Mental health insights

The core of maintaining mental health for ordinary people is never to "eliminate negative emotions" or "maintain positivity and stability at all times", but to allow one's mental state to be "occasionally unhealthy" - giving up the obsession with "perfect emotions" and accepting the rationality of fluctuations is the most cost-effective way of psychological care.

Last month I just met a 26-year-old Internet operator who graduated in 985. She has never been angry in front of her colleagues in 3 years of working. She even broke up with her boyfriend of 4 years last month. She set a rule for herself to "stop crying after 15 minutes" for fear of delaying the next day's weekly report. As a result, last week she suddenly became unable to move at her workstation, and it was difficult to lift her fingers. She went to three hospitals and no organic problem was found. When she was transferred to us, her first words were "Am I so useless that I can't even control my emotions well?"

According to the traditional psychoanalytic school, this is a typical somatization caused by over-repression of emotions - the grievances, sadness, and anger that you hold back by pressing your head will not disappear out of thin air, but will only find a more hidden outlet to explode. Either there is a physical problem, or a sudden emotional collapse at a certain moment. Looking at it as a humanistic counselor, the root of the problem is that she regards "emotional stability" as a KPI that must be completed, and puts "the self that meets social expectations" before the "real self". She even pinches her watch when she is sad. This is essentially an extreme disrespect for her own feelings. Oh, by the way, positive psychology, which became very popular in the past few years, also went through the detour of "forced positivity" in its early days. It was only in recent years that academic circles added relevant research data: people who forcibly suppress negative emotions for a long time have 37% higher cortisol levels in their bodies than people who allow themselves to vent their emotions calmly, and their long-term risk of cardiovascular disease is about 20% higher.

It’s funny to say that I myself also made this mistake when I first entered the industry. At that time, I always felt that I was doing psychological work and that I had to be emotionally calm at all times. Even when I had an argument with my mother, I had to reflect on myself, "Am I having irrational beliefs again?" When the epidemic was at its worst the year before last, we had to receive 30 or 40 calls for help a day. There was a time when I didn’t even have the strength to speak when I went home, and I was still blaming myself, “Why can’t I even adjust my own emotions well and how can I help others?” Later, my supervisor gave me a clear idea: “If you deprive yourself of the right to be angry, tired, and impatient, you won’t be able to truly empathize with other people’s emotions when you receive counseling. ”

Nowadays, the Internet is full of content about "3 steps to get rid of a glassy heart" and "5 ways to achieve emotional freedom". Many people follow them, but the more they learn, the more anxious they become. They always feel that they can't even manage their emotions well and are simply a loser. In fact, if you think about it, what is the difference between this and forcing yourself to "no coughing, no runny nose, you must get better immediately" when you have a cold? Pressing hard can easily turn a small cold into pneumonia, and the same goes for emotions. Occasionally emoticon, sometimes not wanting to talk, and occasionally swearing in the air are essentially psychological "little colds", which are signals sent by the body to you: You have been too tired recently and it's time to take a rest. They are not a scourge at all.

Don't believe in any "standard emotion regulation methods". There is no right or wrong, and the one that suits you is the best. I once had a visitor who was a junior high school teacher. She had to take care of more than 40 half-year-old children every day. She was so angry that she had a headache every day. She tried mindfulness and meditation before, but the more she sat, the more annoyed she became. Later, she accidentally discovered that she was very relaxed when playing Lego, so she went home from get off work for two hours every day and put together a cabinet of thousands of pieces of puzzles and aircraft carrier models. Now she no longer forces herself to "regulate her emotions in a professional way". Playing Lego for two hours after get off work is more effective than practicing mindfulness three times.

I carry a palm-sized notebook in my pocket all the time. When I feel overwhelmed, I just write a few words, even if it's "I'm really annoyed today." I came across a foreign research conclusion a while ago, saying that people who allow themselves to accept negative emotions calmly can recover emotionally twice as fast as people who force themselves to be happy immediately. You see, the ancestors said that "blocking is worse than spreading", and when it comes to mental health, it is also an unbreakable truth.