Avoiding Avoidance

Pain (both physical and psychological) is universal. At some point in our lives many of us will experience feelings of depression, anxiety, despair, etc. However, what we do with this pain can have profound effects on our well-being and life. Pain is aversive, and, as such, understandably, we want to get rid of it. However, sometimes our attempts to get rid of pain end up making things worse. Perhaps the most common approach to trying to rid ourselves of our pain is avoidance. This can take numerous forms. For example, we may have an unpleasant thought such as, “I am no good”, which makes us feel sad. We may respond to this thought, therefore, by trying to push it out of our mind. Unfortunately, trying not to think something usually has the paradoxical effect of making it more likely that you will think it (You can try this out yourself. For the next two minutes try very hard not to think about ‘pink elephants’. What happens?). We may also start to avoid social situations because we think other people share this idea that we are no good. If we continue avoiding social situations, we may find that, over time, our friends and family do not call us as often and stop inviting us to social events, which just seems to confirm the idea that we are no good. The pain of that original thought “I am no good” has now been compounded by our efforts to avoid it. What can we do about this? Overcoming our avoidance of painful thoughts, feelings, and memories can take time and practice, especially as sometimes these patterns of thinking and behaving have become so ingrained that we are not even aware of what we are doing. A psychologist or counselor may be able to help you identify the ways your efforts to avoid pain are making things worse and enable you to respond to your pain in different ways by, for example, challenging the validity of painful thoughts, gradually reengaging with valued parts of your life that may have been given up, and learning to take a more detached, open, and accepting stance towards your painful thoughts, feelings, and memories.

Disclaimer: This blog does not provide or replace psychological treatment or evaluation. Contact a psychologist in your community if you are in need of individualized services.

Written by Eiryth Finnigan, PhD