Everyone says that avoiding emotions is bad. But it is not always the case

Explain with a psychologist

There are so many bad events that we begin to move away from negative experiences. For some people, avoidance is a habitual strategy that comes up in other situations as well. However, it does not always help a person to cope with difficulties over a long distance. Psychologist and coordinator of the school for psychologists "Pure Cognition" Regina Yakubzhanova explains in which cases avoidance helps, and in which it only makes it worse.

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Avoidance is difficult to categorize because the same behavior can perform different functions. You can watch the series after a working day both for relaxation and to escape from problems. For example, in order not to face the feeling of loneliness when you are alone with yourself. Reading a book can help you relax, or it can be an excuse not to talk to your husband about unpleasant topics.

All people tend to avoid what causes discomfort. We do it every day.

Problems start when this strategy is used too often. Regular avoidance of the same unpleasant experiences, one way or another, has negative consequences and leads a person to abandon some activity. For example, refusing to meet people, be alone with yourself, or do some things that are familiar to you. This, in turn, begins to affect social life, physical and mental state.

When is avoidance harmful?

• If, after experiencing a big shock or an important event (for example, the loss of a loved one, war, emigration, a sharp loss of a job), we avoid experiences (try not to think, change the topic, take up time with anything, so as not to face our feelings) and do not return to them when the resource was replenished. Such situations threaten with serious consequences: the psyche is injured if the stage of experience does not pass. Relatively speaking, we take an injury, put it in a suitcase and think that it no longer bothers us. In fact, it greatly affects mental processes: in order to avoid these experiences, the psyche spends a lot of effort and resources.
• Avoidance behavior can affect the quality of life in general: functionality, performance, mental health, socialization.

A striking example of avoidance behavior that clearly harms a person is the use of psychoactive substances. Most often, people take them when they want to move away from unpleasant experiences and quickly feel something pleasant. Another example is workaholism. A person can feel confident and successful at work: he succeeds, he is praised, and he works more and more. At the same time, he does not deal with personal issues that are important to him, but unpleasant.

When avoiding, we make a choice in favor of something else, but pleasant. For example: do not enter into a difficult conversation with a partner, but stay late at work, where everything works out for you. At the moment you feel good, but then you get worse, because guilt and responsibility are added for the fact that the problem at home is getting worse. And you again go headlong into work so as not to feel anything. This accumulates like a snowball, and in the long run, avoidance most often leads to a worse situation - a big scandal with a partner or a divorce.

And in what cases is it not harmful?

There is a common myth that avoidance is bad. Because of this, people who resort to it may feel ashamed of themselves and think that something is wrong with them. Although avoiding a specific situation once or twice is not scary: in this way a person can help his psyche accumulate a resource in order to cope with something difficult.

You can judge whether avoidance helps you or not by the consequences. For example, you are afraid of public speaking and refuse it. In one case, this will not affect your life in any way, in another they may be important for a career or the realization of your values. In this case, avoidance will move you away from the desired result, that is, interfere.

Avoidance doesn't hurt:

• when the psyche is exhausted and the removal from unpleasant experiences is a temporary scenario, and after a while the person still returns to the problem;
• conscious avoidance, when a person goes for it with an understanding of the consequences.

It is important to remember that we all have a basic right to avoid: this is a normal defense mechanism. But we need to be prepared for the consequences of our choice: if we choose short-term avoidance, then either we return to these experiences later, or avoidance will harm us.

How to learn not to avoid unpleasant experiences?

First you need to learn to stop and notice what is happening to you now, how you feel. In the conditions of the modern rhythm of life, in which it is customary to rush and achieve as much as possible, this is not the most obvious occupation. However, slowing down is very important. Several steps can be distinguished.

1. Determine what is important to you

Avoidance is a movement away from something, and there is also a movement towards something: important, valuable, pleasant. Values ​​are a guide, a beacon that helps you understand whether you are living the life you want and what actions you need to take on the way to it.

Two tools can help in the "inventory" of values:
1) the value compass - an exercise that will help break life into areas and find out what is important in each of them;

2) a list of 40 values ​​- a list of the most common values ​​from which you can choose what resonates with you the most.

1. Identify actions that will help move towards values

It is important to add an action to each value that will help you get closer to the desired result. For example, in order to realize the value of taking care of yourself, you need to follow the daily routine and nutrition, and do exercises. Another example: when the value of partnership and cooperation with others is important to a person, he may have to enter into unpleasant negotiations that are inevitable in human relationships. The problem at this stage is often that the steps towards value can be quite unpleasant.

1. Learn to endure and experience uncomfortable sensations

To do this, you need to listen to yourself. Ask questions: what am I doing now? How do I feel? Where is my attention? What thoughts and feelings am I experiencing? What are they pushing me to? Will it help me in the long run?

At this stage, you can try mindfulness practices - they help train acceptance of your thoughts and feelings. You can use the audio recordings of the meditations from one of these two links or other resources that are available to you.

What should I do if I notice that a loved one is avoiding?

Most often, the only thing that can be done in such a situation is to tell a loved one about your anxiety and feelings. We can only speculate why a person pulls away, or if they do it at all.

In the case when the other person's avoidance behavior interferes with us (for example, when it is not just a friend, but a family member with whom you live), you need to talk not only about your feelings, but also about the specific consequences that you face due to his behaviour.

For a person who is used to avoiding, becoming aware of what is happening is a very difficult and often unpleasant process, at this stage we can offer help and support. But if you have already contacted him several times and he has not heard you, then the likelihood that this will happen in the near future is low.

In this case, the most environmentally friendly way to take care of yourself is likely to be to minimize communication. It can be painful, even a feeling of guilt may appear: they say, we leave a person when it is difficult for him. But we should keep in mind that there is really nothing we can do in such a situation.