ for their imaginary worthlessness.
They don’t walk around in a state of perpetual frustration with life.
They don't feel empty.
They genuinely like themselves, and treat themselves as if they do.
These are just a few naturally-resulting effects of living with the (accurate) understanding that being a person means that you and your feelings have inherent value. I pulled them off the top of my head. If we were trying to create a comprehensive list, it would go on for many pages.
By contrast, let’s create a similar list for people who believe that they and their feelings are inherently irrelevant and shameful, devoid of inherent worth:
They depend completely on external sources of validation at all times, because…
…they are completely incapable, as long as they live with this emotional disorder, of generating their own sense of worth from within, for themselves.
Any sense of contentment they get to enjoy depends on what others are doing, or what is happening around them.
They are on a never-ending mission to find external things to supply themselves with a sense of fullness. (They’re constantly trying to fill their emptiness.) This involves material things, food, sex, pets, even other people.
They view potential romantic partners as being their saviors who will ‘complete’ them (because they are unable to feel ‘whole’ on their own).
They subconsciously perceive every negative experience in life as confirmation of what they already believe: That they are shit. By extension, they…
…sensitively view every negative thing as a personal affront.
They have to fake self-confidence. They walk around in a state of tenseness and anxiety.
They live perpetually frustrated because their lives are disordered.
They live in constant shame over who they are. They are constantly trying to compensate or ‘make up’ for being worthless.
They feel empty. Nothing external can ever satisfy the feeling of emptiness. It’s an endless pit; no matter how much they shove into it, the feeling of emptiness persists.
They secretly loathe themselves, and the way they treat themselves (including the way they neglect themselves) regularly demonstrates this.
Did the person we just described sound familiar? Yes, the person should sound familiar. And now, you should be beginning to understand why the person with Borderline Personality Disorder feels, thinks, and behaves the way he or she does, as well as the underlying cause for this.
As you can see, seeking a ‘treatment’ for the symptom of emptiness is not constructive. Rather, the only true solution is working to understand, and undo the underlying causes - that is, the problem.
My work here with The Last Symptom, LLC (thelastsymptom.com) is meant to help people focus on the right things, avoid the lies, misdirection, and misinformation that saturate this topic, and to gain the insights that will truly help them understand and eliminate the very causes of Borderline Personality Disorder once and for all. After all, you don’t want to still be popping Aspirins for the rest of your life and forever dealing with the same problems.
I strongly encourage all to take advantage of my free, weekly podcast titled The Last Symptom, which is available on every major podcast platform of your preference. There, I comprehensively address all things related to Borderline Personality Disorder and authentic recovery.