May 31, 2015

How does that make you feel?


How does that make you feel?
Introspection is a very important part of the work of a psychological. Talking about king the silence, explaining emotions, reflecting on reactions are all valuable to move the clinical process forward. That does not mean it has a place in life outside the clinician’s room. Even in the clinician’s room the process is frustrating and akward. Having a spouse ask you ‘how that makes you feel’ or to reflect on a given emotional action is less valuable in real life. In real life the primary goal is not merely self reflection but creating better relationships -which self reflection enables you to do. And example is when some says “I’m sorry I you felt that way” instead of acknowledging the hurt you are responsible for, rightly or wrongly, you place the focus on the person who is hurt and their responsibilities for the emotions. Self reflection on why things make you feel the way they make you feel is a valuable to for self growth but in a relationship acknowledging the other person is hurt without acknowledging your role in their hurt can lead to rejection and distance.

Childhood connection
Lots of people I the psychological field *don’t* care about a person’s childhood and don’t think it’s necessary in understanding someone or helping them change. Not everything is connected to your childhood and trying to connect everyone’s bad behavior to that time long ago is not only painfully annoying but shallow and deterministic. Over the course of several sessions -sometimes lasting years, psychologists concerned with childhood connection can do so in a valuable way that frees the client and help them to reflect and heal. Casual conversations about so and so being like such and such because of their childhood do neither and are too often and excuse rather than a starting point for change.

Psychological parlance in everyday language
Islamopobia, homophobia, transphobia, etc. Why?!? A phobia is a psychological disorder, none of the “phobias” listed above are. I suppose people think they’ll be taken more seriously if they use scientific language. People may very well be afraid of Islam, homosexuality or transgender and I’m not against it having a word but why conflate clinical psychological disorder and the everyday dislike or even hate for a particular group.

In short, be a normal person and just make things better when you’ve hurt someone instead of assessing their psychological state, be empathetic with the person you have in front of you instead of with their assumed childhood, hate can be taken seriously without giving it pseudo scientific names….

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