ZONES OF LIFE OR PRISONERS OF CONSCIOUSNESS

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

ZONES OF LIFE OR PRISONERS OF CONSCIOUSNESS

I got out of obedience:

Behind the flags - the lust for life is stronger!

Only from behind I happily heard

Delighted screams of people.

V. Vysotsky

Borders are not outside, And inside us

Quote from the movie "Route 60"

I was impressed by the story I read on Facebook. It was about a scientist-oceanographer who made an unusual escape from the USSR. This scientist passionately wanted to break out of the Soviet Union abroad. But he was not allowed to travel abroad and it was difficult for him, almost impossible to fulfill his dream. But he did not lose hope for freedom. And then one day, as part of a group of scientists, he found himself on an expedition to the Pacific Ocean. The scientist conceived an escape and started swimming at night, hoping to escape. In total, he had to swim three nights and two days and swim more than 100 km before he swam to some island in the ocean. I was struck by the will to freedom and courage of this man. For the sake of freedom, he committed an act full of mortal risk, showing by this that a person always has a choice!

I began to think about the capabilities of a person and his limitations, about those mechanisms that limit his freedom.

Immediately I recalled the amazing facts from the experiments of Martin Seligman, which had already become textbook in psychology, during which he discovered such a phenomenon as learned helplessness.

What is the essence of this phenomenon?

Learned helplessness, same acquired or learned helplessness - the state of a person or animal, in which the individual does not make attempts to improve his condition (does not try to avoid negative stimuli or get positive ones), although he has such an opportunity. It appears, as a rule, after several unsuccessful attempts to influence negative circumstances of the environment (or avoid them) and is characterized by passivity, refusal to act, unwillingness to change an unfavorable environment or avoid it, even when such an opportunity arises.

Seligman's experiments

Martin Seligman in 1967, together with his colleague Stephen Meyer, developed a scheme for an experiment with an electric shock with the participation of three groups of dogs.

First group it was possible to avoid painful effects: by pressing with its nose on a special panel, the dog of this group could turn off the power of the system causing the blow. Thus, she was able to control the situation, her reaction mattered. Have second group disabling the shock device depended on the actions of the first group. These dogs received the same blow as the dogs of the first group, but their own reaction did not influence the result. The painful effect on the dog of the second group ceased only when the associated dog of the first group pressed the disconnecting panel. Third group dogs (control) did not receive a blow at all.

For some time, the two experimental groups of dogs were exposed to electric shocks of equal intensity to the same extent, and for the same time. The only difference was that some of them could easily stop the unpleasant effect, while others managed to make sure that they could not influence the troubles.

After that, all three groups of dogs were placed in a box with a partition, through which any of them could easily jump, and thus get rid of the electric shock.

This is exactly what the dogs from the group that had the ability to control the blow did. The dogs of the control group easily jumped over the barrier. However, dogs with the experience of uncontrollable troubles rushed about the box, and then lay down on the bottom and, whining, endured electric shocks of greater and greater force.

Seligman and Meyer concluded that helplessness is caused not by unpleasant events in themselves, but by the experience of uncontrollable events. A living creature becomes helpless if it gets used to the fact that nothing depends on its active actions, troubles occur by themselves and cannot be influenced in any way.

Search activity

There is another interesting fact obtained in Seligman's experiments. It turns out that not all animals involved in the experiment develop learned helplessness. Some individuals, in spite of the prevailing circumstances, turned out to be unbroken and the learned helplessness was not formed in them. Seligman called this phenomenon - search activity.

Later, Seligman repeatedly confirmed the results obtained, showing that they apply not only to animals, but also to humans. He created a technique that allows to determine the place of each person on the polar scale: "Learned helplessness - Search activity." Seligman showed that a person's performance on this scale has an impact on various spheres of human life - business, politics and even health.

In general, this construct determines the degree of a person's activity, defining for him the personal boundaries of this world and his possibilities in it, depending on the quality of these boundaries. And these boundaries are the boundaries of his consciousness.

Zones of life

In the consciousness of every person there are boundaries - limitations that regulate the degree of his activity in contact with the world. For some, these boundaries are very rigid and the area of his life zone is small, for others - more. Someone lives in his small world and is afraid that it will collapse, someone boldly develops new territories … Zones of life or territories of life for each person are different and they are determined by the attitudes of his consciousness.

I remembered another example from the same series of experiments, this time with fleas. Fleas were placed in a jar and covered with a lid. Fleas, being bouncy creatures, did not abandon the idea of jumping, but the cap limited the height of their jumps. Some time has passed. The lid of the jar was opened, but not a single flea could jump out of the jar!

Who creates these boundaries? How? How are they in the future and by what means are they supported?

Limiting mechanisms:

I will divide the mechanisms of limitation into cognitive and emotional. Cognitive mechanisms of limitation of consciousness are represented by knowledge, emotional - by emotions. I'll start with the cognitive ones.

Introjects - the uncritically assimilated knowledge of other people, taken on faith, by which a person is guided in his life as rules. Introject - information that has been swallowed without going through assimilation (chewing and digestion with assimilation).

Examples of introjects:

• Feelings should not be shown.
• Orders are not negotiable.
• The husband must earn money, and the wife must raise the children.
• A woman shouldn't be in business.
• Men don't cry, etc.

Introjects for a person are presented in the form of obligations:

• A good husband (good wife) should (should) …
• A woman (man) of my position should (should) …
• A good father (good mother) should (should) …
• When I'm angry, I must (must) …
• All people should …

Introjects are elements of a person's picture of the world, not related to his personal experience of knowing this world.

Picture of the world - a system of human ideas about the world, its qualities and properties, including its assessment. The picture of the world includes, in addition to ideas about the world, ideas about other people (Picture of the Other) and ideas about oneself (picture I).

