Trying To Control Everything Leads Us To Suffering
Suffering is something inherent to the human condition it is something that is part of life and one thing cannot be separated from the other.
Now, you can live suffering less; To do this, we can apply some of the precepts of a school of philosophy called Stoicism, which has more than 2,000 years of history and which has been of great influence in the development of one of the main theoretical frameworks in psychology: the cognitive-behavioral model. .
We can suffer from multiple causes and, in this sense, it is necessary to make a first distinction between physical pain and emotional pain
When we refer to emotions, it is necessary to point out that all of them are useful and necessary, even though some may be more pleasant than others.
We can see emotions as a tool that nature has provided us with to direct our lives (without letting our emotions direct it). So anger, well conducted, moves us to defend ourselves or others against something we consider unfair. Fear, when founded on the basis of real danger, protects us from possible harm. AND sadness at the loss of something important moves us to withdraw into ourselves, inviting us to analysis and reflection promoting making necessary changes in our lives or in our way of seeing the world, or the way we see ourselves.
Nevertheless, Not all the emotional suffering that afflicts us is necessary or useful ; A good part of our pain is excessive and sterile, in other words, it takes us nowhere, it does not contribute to improving our lives.
This unproductive suffering is explained by the role of thought, which is a human attribute that differentiates us from animals, so lWe people are afflicted by fantasies of a future that has not yet arrived (and may never arrive) or we regret things that happened long ago. These thoughts lead us to escape from the only place in which we can truly exist: the present moment.
We can project ourselves into the future to make plans or to prepare for possible setbacks and we can review the past to learn from mistakes. The problem lies when this activity becomes excessive or misguided, when we feel the need to get ahead of everything that may happen or when we wallow in guilt, preventing any option to reflect and grow.
Thinking, like many other activities, can become a habit, and When we get used to thinking in a certain way we get used to suffering, often without being aware that we are hurting ourselves with that way of thinking. When we talk about thinking we can also talk about cognitive processes, here would be language, memory or attention, among others.
What we focus our attention on is amplified, so if I choose to focus on opportunities I will pay less attention to risks, and if I focus on the valuable things in my life, I will pay less attention to losses. or to the things that I still don’t have or the things that I could lose.
@professional(2050435, “Are you interested in psychotherapeutic support?”)
The suffering caused by the search for control
Many of the torments we inflict on ourselves correspond to the habit of trying to have everything under control. We often pay too much attention to issues over which we have no direct control or no control at all Since our attention span is limited, when we focus on what worries us, we neglect what we could focus on, that is, we neglect our room for maneuver.
This behavior, sustained over time, causes us a feeling of helplessness, fatigue and helplessness. By always being alert, we are tense and this can make us irritable.
Developing the habit of focusing on our real area of possibilities will give us greater peace it will avoid time wasted on issues that we cannot influence, it will make us more effective, it will free up mental space by giving more fuel to the creativity muscle and all this will have a notable impact on our mood.
To recover and strengthen our true power We must ask ourselves the question “what can I do in this situation?” and fully explore the response, mobilizing all the resources at our disposal. We will no longer torment ourselves for not doing what we could do.
Now, if the answer is “nothing,” there is no other option than to accept this reality and cope with the situation. Surrendering to the inevitable provides immediate relief, as you are no longer struggling with something that cannot be changed.
Conclusion
The tendency to be in tension, watching, sometimes makes us live believing that all those unpleasant situations that we imagine do not happen to us because we are controlling what happens, and this makes us believe that if we leave that unhealthy state of alert, terrible things could happen to us. . Functioning like this makes it very difficult for us to stop being alert because we consider it a threat.
The paradox is that When we allow ourselves to let go of control and relax, our minds expand and our wits improve, so that we can better face the possible eventualities that may occur to us. This, in turn, is an opportunity to see that there is no need to try to control everything.
Lord, grant me serenity to accept everything I cannot change, courage to change what I am capable of changing, and wisdom to understand the difference.. – Reinhold Niebuhr –
