Avoidance Sucks
Here’s what I mean by that:
- Avoidance of feared stimuli increases rather than decreases fear. So it perpetuates itself at your expense. This is approximately 35% of all therapy, possibly.
- Avoidance is painful by itself. Every time you avoid, you’re having a measure of the pain you would have in confronting. But you avoid it over and over and over… so you have a partial measure of pain over and over and over, which almost always ends up being more painful over time.
- Avoidance narrows your options. I mean this in small ways, but also in the very big, existential way – like the “untimely deadness of a too narrow existence”
Some caveats, in case you’re thinking any of these things:
- Staying away from genuinely toxic or dangerous things/people/situations isn’t avoidance, it’s wisdom.
- If you believe you benefit from a “change of scenery,” you need to give a good think about if it’s escaping/avoidance or something else. A lot of that is how you use that time. If you just get away from stressors and enjoy that, it’s avoidance. If you use the time away to actively work on stuff that will improve your life when you’re back, ok.
Comment below: How have clients sometimes gotten in trouble by avoiding? How have you??