All Those Bastards on The Committee

Toxic:  Very harmful or unpleasant in an insidious or pervasive way. 

One of the favorite bits we hear often in Alcoholics Anonymous mentions a shadowy essence called "The Committee," a group of gibbering fools who live deep in our heads, firmly entrenched and brooking no dissent, spending their time and energy shrieking and screaming contradictory information at a high volume.  

Think we're special in The Rooms?  Here are the Toltecs: "The mind can also talk and listen to itself.  Part of the mind is speaking, and the other part is listening.  It is a big problem when a thousand parts of your mind are all speaking at the same time.  Each one has different thoughts and feelings; each  one has a different point of view.  This mental chaos is the reason humans hardly know what they want, how they want it, or when they want it.  They don't agree with themselves because there are parts of the mind that want one thing, and other parts that  want exactly the opposite."

Here's a huge Seaweed stereotype: Men come in A.A. angry and defiant and certain that the problem is with someone else and women come in depressed and guilty and ashamed and certain that they're the problem.  There are obviously many variations of this stereotype but it makes me aware that a One Size Fits All approach is a fool's errand.  If someone is sure that they're responsible for all the world's woes it hardly makes sense to come at them with a heavy hand.  If someone is feeling like crap it's not helpful for me to agree.  Guys need to be knocked off their high horse and women need to be helped back into the saddle.

Funny side note on why relationships between A.A. members can be a disaster: a woman who feels like shit believing that she's the problem connects with a guy who is sure he isn't the problem and is looking for someone he can blame.  The definition of toxic.