The Matrix: Reboot'2020

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

At the beginning of this year, we all faced unexpected events. Nothing foreshadowed such a reversal, but for six months the whole world has been living by one theme - the theme of the new coronavirus pandemic. Will life under quarantine be the beginning of global change? The forecasts of experts are diverse, but they have one thing in common: uncertainty. The future is vague, the present is vague - what is it, our new reality?

Six months have passed since the word "pandemic" was first spoken. Our world has gone through the stages of shock, fear and denial, it met face to face with death. Before the outbreak of the coronavirus outbreak, no one really tracked how many people die from hunger and armed conflict, from influenza and systemic diseases. But now all the media give in the morning a summary of those who have fallen ill and died from the new virus. During these six months, we even began to understand something about this virus. Rather, the scientific community informed us how we can more or less protect ourselves from it, although there are still disputes about the same masks and gloves - someone says that they are effective, someone - that they do harm. Uncertainty, it creates a sense of anxiety. Moreover, in addition to the threat to health, social problems have appeared. Many lost their jobs and funds to maintain their usual standard of living, the spheres of communication, communication and education were transformed. The global restructuring of social life could not but affect people, because sudden changes of a long duration of exposure are a serious test for the psyche. Of course, a person has the ability and resources for adaptation. But for each of us, this process takes place individually. In the end, adaptation is possible only when contact with one's own feelings is not lost, there is no denial of the reality of what is happening.

Why is this preface? Of course, I am a practicing psychoanalyst, but I, like any other person, had to adapt to the conditions of the new reality. It is fortunate that before the pandemic, I already had experience of practicing online. Nevertheless, the complete transition to this format for several months became a new challenge for me as well. So, therapy is approached with a variety of requests, but I have noted a feature of recent times: people avoid mentioning what they feel and how they are experiencing the current situation, talking about "here and now." As if nothing is happening and does not affect either them or their loved ones in any way. It reminded me of our childhood game: while running away, we raised our hands and shouted: "I'm in the house!" Symbolically, this meant complete inaccessibility. In the same way, you can symbolically hide from what scares you. But alas - this method will not protect against a real rockfall.

In other words, there is a lot of information about anxiety, my patients are well-grounded in this topic, which is great. But having theoretical knowledge about toothache, influenza virus or appendicitis, we still go to the doctor. Because theories don't cure. Heals experience, interaction with those who know how to use this knowledge. And the self-concept of anxiety is greatly distorted: it comes to the point that some are sure that it should not be at all. This is not true, because anxiety is a normal human feeling. Experiencing anxiety is vital, it is life. In anxiety, a mass of energy, it helps to overcome, develop, break through, like a sprout breaks through the cover of the earth.

People often say to me: please, relieve me of my anxiety, I don't want to feel anything. I ask the question: do you want to be dead? Only a dead person feels nothing. The energy of anxiety can and must be transformed and directed towards development and creation, and not towards destruction. Such a request occurs, as a rule, when the anxiety is so strong that it is impossible to cope with it alone, when life hits a person with great speed and force. Where does this anxiety, the need to do something, complete, fulfill, as if tomorrow will be too late, as if there will be no tomorrow?

The reason is that somewhere in the unconscious there is an old woman with a scythe, and there is no way to control her arrival. That is, increased anxiety is a compensatory mechanism for the fear of death. She seems to say: I must live life faster - death is close, I do not control it. This is a very difficult, hard to bear feeling. It is difficult to be in touch with this feeling. But being in contact with him means not running away from feelings into mechanistic functioning - not jamming them, not drowning them out by social networks and computer games. Contact is an acquaintance. Ask yourself: what am I afraid of now that suddenly upset me so? This self-inquiry helps to understand the nature of your soul, because feelings play an important role in mental life.

In the next article I will try to cover this issue.

Illustration: Mary Woronov, "Anxiety", 2005

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Is it difficult to deal with feelings and experiences? Is reality scary?

Come, let us learn together not to be afraid of fear.

Psychoanalyst Karine Matveeva