self-healing mechanism

The self-healing mechanism is essentially not the "superpower to eliminate pain" as people mistakenly believe, but a non-pathological compensatory system that is inherent in the human body and mind and actively regulates cognition, repairs emotions, and rebuilds inner balance after encountering stressful events or traumatic experiences. It is not an innate and constant skill, but can be strengthened through acquired active intervention. At the same time, there are obvious individual differences, and there is no unified standard of effectiveness.

I met a girl who worked in Internet operations two years ago. She was cut off from projects, laid off, and broke up with her boyfriend of three years. When the triple blow struck, she cried at home for three days without even opening the curtains. Her friends were afraid that something might happen to her and took her for psychological counseling. As a result, she went downstairs in slippers on the afternoon of the third day. She carried two large bags of cans and squatted at the door of her unit to feed stray cats. She fed them for two months. Later, when she talked about this with a counselor, the other person said that the moment she squatted downstairs to open the cans, her body's self-healing mechanism was actually activated automatically - it was not at all "idle and escaping from reality" as others said.

As for how this mechanism works, different academic schools have quite different opinions. Researchers of classic psychoanalysis prefer to interpret it as a "positive upgrade of the defense mechanism." They say that when people encounter severe pain, their subconscious will automatically bypass coping modes such as suppression, denial, and regression that are easy to cause internal friction, and instead use more gentle coping modes such as sublimation and replacement. Digest emotions in a harmonious way - just like the girl who feeds the cat, she actually projects her current need to "be taken care of and be seen" onto the stray cat that is weaker than her. The process of feeding the cat is essentially soothing the injured self who is huddled in the corner. However, this set of explanations has also been questioned a lot in recent years. Many people feel that psychoanalysis always pulls problems back to childhood experiences and subconsciousness, which in turn weakens people's current subjective initiative.

Most of the people who hold this opinion are researchers in positive psychology and cognitive neuroscience. In their view, there is no mysterious subconscious drive. Self-healing is simply an intuitive manifestation of the brain's neuroplasticity: under long-term stress, the amygdala, which is responsible for fear and anxiety, will be abnormally active, while the function of the prefrontal cortex, which is responsible for decision-making and rational thinking, will be suppressed. When you start When you start to do something that does not consume your emotions at all and can give you a small sense of certainty, the activity of the prefrontal cortex will slowly recover and gradually take over the control of your emotions - even if what you are doing is just building Lego, cleaning the range hood, or even refolding the clothes at home according to color, as long as this thing can give you the feeling of "I can control something", it can provide a fulcrum for healing.

Oh, by the way, there is another pitfall that many people have stepped on, which is that self-healing must be "positive energy" and you have to force yourself to "reconcile with the past" and "forgive those who hurt you" to be successful. I once met a girl who was PUA in the workplace for a whole year. After leaving her job, she signed up for several therapy classes. She forced herself to write an awareness diary every day to "let go of her resentment towards the leader." As a result, the more she wrote, the more anxious she became, and her hands shook when she thought about that experience. Later, she simply stopped taking classes and went to the boxing gym three times a week to box. She pasted the face of a human target into a photo of her former boss. She continued boxing for more than three months. The last time I saw her, she had been promoted to the director of a new company. She said, "I still haven't forgiven that idiot, but I don't care about him anymore. He's nothing." You see, there is never a standard answer to healing. Allowing yourself to move forward with resentment and not forgiving is also part of the self-healing mechanism.

I once met an aunt who ran a sewing and mending stall in the community. She was in her fifties. Her son died in a car accident a few years ago. When the accident first happened, she couldn't even get out of bed. Later, for some reason, she set up a sewing and mending stall. She mended schoolbags for children in the community, mended suit buttons for office workers, and mended holes in down jackets. She repaired them for five years. I once had a big hole in my down jacket and went to her to mend it. While she embroidered a little tiger to cover the hole, she told me, "Every time I mend a hole, I feel that the hole in my heart is also filled a little bit." What type of therapy do you think she is doing? It’s nothing, but it’s useful.

Of course, many people now question the effectiveness of self-healing and feel that it is often "self-deception". Many people even make a lot of money by selling the anxiety of "self-healing". It sounds outrageous to heal the original family in seven days and get rid of depression in 21 days. Objectively speaking, the boundaries of self-healing are actually very clear: it is only suitable for dealing with emotional trauma and stress reactions within the normal range. If you have suffered from long-term insomnia, physical pain, and are unable to socialize and work normally, don't force yourself to do it. You should find a doctor and take medicine when you should. Self-healing is a supplement, not a medicine for treating diseases. If you insist on it, it will easily delay things.

When I'm so stressed that I can't write anything, I like to clean the range hood. I wear rubber gloves and spray the oil out with it. I remove the filter and brush it until it's shiny. The oil box is washed so that it can reflect light. After cleaning, I stand in the kitchen and look at the bright range hood. I feel that the messy threads in my brain have been washed away along with the oil stains. It’s pretty boring to say, but for me, it’s much more useful than half an hour of meditation.

A few days ago, I met the girl who fed the cats again at the gate of the community. She was carrying a cat bag with her adopted Sanhua, and she was going to get vaccinated. She has now found a new job, operating pet content, and just put her previous experience to use. When the wind blew her bangs, she smiled and told me, "I used to feel that the sky was falling, but now I realize that when the sky fell, I was still holding the umbrella in my hand."

You see, there are no invincible people. The so-called self-healing simply means that your body is supporting you and handing you the umbrella.