If you want to understand how you will feel in the future, look at others who have experienced something similar.
Change is stressful - it's completely normal.
When an animal sees something new, then it tenses and initially treats it very anxiously. The secretion of adrenaline increases, the whole body is mobilized, the muscles are ready for active movements, and attention is focused.
In popular literature, stress is associated with a negative phenomenon, but in reality it is not. Under the influence of stress, a person not only feels a surge of physical strength - his brain functions also improve.
Scientists have found that a person remembers better in a stressful situation, since in the process of analyzing and processing information, the brain begins to use not only the hippocampus, but also the amygdala, that is, reserves are included.
But nature did not lay down mechanisms for survival in the regime of prolonged stress. It is impossible to keep the body in a state of increased mobilization for a long time. From the point of view of evolution, if an animal could not cope with a situation, run away, win or somehow get away from it, then most likely it is already dead or eaten by another animal.
On the one hand, the world is becoming dynamic and fast-paced, and on the other, stressful situations become extremely protracted. Even some minor conflict at work can drag on for several months or even years, and what can we say about more serious problems, such as divorce.
This kind of prolonged dysfunctional stress is called distress. The fact is that long-term experiences take away our cognitive resources, and a vicious circle turns out: the more we suffer, the less energy remains to find a solution to the problem, since the brain is completely filled with negative emotions, which only worsens the current situation and intensifies the experience.
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The spiral twisted for some time, and in the end we ended up in a position where we didn't want anything, nothing pleases and does not give the same pleasure. We can no longer even imagine our future with any optimism - and this is one of the main signs of depression. A vicious circle arises from which it is very difficult to get out, since evolution has not provided us with the necessary automatic tools.
Those who have already fallen into a state of depression, most likely, will not read this blog, since nothing is interesting and does not attract the attention of such an individual - his brain is occupied only with experiencing. The ability to experience, think about the future and imagine is a distinctive feature of a person, and one part of the brain is responsible for all this. Homo sapiens from non-Ardelthals and great apes are, among other things, distinguished by this significant development of the frontal cortex of the brain.
One of the surgical treatments for persistent clinical depression was, oddly enough, lobotomy. Patients literally cut the tissues of the orbitofrontal cortex with an ice pick. As a result of this operation, the person calmed down, because … he could no longer imagine. Doctors asked questions to patients who underwent this operation about what a person experiences when he thinks about his future, the answer most often was - nothing, just emptiness.
Daniel Gilbert, in his book Stumbling Over Happiness, cites three major flaws in imagination:
1. Our imagination allows itself to arbitrarily fill in the missing information and at the same time very often misses the most important
Our brain is good at predicting and predicting the coming events. When we listen to someone speak, we do not hear all the sounds, and our brain easily fills in the blanks. Sometimes we do not even feel that we have not heard something. When we read some text, we can easily guess what the next avocado will be in this sentence. Ops, stumbled because the brain predicted that there would be a "word", not an "avocado." But in the case of long-term predictions and attempts at imagination, our brains start filling in the blanks at will.
2. We usually project the present into the future
Reread the science fiction writers of the 1980s and 1990s who imagined today, and there you will see the slightly transformed past in which the authors lived. The future is unknown, and the course of events depends on a huge number of random events. Accordingly, if we perceive the current situation as negative, then it is extremely difficult for us to imagine a happy future.
3. We always make mistakes when we try to guess what sensations and experiences we will have, when and if certain events occur
We think we will be in a state of euphoria when our favorite team wins or we get a pay raise. In fact, when these events occur, they will be against the background of many other very different events, a different emotional background and, most likely, will be perceived by us in a completely different way, at least not as brightly as we imagine in our imagination. And it is almost impossible to imagine pleasant feelings in the future at a time when we are suffering in the present.
Thus, if you find yourself in a situation from which you could not find a way out, when you perceive your present as terrible, and the future is hopeless, then it is better not to fall into a vicious circle of experiences and not make these mistakes:
- There is no need to try to control your future, it is unknown, there are some factors determining it, but too many chances come into play. We have learned to imagine, but we cannot predict yet.
- You don't need to look at your past, especially in terms of what we liked the most and what we didn't. Our brain quickly erases sensations from memory and replaces them, based on the current situation.
- You don't have to try to imagine how you will feel in any particular situation in the future. If we cannot remember our old feelings, then we can predict future feelings even worse.
Instead, it's best to follow these simple rules:
- If you want to understand how you will feel in the future, look at others who have experienced something similar. If you are afraid that you will have to work not in your specialty with a strong decrease in status and salary, find and talk to who of the directors became drivers. If you are afraid that you will be disabled, then talk to a real disabled person, and you will see that most of them were able to adapt to life. You will be surprised how much the sense of self of a real person who has experienced a catastrophic situation will differ from your idea of it.
- Look at the world wider. Any driver knows that if you look under the wheel, then the speed seems to be higher, and you can easily miss an important turn or bumps on the road. Looking into your future, you need to look with the widest possible horizon, dry statistics will give a better forecast than our subjective feelings.
- Focus on what man is evolutionarily adapted to - survival in the here and now. We are good at feeling the threats and patterns that lead to success here and now. Without these skills, our ancestors could not have survived without fangs, claws, and a good sense of smell. In times of crisis and danger, strategy, planning, analysis will not help much. What animals do when faced with danger is run. A quick reaction and focus on the necessary momentary action here and now is more likely to help cope with the threat than a deep emotional analysis of the situation.
The main task is, solving the problem, to stop running like a squirrel in a wheel. The longer the way out of the situation is not found, the more monotonous and alarming thoughts become, which lead to even greater feelings and narrowing of the options for solving the problem. It turns out that instead of driving, we sit in a running car, we press on the gas, gasoline burns, smoke goes on, but the car does not go - we forgot to turn on the speed, because the brain is busy with suffering, and our eyes look continuously at one point.
Author: Arie Gotsdanker
