Interview with psychologists Tais Pérez and Sergio Gracia about their book ‘Your anxiety under control’The book is a guide to understanding anxiety and not letting it dominate us“Anxiety is a great liar: it tells you that things are going to happen that will never they happen”, they say. In a culture as hedonistic as ours, in which messages such as Mr. Wonderful proliferate: “today nothing can go wrong”; “stop thinking about everything and smile”; “Today is going to be the cane”, it is difficult to accept that life includes a certain amount of suffering. Anxiety is a good example of this suffering that comes “as standard” with life; “One thing is to feel it, that is something normal, and another thing is to suffer anxiety” explains the psychologist Tais Pérez. The sooner we accept that, on certain occasions, it is normal to feel anxiety instead of spending our lives trying not to feel it, the sooner we can learn to manage it. But of course, points out psychologist Sergio García, “those positive messages of pampering yourself, taking care of yourself, you first… they don’t help because they create a tendency that, if I suffer, this is something tremendously unacceptable and then of course, when that suffering appears, I I tend to reject”. Your anxiety under control (Zenith, 2022) is the title of the first book by this couple of psychologists, Tais Pérez and Sergio García; a guide to understand what anxiety is and not let it dominate us; a manual that is more necessary than ever in these post-pandemic times in which we have all felt anxiety to a greater or lesser extent. The more uncertainty there is, the more likely it is to suffer from anxiety (Sergio García, psychologist) Question: The official figures speak of a clear increase in anxiety and mental health problems in general since the start of the pandemic… Sergio: It is a context of uncertainty, and not only health, but also job insecurity, the economic times we are going through and social: how much the more uncertainty there is, the more likely to suffer from anxiety… Tais: In the pandemic, psychological difficulties began to be part of the majority. Before it was the opposite; now you’re weird if you don’t have a psychological difficulty… Q: Has the pandemic contributed to destigmatizing mental health problems? Tais: Before the pandemic, people were already talking a lot on networks and psychology accounts that spoke a little in simpler language of what was happening to us, with which we could feel identified. The young people, I think they have done a tremendous job there, I think they opened the door a little and, when the pandemic came and what happened happened, and mental health problems intensified, with that previous step, I think it is what that made people start asking for real professional help. It is also super important to have guides with a base of scientific evidence to know why what happens to us happens to us, where it comes from, what we can do if that happens to us, if we have, for example, a child with anxiety problems… the book is a door to understand. Suddenly one day you begin to see that you no longer do things for yourself, but that you are doing them to avoid anxiety (Tais Pérez, psychologist) Q: The book is a door to understand, for example, something that you make it very clear in your book from the beginning: that it is one thing to feel anxiety and quite another to suffer anxiety…Tais: It is one thing to feel it, which is something normal; It is something that can arise right here, in this interview. Another thing is when we suffer it, which is when anxiety already limits our life; we stop doing things because of anxiety (…) It is when anxiety is what decides for you. “No, better not go there because it will give you a lot of anxiety”, “better not go out, it will not give you a panic attack”. And suddenly one day you begin to see that you are no longer doing things for yourself, but that you are doing them to avoid anxiety…Sergio: In the book we place a lot of emphasis on an important part, which is all these avoidance behaviors, which have to do with when anxiety manifests itself, and this generates a discomfort, then I begin to avoid it, to distract myself or seek to calm down or seek security in my life. Then the anxiety begins to restrict me from doing things that I really want to do: it begins to limit my actions and interactions with others… there it begins to become a problem. P: That problem, deep down, is the consequence of our tendency to try to avoid anxiety, instead of accepting it. But that is not a message that fits in with the welfare society, which pushes us to always be great… Tais: In fact, you go to the doctor and the first thing he tells you when you have anxiety is to take diazepam on duty… that’s the strategy of reassurance. Sergio: What you have said is key; that point of society in which my well-being prevails and I cannot be wrong. Those positive messages of pampering yourself, taking care of yourself, yourself first… don’t help because they create a tendency that, if I suffer, this is something tremendously unacceptable and then of course, when that suffering appears, I tend to reject it. One of the basic steps of therapy is the acceptance of suffering as well. The therapeutic objective is no longer to stop being afraid of flying, for example, but rather to be able to go see my mother whom I haven’t seen for 8 years (Tais Pérez, psychologist)Q: In the book you explain that therapy to treat Anxiety has more to do with exposing ourselves to the focus of anxiety than with avoiding it. Sergio: Exposure therapy is the only way for you to understand that anxiety is a great liar: it tells you that things are going to happen that never happen. It tells you that you are going to have a heart attack, that you are going to lose control or that you are going to go crazy. You have to get in there little by little, and as you expose that person, and that person realizes that everything is normal, that everything he thinks is going to happen doesn’t happen, then he begins to get used to it little by little. The key is to approach the person step by step, gradually, with the least possible suffering and within a framework of security that we provide before getting into it, because before that we have already talked very well about what anxiety is and why it affects it. curre, we demystify it… and the person is already treading safely. Q: What other guidelines serve to keep anxiety under control and that it is not anxiety that controls us? Tais: Many times what is done is to connect those small objectives, those small exhibitions, to important values for the person, such as being able to take your daughter on a trip, or go with the family to do something…the therapeutic objective is no longer it is to stop being afraid of flying, for example, but it is to be able to go see my mother whom I haven’t seen for 8 years. Q: In therapy one finds that space that is not granted on a day-to-day basis to stop and reflect , to verbalize. Tais: People come looking for just that in therapy: you have that time, you have that space to be able to reflect on yourself, on what you are doing, on why to stop suffering. Because the therapeutic objectives are normally agreed to stop having that reason for consultation, but also to connect with your values… You arrive at therapy, stop and, suddenly, someone really listens to you, they are not waiting their turn to speak, and Do you really feel heard in a safe space (Sergio García, psychologist) Q: This acceleration with which we live, which does not leave us time to stop and reconnect with ourselves, with our values, with what is important to us…? Could this be one of the reasons why there is more anxiety now than ever? Sergio: Everything is going faster and faster, we see it in everything: in technology, we have gone from 3G, to 4G, to 5G in no time. Connectivity, being aware of several applications at the same time. There is a culture of acceleration and accumulation as well: we accumulate friends, we accumulate music on spotify, we have a library on spotify that we are not going to listen to even living 10 lives. There is an anxiety associated with that; the famous anxiety of missing out, ‘fomo’ or fear of missing something. Because there comes a point where I want to be up to date with everything and it is impossible. It’s a culture of acceleration, yes. So, you arrive at therapy, you stop and, suddenly, someone really listens to you, they are not waiting their turn to speak, and you really feel heard in a safe space (…) We were talking the other day on social media about insight as a phenomenon of therapy, which is that moment when we are talking and, suddenly, ‘bang’ you connect an idea and a new meaning opens up…those things, in therapy, appear because you put ideas in order. Q: Unfortunately, not everyone can afford go to therapy; it’s almost a luxury good…Tais: That’s the idea of the book, which arises a bit because of the difficulty there is right now in accessing mental health and that, when you finally get access, the poor are overwhelmed and give you Appointments once a month, which you know is highly contraindicated. In a therapy, weekly sessions are better so that you finish as soon as possible and you can follow a rhythm of therapy according to the therapeutic objectives that you have agreed. And later, the book also serves as support for the therapy itself. Sergio: Yes, the book is a bit as if they had recorded us in therapy…
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