“I’m not saying TV Tropes is right about everything,” I typed into the chat window, “but right now it understands your life better than you do.”

I have invented a new form of psychotherapy

I call it Cognitive Trope Therapy

the way it works is that when you have a thought, you write it down

like, say

“You are different from the others. You will never know their innocence… and that is why you should hate your own existence. Die. Die. Die.”

then you figure out whether, if your life were a fantasy novel, these words would be spoken by figures wearing black robes, and speaking in a dry, whispering voice, and they are actually withered beings who touched the Stone of Evil

and if so then you don’t listen

I would write this up as a pop psych bestseller but it would be only two pages long

now

I know what you are thinking

you are thinking “but what if the whispering voice seems like it might have a point”

and to this I say

there are various stages of life, mood, and skill where you may be better off JUST NOT LISTENING TO ANYTHING THE LONE POWER WHISPERS INTO YOUR EAR AT NIGHT even if it “SOUNDS LIKE IT MIGHT HAVE A POINT”

times when you should leave the carefully optimal reasoning to WIZARDS IN OTHERWISE GOOD MENTAL HEALTH and instead be like “NA NA NA NA I’M NOT LISTENING” and then go BACK TO SLEEP

next you’re thinking “but mightn’t it be important that I listen to thoughts that seem painful, and consider them carefully to decide if maybe they’re reasonable after all?”

well the advice of Cognitive Trope Therapy here is straightforward



just pretend you are in a fantasy novel and ask yourself what you would be yelling at the character on the page



like ask yourself whether these possibly important words are being spoken by the kindly old witch who has approached the fanatic knight with concern in her eyes and implored him to realize that he will only hurt others more by what he is doing



so that if the knight character was like “okay maybe you have a point let’s talk about this logically” you would jump into the air for joy at seeing the trope subverted by this surprisingly intelligent character



then you should listen to this KINDLY witch whose voice DOES NOT CARRY ANY HISSING UNDERTONE



but if you haven’t been eating well or sleeping well and things have been going wrong in your life



and the book has zoomed out to show you this poor, drained character staggering through the wilderness



and just then a figure clad in back rises up and hisses, “you sshould lissten to me, a good rationalisst would lissten to me, I might be telling the truth… maybe your friends really do hate you…”



then what you would cheer at



is this tired, despairing character unexpectedly going “FRAK THIS FOR MY FAITH IS A SHIELD PROOF AGAINST YOUR BLANDISHMENTS” and kicking the black-clad figure in the face



while the character soberly nodding and saying, “Yes, I should totally pick this moment of my life to hear you out and rationally consider whether to find a dark fulfillment in serving the Outer Death God” is going to cause you to FACEPALM because you know this is NOT GOING TO END WELL

it makes you want to yell at the character to have some common sense instead of blindly following the plot

and that’s how Cognitive Trope Therapy says to decide whether to listen carefully to an inner voice

I mean

maybe you can’t just write self-insert fanfiction of your own mental life and declare it to be canon

(unless you can)

but you probably have enough author power to make your character be the one who says “And now for the recruitment speech” right before the Abyssal One launches into their dramatic monologue, instead of TAKING IT ALL AT FACE VALUE

maybe that’s not OPTIMAL reasoning but it’s better than TREATING THE NAZGUL AS YOUR VOICE OF SANITY

like sure yes there is more to clear thinking than being a Genre Savvy Level 1 Intelligent character inside your own mental universe

but if you haven’t mastered that part yet then start there



this concludes my pop psych bestseller

the end