Worry, grief, disgrace, embarrassment, and different uncomfortable feelings usually are not nice. Every so often it’s fairly regular to keep away from a scenario, particular person, place, or factor that may set off an undesirable emotion, however when it interferes along with your each day functioning and/or turns into a problematic recurring difficulty, it’s clinically outlined as emotional avoidance.
Emotional avoidance is something you do to make an emotion go away or turn out to be much less intense. All of us do it in some unspecified time in the future however the issue with emotional avoidance is that we normally view the emotion (and the bodily emotions that include it) as harmful or threatening. In flip, many individuals do all the things attainable to make the emotion go away or turn out to be much less intense. How do they do this precisely? By way of 5 “methods” – or relatively, unproductive coping mechanisms – known as whole avoidance, refined avoidance, thought avoidance, fear, and security alerts.
In my work as founder and director of the Kentucky Middle for Anxiousness and Associated Issues, I deal with many individuals who discover it troublesome to cease the cycle of emotional avoidance. However it’s attainable to do, and treatable, and my sufferers go on to reside more healthy, fuller, extra assertive lives.
Three Varieties of Emotional Avoidance
One sort of emotional avoidance is simple to acknowledge; whole avoidance is totally avoiding a scenario, or just about something, that triggers an intense emotion. In whole avoidance, we frequently state, whether or not externally or internally, “I don’t do _____” as if it is part of who we’re. Complete avoidance can embrace bodily issues or locations like social gatherings, public talking, crowds, theaters, driving on the interstate, open areas, tunnels, and bridges, in addition to emotional processes like apologizing, listening to sure songs, or not eager to have any contact with somebody who beforehand wronged you.
One other sort, refined avoidance, refers to being in an uncomfortable scenario however not absolutely experiencing that scenario. I consult with this as “I’m there, however I’m not utterly there.” For instance, you get anxious ordering meals at a restaurant. Despite the fact that you order your meals, you by no means make eye contact with the particular person taking your order. Different examples embrace sitting alone in one other room throughout household gatherings or not talking to somebody in a social scenario, driving your automotive to social occasions “in case” you get anxious and wish to depart early, at all times utilizing the self-checkout line at a grocery store to keep away from folks, not watching a tragic scene in a film, or sitting in an aisle seat at a theater in case you’re feeling you might be in peril and “want” to flee.
Thought avoidance, one more emotional avoidance technique, refers to belongings you do to maintain your thoughts off uncomfortable ideas. Examples embrace pushing away detrimental ideas (which come again), distraction with issues like video video games, TV, music, and even taking a nap. Probably the most frequent thought avoidance methods that plagues many individuals is one thing we’re all acquainted with – fear.
Fear as an Avoidance Technique and Why it Doesn’t Work
Fear, a method the place you keep away from the feelings and the detrimental photos of the dreaded final result (that’s unlikely to occur), is commonly misunderstood. As a Christian, I imagine all feelings are a present from God, even “dangerous” ones, however as a clinician I additionally know that we don’t should be mastered by feelings like fear and that we are able to reside in emotional maturity. Fear shouldn’t be solely unhelpful however it will probably deceive us – Jesus himself tells us to not do it – and therapists know it’s unproductive. In my current e book, Mastering Our Feelings: Biblical Ideas for Emotional Well being, I clarify how we are able to expertise emotional transformation. Utilizing my therapeutic experience and offering workout routines, worksheets, reflection prompts, and Scripture readings, I assist readers higher perceive considering patterns, emotional triggers, and avoidance behaviors.
Figuring out fear is a vital ability in recognizing the method of fear so we are able to management it and hopefully put it out of our minds. Fear shouldn’t be anxiousness, however relatively a response to anxiousness. And whereas intentions are good, folks typically attempt to use fear to handle their anxiousness, nevertheless it by no means works. Anxiousness and fear have a bidirectional relationship; anxious ideas typically result in fear as an try and handle anxiousness however fear as a method results in extra anxiousness sooner or later.
Drawback Fixing As an alternative of Fear
Fear happens in our brains to shift our consideration away from “seeing” the pictures of the dreaded final result and stopping us from processing the feelings related to that feared final result. For instance, let’s say you get anxious about an unknown bodily sensation in your physique. To deal with the anxiousness, you are concerned in regards to the bodily symptom. You test Google for hours for what the signs would possibly imply, asking household or pals if these signs are regular, looking out on-line for cures, and even distracting your self with one thing else. Within the quick time period, you’re feeling reduction as a result of it looks like you might be downside fixing.
However actually what you might be doing is feeding the concern and that results in extra anxiousness over time. Actually, most individuals fear about occasions which have a really low likelihood of occurring. True downside fixing, then again, results in decision and a lower in anxiousness.
Security Indicators – What Are They in Emotional Avoidance
Probably the most refined avoidance methods chances are you’ll use in emotional avoidance known as a ‘security sign’. It’s something – a water bottle, a vital oil, a determine, a cell phone or different gadget, or perhaps a particular particular person or pet – you have to have with you to make you’re feeling extra comfy in a scenario that you just understand as harmful.
Security alerts work by reinforcing the concept that conditions usually are not protected until you have got this object or particular person with you. Many individuals situation themselves to handle intense feelings on this approach. In consequence, when the item or particular person shouldn’t be there for a perceived harmful / uncomfortable scenario, the limbic system is activated and intense feelings happen. As such, you study to affiliate feeling much less distressed along with your security sign and it turns into a behavior so that you can have it. And it could be that you just keep away from the depth of feelings within the quick time period however maintaining security alerts with you maintains the depth of those feelings in the long run.
It may be crucial at occasions to have a help particular person with you in conditions which might be realistically difficult or harmful, corresponding to awaiting information from a physician or attending a parent-teacher convention, however some folks with an emotional avoidance situation get so used to security alerts that they don’t see them as an issue till they don’t have the merchandise with them.
Tailored from Mastering Our Feelings by Kevin Chapman. ©2025 by Kevin Chapman. Utilized by permission of InterVarsity Press. www.ivpress.com.
