Dedicated to: Yocelin 

Introduction.

Our minds remember for a very specific reason: to know how to better behave in the future. The more predictable and stable the cause and effect -as in chess- the more useful that memory becomes. Being able to find casualty and how factors can induce different outcomes is one of the most powerful weapons life has created. We as humans have polished this art to turn into science, nonetheless, in our daily life it is very hard to note what are the true causes of our behavior.

The more out of line our behavior is to what we think are our values the more uncomfortable our mind becomes. Saying one thing and doing another is very stressful for our body, it even has a specific term in psychology; cognitive dissonance.

We do not like to be contradictory. It hurts. But it is also very common to dislike what we do, feel and think; being regretful is the norm rather than the exception. Deep psychologists like Jung and Freud knew that behind our behavior is a complex and intricate machinery. Not being able to access the foundation of our acting is actually an advantage -as any Linux user knows- but it also can hinder the process of healing; without awareness of what is happening we cannot realistically expect to improve nor control anything.

Inexplicable outrage.

Because I know I cannot be sure about anything I often use the phrase “I would bet that is right” to denote I have confidence that something is either true or false. In this case, I would bet that you, at some time in your life, did something that you regret. It does not matter what it was, what matters is the negative aftermath you felt.

The «origin» of these reactions often feels very stupid, we may even describe them as pity, nonetheless they were enough to trigger a strong emotional response. These reactions probably did even scare, disappoint or made you angry “How I was capable of doing that?”, “How I was that stupid?”.

It is very easy to get confused. You believe you know yourself, but what happened completely contradicts that hypothesis. You may not accept it, but you have crossed paths with an unknown and darker part of yourself. It may even freak you out, “if I was incapable of controlling myself then I must be crazy, wouldn’t I?”.

The truth is that we, at the end of the day, we continue to be animals. Our brain is actually triune: –as Paul MacLean stated– it contains a lizard –the one controlling our deepest survival instincts–, a mammal –the one controlling feelings, habits and memory– and a human brain –controlling our reason, imagination and language. Our survival has been dependent on the interdependence of these three brains, but we only can directly access our neocortex or human brain.

Many of the open cycles we develop through time form in our childhood where our brains were more malleable and influenceable. Our neural circuitry is not formed directly from our birth –as other animals do– but it builds itself from experience.

These patterns continue to unfold without outside our consciousness, ideally when we receive feedback we can judge if they work: if they indeed are effective we maintain them, if not they are changed or completely abandoned. 

Either abandoning or changing them is very difficult. To abandon the patterns is to abandon the causes that trigger them, a false alternative in many instances. To change them is to work through the causes and replace our responses with more effective strategies, the caveat here is that we cannot control our feelings, we can only tame them. 

Trying to do the contrary, to actually decide directly what feelings we want to have is associated with a greater negative intensity in the same feelings –caused probably by frustration and hopelessness– for example saying to someone stop being so sad or stop loving someone will only make their incapacity more visible. 

Acknowledging that limitation is necessary. We have to know that the real pathway to actually finding the causes and the solutions of these unexplainable outrages we have to reflect and work inward. 

Breaking the patterns.

We need to mobilize the power of our 2 automatic, reactive brains to the jurisdiction of the neocortex, the only brain that we can directly influence. We can do this with many strategies but I think the most straightforward approach is labeling: giving a name and a cause to these impulses.

“Our emotional self thrives in ignorance” as the author Robert Greene wrote in the laws of human nature. If we bring light to the darker, most mysterious parts of our unconscious we do not only make the emotion weaker but we also realize that often they probably were never strong at all.

Physiologically this transfer of information to different parts of our brains works precisely as we would think it does. A fear, for example, can give intense signals to the amygdala –part of the mammal brain– and once labeled, it literally moves to the frontal part of our cortex, associated with language.

To do a proper label –either in you or in a counterpart– you need to remember that you are implicitly accepting it as it is. This means that there must be no judgment beforehand, just definition. Judging, as I explained earlier, is just going to make the feeling stronger and harder to deal with.

Begin with the emotion. What exactly am I feeling? Anger? Envy? Disappointment? Sadness?… Be as precise as you can, different emotions denote different responses in the body, tone of voice and the words used. Pay careful attention, see how stressed you or the other is, look for pacifying behaviors —habits used unconsciously to try to comfort oneself, such as nail biting, pulling of hair or touching your face. 

Once you have a concrete grasp of what feeling is present, look for a cause. What could have happened to trigger this feeling? Because our emotions are designed to fade quickly, have a bias towards recent events. If you paid attention to the person before his arousal you could have seen a small reaction immediately after his emotional trigger. Sudden changes of behavior are a strong signal of the presence of an emotion.

Now, after you think you know enough information, be direct and state your label out loud. Do not overthink it; if you are wrong with your label you will be corrected. Remember to just stay true to the facts, do not categorize or try to “solve” the problem directly, as you will only trigger defensiveness. Your brain does not like to be judged, it does not matter if the judge is you.

Was your label incorrect? Do not worry, just keep gathering information. Be creative. Remember the trouble we are dealing with has an irrational nature. Ask lots of questions, specially of things that you genuinely do not understand. Be patient, it may feel like a lot of work but this approach has the potential to destroy the problem once and for all.

Was your label correct? Fine, continue to dig. Open cycles may manifest themselves in pitiful ways, so do not think that the work is finished once you cut one of the hydra heads. Go deeper, as deep as you can but always remember to be gentle because you are reopening a painful wound.

Do not worry about finding a solution. The magic of being rational with our emotions is that we do not actually need to solve anything. Once we know enough, once we have wither our irrationality then the solution is natural.

Conclusion.

Our lives can be truly hard. There are emotions and underlying needs that we do not completely understand. They become stronger because we have refused to confront them in the first place and the most painful thing of it all is that we have reason to do so.

Our modern society is too focused on performance that we actually leave our health and well being to an indefinite time. Our society often shames people for the mere experience of having trouble. We are surrounded by so many people that appear to be perfect and by so few that actually talk of their struggles –and the ones who do often do it for a desire to have power or visibility– that we often feel incompetent in comparison.

We have plenty of reasons to avoid these problems, but the consequences can be truly devastating if we leave the control of our lives in irrational hands, even if those hands are ours.

Be compassionate with yourself, other people will most surely not be. You are not alone. Have patience in your progress and remember that while you are still alive you can influence your future to a better one, for you and those who you care for.

If you need someone remember that you can contact me. Without anything more to say, goodbye.

Photo by Henry & Co. on Unsplash