MemphisCounselor

Emotions are a natural and critical bridge between our brains and our bodies.  They begin their work before we are consciously aware of them, causing nerve signals and hormones to rapidly move through our body.  It is only the sensation of these bodily reactions that makes us aware of the emotion.  Emotions come with an action potential; to focus attention, to fight, to withdraw, to run, etc.  Without adding thought to emotion, we are impulsive.  By adding thought, we can use emotions and thought together to make wise decisions.

Sometimes, emotions are at the center of problems we have.  An emotion may be so strong that it cuts off our ability to think.  Our fight/flight response may be so sensitive that non-threatening things are sensed as threats.  We may get stuck in one emotion.

When this happens, our response is often to try to avoid or control the emotion that seems to be the problem.  This almost always makes the problem worse.  Avoidance of thoughts and feelings is central to what causes a bad event to become a trauma and to stay that way for years.  It is also central to many situations where we become stuck in an emotion.  For example, fear of public speaking does not go away by avoiding public speaking, and in fact may become worse.  By being willing to speak in public despite the fear; noticing the fear but not buying into it’s message, the person finds that the feared catastrophes do not occur and she may even get positive feedback.  In any case, the person is choosing to do what she values, despite uncomfortable feelings and thoughts that she has which would otherwise constrain her life.  Similar examples can be used to demonstrate that avoidance/control of thoughts and feelings prevents the healing of shame, grief, guilt, anxiety, phobias, etc.

Control of thoughts and feelings doesn’t work for another reason.  In order to NOT think about something, we have to think about it, right?  For example, a man who has been bitten by a snake gets a rush of adrenaline every time he sees a coil of rope.  He can say, “I’m not going to think about the snake when I see the coil of rope.”  But then he just thought about the snake, strengthening the association between the coil of rope and the coiled up snake.  If, on the other hand, he goes to work in a rope factory it will not be long  till that association no longer exists.

Regulation of emotion, on the other hand, is the ability to increase or decrease our level of emotional arousal.  Emotions begin prior to our conscious recognition so cannot be stopped directly.  However, once we notice them, we can choose to alter the effect the emotion is having on our body.  The purpose of this is to allow the thinking part of our brain to work better so that our behavior is controlled by thought and emotion vs. just emotion (impulsivity).  For instance, if we find ourselves angry, we might use any of the following to lower our level of emotion:

1. Taking a few deep breaths
2. Monitoring our breathing to breathe fully but not hyperventilate.
3. Noticing our thoughts but only focusing on our present 5-senses experience.
4. Meditation
5. Soothing imagery
6. Progressive muscle relaxation
7. Looking upward at the ceiling, and/or moving our eyes back and forth between the corners of the ceiling and the walls.  The former reduces our brains access to emotion and the latter helps processing of emotion.

Similarly, if we feel numb, detached, or depressed, we might:

1. Make ourselves do something that we would ordinarily enjoy
2. Pay particular attention to our senses; notice five things we can hear, five things we can feel, five things we can see, etc.
3. Watch a funny television show or movie, even though we do not feel like doing so.
4. Listen to uplifting music.

Feeling numb, detached, or depressed is often an indication that emotion is being repressed (being kept from awareness by the unconscious).  This means that we are avoiding our emotions unconsciously,  so we need to get at those emotions and feel them.  Therapy can be helpful in this effort.

So what is the difference between distracting oneself by watching a movie (healthy) and avoiding emotions (unhealthy)?  The former is a conscious activity.  It also is a control of attention rather than trying to control the thought or emotion.  One chooses to distract oneself for a period of time and can come back to the troubling thought or feeling at a more opportune time.  Avoidance is often unconscious.  Some examples of avoidant behavior include substance use/abuse, aggressive behavior, passive behavior, withdrawal, denial, cutting off relationships, rationalization, saying “I don’t know” or “I don’t care”, blaming others, staying at home, not meeting new people, pulling other people into our dramas, overeating, compulsive shopping, . . . the list is endless.  Although we are conscious that we are doing these things, we are not conscious of why.

The key to healing of emotion-centered problems is being willing to move forward with life in spite of the uncomfortable thoughts and feelings; to notice and tolerate them and to not buy into their message.  The goal is to learn from ongoing experience rather than from fears generated by our minds.