Everyone his/her own Therapist?

by Richard C. Raynard, Ph.D.
Licensed Clinical Psychologist

What does our bad habit or self-defeating behavior do for you?  This paradoxical question and its gutsy answer helps you let go of a self-defeating habit and find a new way.

Yes, whatever you do has a purpose, or you wouldn't do it - right?

The point is that whatever you do that gets you into trouble does a whole, whole lot for you. When you take time to write down seriously all the benefits, you will need more than a page.

Let's say you procrastinate and you are really good at it. Here are just a few emotional traps:

Choices

1. You don't have to risk criticism (fear)
2. You live in glorious possibilities (hope)
3. You are saving up a "good" experience (secure)
4. You have a sense of freedom in not-doing (self-satisfaction)
5. You don't have to face your limitations (anxiety)
6. You don't risk defeat (abuse)
7. You don't have to look at "what comes after that (carefree) 

Now you are in a position to find other ways of getting each benefit, e.g. "I welcome defeat because I learn the quickest that way!" Or, "Once I start, it is more clear what I have to do after that". You have choices.

This self-examination can be difficult or easy, depending, but it has been a most empowering exercise for everyone. We are amazed at what our bad habit has been up to, and it is often clear what we must do to change it. And find emotional freedom.

Are you tempted to try this out?

About Dr. Raynard
Dr. Richard Raynard is a licensed clinical psychologist with 35 years experience resolving a broad range of emotional problems. As a cognitive-behavioral therapist who has specialized in anxiety and phobic disorders since 1980, he has spent the last 35 years fulfilling his life-long desire to explore and define the true purpose of emotions and how people can easily use emotions to create meaning and satisfaction in their lives. Dr. Raynard's series of books on emotions can be found on Amazon.com. His other books include Don't Panic, and Anxiety & Panic Medications.

Beneath the Anxiety - Treasure!

 

by Richard C. Raynard, Ph.D.
Licensed Clinical Psychologist

Anxiety and fear can make you avoid a bad situation, and you also can learn how to face up to it. But what then? Do you know what to do with your new-found freedom?

I have come to see that it makes a very small satisfaction in overcoming an anxiety "disorder" if you don't know what to do with your new freedom. I have learned to ask my clients what the would love to do with their life, their dream job, their ideal day, the experiences they wish to have, what they need most - all ways of asking for the true love in their life.

When the love of your life is frustrated, minimized, or slighted, strong emotions are generated, such as anger, guilt, disgust, depression, and more. This sense of something missing from your life can lead to a kind of low level depression.

Free at last

Burns (2013) found that after a client got mostly over her anxiety at work, she still had nausea and the urge to vomit when she walked by the desk of her boss. I believe that her nausea was not remaining anxiety but disgust with her work. Disgust, the emotion driving guilt.  She long desired to be a dress designer, and when she left to pursue that line of work, all her nausea disappeared.

Yes, if fear and anxiety have oppressed you for a long time, it may be hard to renew hope and faith in what you love.  Still, clearing away the worries and fears helps you find the hidden treasure.

About Dr. Raynard
Dr. Richard Raynard is a licensed clinical psychologist with 35 years experience resolving a broad range of emotional problems. As a cognitive-behavioral therapist who has specialized in anxiety and phobic disorders since 1980, he has spent the last 35 years fulfilling his life-long desire to explore and define the true purpose of emotions and how people can easily use emotions to create meaning and satisfaction in their lives. Dr. Raynard's series of books on emotions can be found on Amazon.com. His other books include Don't Panic, and Anxiety & Panic Medications.

Emotions Give Us Choices - Ready or Not

by Richard C. Raynard, Ph.D
Licensed Clinical Psychologist

Even from the first onset of an emotion, e.g. anger, we have the power to choose how the emotion will turn out, whether locked in a rigid mood (Bitterness) or transformed into positive energy (Fulfillment). Anger, by itself, does not impel us to do any one thing, because, unlike all other animal life, we have the ability to reflect and choose.  The choices of an animal are immediate, non-reflective, stimulus-bound, and instinctive - not a choice at all.


