Handling Emotions and Thoughts
The natural trap – avoiding and struggling with unpleasant emotions, thoughts and sensations
Avoiding pain is an instinctive and natural part of life for most humans. In the heat of summer we avoid walking barefoot on hot roads or pricking our finger on a thorn bush. This makes complete sense. Similarly, we're inclined to avoid feeling psychological pain such as the anxiety most of us feel if we have to speak in front of a group of people. Again, this is a natural human reaction. However, there is a catch. It is not always easy or even possible to avoid psychological pain altogether and to do so often comes at a cost. Just living inevitably results in psychological pain such as the worry we feel when someone close to us falls ill.
Can we “get rid of” or avoid psychological pain?
We can try and “get rid of” or avoid painful thoughts and emotions and there are short term ways of doing this. For example, a person could use alcohol or other drugs to take there mind off worry or to “numb” unpleasant emotions. However, these strategies are usually short term and don't last long. Worse still, they usually have a downside and some long term costs e.g. alcoholism. The more we focus on avoiding something the more likely we are to bring it on. Consider what happens when you try to stop yourself from worrying. The more you try and stop it the more you tend to worry and before you know it your worried and worrying more about being worried and around it goes.
Learning Activity:
Ask yourself, what sorts of thoughts and emotions have I been trying to “get rid of”.
What have I been doing to avoid feeling unpleasant, thoughts, emotions or physical feelings.
Ask yourself, what has it cost me (in terms of time, energy, living) trying handle things this way.
What have you tried and how well has it worked?
Acceptance as an alternative to avoidance
As an alternative to trying to run from, get rid of or avoid unpleasant thoughts and feelings Acceptance and Commitment Therapy suggests that each of us can learn to better manage our psychological discomfort by developing “mindfulness” skills. There are many different ways of developing mindfulness but in each the core principles remain the same. We are learning to:
stay focused on the present moment (what we are experiencing right now) and
acknowledge and accept the thoughts and feelings we are having (even when they are unpleasant thoughts and feelings).
It is important to recognize that these skills generally require practice and continuous effort. However, with time anyone can develop these skills. To begin, read and practice the attached mindfulness worksheets and/or listen to the mindfulness practice tracks on the CD. I suggest putting aside 5 to 10 minutes each day to listen to the CD or practice one of these skills quietly but also try some of the real-time skills you can practice throughout the day.
Augustine Hwee Clinical Psychologist