It isn’t always the way you think it is by Dr Elizabeth
McCardell, M. Counselling, PhD
Sept 2011
Sept 2011
Many years ago I read of a 1970s (I think)
experiment whereby human subjects were artificially physiologically aroused and
presented with pictures of happy or sad faces and their resulting emotions reported.
Those shown happy faces said they were feeling happy, those shown sad faces
said they felt sad. This experiment, performed by numerous others since, shows
the plasticity of our capacity to make meaning from our felt bodily state in
relation to the contexts we find ourselves in. This is a three-way process,
though it looks like just a two-way one: bodily arousal plus context, but the content
of the meanings we make are more than just what are presented by external
context. The meanings we make arise out of our historical individual take on
the social and cultural stories of the environment we most identify with. This take is built up over time and with
reinforcement from family, peers, schooling, and other pervasive institutions.
Meanings are not fixed, but fluid and adaptive; indeed they are shaped – endlessly – by alternate views of things. This means that we are able to change how we see, respond to, and inhabit our world as well as experience our own lives. This fact lies at the heart and raison d’etre of effective therapy, along with care of the body.
Meanings are not fixed, but fluid and adaptive; indeed they are shaped – endlessly – by alternate views of things. This means that we are able to change how we see, respond to, and inhabit our world as well as experience our own lives. This fact lies at the heart and raison d’etre of effective therapy, along with care of the body.
I find it very interesting that the body first
feels, and then we make meaning – sense - of this first feeling. There is a
perceptual gap, a window of opportunity to shift our reactions from habitual
responses to perceiving the experience in new ways, or even just observing the
physiological sense without attaching meaning to it. By being able to choose
the meanings we make allow us to wend our pathway through life less reactively,
more choicefully, and wisely.
We have a lot to contend with, however. Threats
to our existence, whether direct or indirect (for example, being in the
presence of a bomb going off, or a bystander to a bank robbery), or just injury
(like falling off a rock and breaking a wrist) shakes the foundation of our
being; we feel the reverberations for a long time and fear resounds around us. Trauma
and abuse (sexual, physical, and emotional) can sometimes cause us to freeze
like terrified animals so we cease to be able to respond with more than a rigid
repertoire of feelings in relation to those around us. We might turn to drugs
and alcohol to “loosen” us up, but such a solution ravages our bodies and minds,
rather than offering actual healing. Bereavement, likewise, has long lasting
effects on our bodies, as well as our minds, and may be experienced as on-going
depletion of our energy. We feel too weak to do what usually interests us. Depression, as it is now being
described, is a likewise a “frozen” response to trauma, and one solution is more
exercise and right diet. The
prescription of “exercise” is too generic and fails to appreciate the diversity
of exercise styles possible. It isn’t just a case of moving your body more, but
moving it in ways that delight you. Right diet can be generically prescribed as
well, forgetting that it isn’t necessarily what you eat, but how and with what
level of enjoyment. Chocolate may perk you up, if that’s your thing and if you
believe it will (I recognize here that the chemical components of substances
and activities do have an affect upon the brain), but there is more going here
than just this one-to-one correspondence. And, in the case of the experiment
mentioned above, there is more to just giving a context to physiological
arousal. The meanings we make have to have something to do with us personally.
The subjects shown pictures of happy or sad people and then reporting feeling happy or sad after being artificially physiologically aroused had to have been conditioned to respond that way, and conditioning is what being a social animal is all about. Social conditioning doesn’t end in a person’s childhood life; it is life-long flexible process. It is also responsive, but not bound by one expression of it, to what arises physiologically. As noted above, there is a perceptible gap between what is felt in the body and what meaning is made of it. There really is a window of opportunity in every moment to change how we view our lives and thus alter how we feel about ourselves, and how we act upon others. Therapy can bring insight into ways we prevent ourselves seizing the day and how we can enliven ourselves to new ways of being, as well as finding ways to not resolving old traumas but moving on from them.
Copyright @ 2013 Dr Elizabeth McCardell
The subjects shown pictures of happy or sad people and then reporting feeling happy or sad after being artificially physiologically aroused had to have been conditioned to respond that way, and conditioning is what being a social animal is all about. Social conditioning doesn’t end in a person’s childhood life; it is life-long flexible process. It is also responsive, but not bound by one expression of it, to what arises physiologically. As noted above, there is a perceptible gap between what is felt in the body and what meaning is made of it. There really is a window of opportunity in every moment to change how we view our lives and thus alter how we feel about ourselves, and how we act upon others. Therapy can bring insight into ways we prevent ourselves seizing the day and how we can enliven ourselves to new ways of being, as well as finding ways to not resolving old traumas but moving on from them.
Copyright @ 2013 Dr Elizabeth McCardell