Woman on Phone
Photo Credit: WebCORB



It is also true that you can, by choice, not see choices at all.  One current, somewhat popular way to express freedom is to act impulsively in a determined way, and avoid the responsibility that goes with choice. The end-state is often thrill-seeking, addictiveness, crime, conflict, a poverty of interests and troubles of every kind. Many are adept at inventing reasons for all the bad fortune in life that results from this: a poor boss, lousy weather, lack of money, a bad mood, and much more.

In perhaps no other realm of mind are there such extreme consequences of your choices than in emotional expression and action.  Emotions are nearly pure energy that will not stay still, just as a fire can consume or serve you.  Emotions compel action that will have their way whether we pay attention to them or not.  And if they are not fulfilled, they will not just go away.  In the case of anger, the same emotion that can make us blame, accuse, collect injustices,and nurse resentment or bloody vengeance is the same emotion that fills an authentic need, with high satisfaction.

It is beguiling that many of our choices in life seem ready-made.  friends, clothes, lifestyle, home, car and other things seem natural choices.  It may be a bit harder to realize we choose our values, beliefs, and even our attitudes.  Emotions are that much murkier"  they can seem to come with no choice at all, whether we go by our gut feelings or deal with them conventionally.  Then again, emotions can be so upsetting that we wish we could be a "rock", glad to be rid of them, especially the "negative" emotions, and avoid choice altogether. 

Yet choice gives us freedom and fulfillment. Just as anger can lead to fulfilling a need, so fear mastered leads to freedom, sadness to renewal, hurt to reconciliation, disgust to respect. All the pages of this blog, my Ebooks and other writings deal with this choice.

About Dr. Raynard
Dr. Richard Raynard is a licensed clinical psychologist with 35 years experience resolving a broad range of emotional problems. As a cognitive-behavioral therapist who has specialized in anxiety and phobic disorders since 1980, I have spent the last 35 years fulfilling my life-long desire to explore and define the true purpose of emotions and how people can easily use emotions to create meaning and satisfaction in their lives. Dr. Raynard's series of books on emotions can be found on Amazon.com. His other books include Don't Panic, and Anxiety & Panic Medications.

What Emotional Fulfillment Can Do For You

by Richard C. Raynard, Ph.D.
Licensed Clinical Psychologist

Emotions just happen all the time, as part of our human nature. It's possible to have feelings about anything. They are a form of pure energy that can persist, remarkably, over a lifetime. there is usually characteristic triggering event for each emotion with an immediate impulse to act in a certain way. Emotions tell us quickly our position towards this event, generally whether it is beneficial or not. Emotions are unusually persistent and do not have to be conscious to affect our thoughts, decisions and actions.


Photo Credit: womansforum.com


We are anatomically wired for emotions through ANS pathways, brain anatomy, neuropeptides, and the instinctual system. Each primary emotion can be sensed and labeled reliably by individuals. Each emotion often blends with other emotions, and we can even have emotions about emotions!

The benefit or cost of an emotion to us depends on how we act on it. Emotions not handled well become stress, which brings less energy, more upset, and less capacity to respond positively. Over time, if emotions are not integrated into our life, they become trapped in rigid moods. Moods involve emotions in a tangle of thoughts, beliefs, attitudes, and action tendencies, a stuck way of looking at the world that does not allow completion of the feeling. The instinctive path of handling emotions leads to defensiveness and ultimately to rigid, stuck moods.

On the other hand, the reflective, distinctly human path of handling emotions allows their acceptance, integration and ultimate fulfillment. Fulfillment of any emotion means its purpose has been filled, the emotion completed, and its disappearance. Emotional freedom is a sense of having relatively few unfulfilled emotional claims. All emotions originate with our loves and attachments, and our happiness is their fulfillment through constant contact, skill, and dedication. The result is a sense of peacefulness - a dynamic process of regular, dependable fulfillment of our emotional life.

This series of articles will be all about how to can bring emotional fulfillment into every area of your life.

About Dr. Raynard
Dr. Richard Raynard is a licensed clinical psychologist with 35 years experience resolving a broad range of emotional problems. As a cognitive-behavioral therapist who has specialized in anxiety and phobic disorders since 1980, I have spent the last 35 years fulfilling my life-long desire to explore and define the true purpose of emotions and how people can easily use emotions to create meaning and satisfaction in their lives. Dr. Raynard's series of books on emotions can be found on Amazon.com. His other books include Don't Panic, and Anxiety & Panic Medications.