The picture of the world is not the world, or rather it is a subjective, inner world. And he is always individual. In this regard, the following statement is true: "How many people - so many worlds." The picture of the world is formed by a person's life experience. A person's picture of the world organizes his perception of this world - all phenomena of the external world are perceived / refracted through the internal picture of the world.

The picture of the world can be metaphorically represented as glasses through which a person looks at the world. Since the qualities of glasses (light transmission, color, refraction, etc.) are different for each person, then his picture of this world will be individual.

Depending on the properties of the picture of the world, a person will also build his contact with him. Attitudes, attitudes, methods of action are derived from the individual picture of the human world. I will dwell on some of the most important for our topic.

Installation - unconscious psychological state, internal quality of the subject, based on his previous experience, predisposition to a certain activity in a certain situation.

It acts as a state of mobilization, readiness for subsequent action. The presence of an attitude in a person allows him to react in one or another specific way to a particular event or phenomenon.

Scripts - a person's life plan, created by him in childhood, under the significant influence of parents or loved ones. Here are examples of some of the scenarios:

• “When I retire I can travel”;
• “In another life I will be rewarded according to merit”;
• “After marriage (or marriage), life consists of only one commitment”;
• “I will never get what I want the most,” etc.

Scenarios, in contrast to introjects, are more global and extend their action to a wider sphere of human life.

Games - stereotyped, automatic, unconscious forms of human life.

Due to the above qualities, the game is not recognized and is not recognized by a person as a game, but is perceived by him as an ordinary life. Each person has their own set of games. Most of the games a person inherits from their parents and passes on to their children.

Any game is carried out sequentially and in stages. E. Bern described the formula for any game, which includes 6 stages: Hook + Bite = Reaction - Switching - Confusion - Reckoning. You can read more about this in his famous book Games People Play.

Again, the main idea here is that games are automatic, stereotypical forms of people's life, and since this is so, a person is deprived of the opportunity to choose - he is just an actor who has mastered his role in this game well.

Here are some examples of games:

• "Hit me";
• The Hunted Horse;
• "Dynamo";
• “Gotcha, you scoundrel”;
• "Why will not you…? - "Yes, but …"

Emotional mechanisms of limiting consciousness

In fairness, it should be noted that emotional limitations of consciousness are formed ontogenetically earlier than cognitive ones. These I would include the following: Fear, Shame, Guilt.

Fear - refers to basic emotions. This is the most powerful and universal mechanism for stopping mental life.

Shame and guilt - social emotions. They arise in the psychic reality of a person thanks to the Other and appear on the psychic stage later than fear. Guilt and shame normally regulate social relationships. In the same case, when their intensity becomes too high, they acquire the qualities of toxicity and are able to "freeze" a person no worse than fear.

The result of cognitive and emotional mechanisms of limiting consciousness is the appearance in a person of attitudes leading to learned helplessness and, as a consequence, limiting his zone of life.

Emotional attitude - "it's scary!"

Cognitive attitude - "it's impossible!"

By and large, all human activity aimed at knowing the external world is regulated by two opposite tendencies: fear and interest. If fear dominates, a person will prefer the Comfort Zone, if interest - the Risk Zone.

Creative adaptation or passive adaptation?

In a person with a formed learned helplessness, creative adaptation is disrupted, his adaptation to life becomes passive, and contacts with the environment are devoid of choice. As a result, human behavior becomes stereotyped, automatic, reduced to the level of conditioned reflexes.

An example about a train. Somehow I happened to be a participant in the following natural experiment. I was on the train. It looks like there was some kind of malfunction in the computer, and the tickets were sold in one carriage. The train was approaching the next station, all the people on the platform rushed into the same carriage, according to the purchased tickets. Gradually the car was filled to capacity. It was difficult for people to sit - it was difficult to stand. I decided to go to another carriage - it turned out to be practically empty, there were those few passengers who risked changing to another carriage, despite their tickets.

Learned helplessness in the context of parenting

Learned helplessness is formed at an early age, when the child has neither the opportunity to critically evaluate someone else's experience, nor anything to oppose the adult's aggression. Due to this, most of the described mechanisms for limiting life are outside the zone of his awareness. A person cannot recognize them, identify them and somehow relate to them, i.e. take a critical-reflective position, and perceives them as something organically inherent in him, including their area of his I.

By stopping-limiting the child's activity, the parents kill the search activity in him and form the learned helplessness. I foresee in this place the indignation of many readers of the type: "Well, then everything can be allowed to the child?", "Who will he then grow up with this attitude?"

I will leave here a place for your discussions, I will express only my opinion on this issue. For me, the following rules-principles are important here:

• Avoiding extremes.
• Timeliness.

Let me explain: I believe that in those periods of life when a child begins to actively explore the world on his own (1-3 years), it is necessary to limit him as little as possible in this. Here, the rule of limitation can only be child safety issues. Yes, and it is impossible during this period due to natural age characteristics (his cognitive sphere is not yet ready) to restrict the child, except by resorting to forceful prohibitions and focusing on fear. It seems that the Japanese upbringing system, which does not limit the child in his manifestations of activity up to 5 years of age, is also based on these ideas. When the child has the opportunity not only to emotionally react to prohibitions (fear), but also to understand their essence, then the time comes for the formation of social boundaries - "What is allowed and what is not" and most importantly "Why?" Otherwise, we form a socially passive, non-initiative member of society.

Children who have been "trained" not to show their needs may appear docile, comfortable, "good" children. But they just refuse to express their needs, or they may grow into adults who will be afraid to express something that they need.

What to do?

Therapy restores the client's ability to choose and he has the opportunity to interrupt the automatic ways of life and live his life more qualitatively, expanding the zones of his life activity.

Skype consultation is possible Skype Login: Gennady.maleychuk