A Psychological Lesson that Helped Me Transcend the Virtual World

This world is getting virtual, you aren’t!

Photo by Nagy Arnold on Unsplash

We live in a world that has become more VIRTUAL than ever before. We don't have to wait for our friends to join us on a trip or so, face time and zoom meetings are sufficient enough to connect us with them.

So why the global number of depression cases have increased significantly during recent times?

Even for those who have not tested positive, lockdown measures have increased feelings of loneliness, isolation, restlessness, and anxiety, as millions of people have been quickly forced to adapt to new realities and make drastic lifestyle changes.

According to the Royal College of Psychiatrists, which represents 18,000 psychiatrists in the UK, more people are seeking crisis mental health services as a result of COVID-19.

What Has Actually Happened Which Led To Such Detrimental Effects?

There’s this small concept in Psychiatry, which explains the behavioral pattern in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) Patients, it's known as Flooding & Systematic Desensitization.

As a psychotherapeutic technique, it is used to treat phobia and anxiety disorders including post-traumatic stress disorder(PTSD).

Let’s see what these two alien terms exactly mean:

Imagine yourself as someone who is very fond of keeping the surroundings and moreover oneself clean and tidy. You just can’t tolerate a 0.1 mm thin layer of dust on your work desk. You clean it the very next moment you see it.

What if I throw a bucket full of sand on you, this is what Flooding exactly is. What do you think you would've done next? Ran into your Bathroom and take a shower to make sure every sand particle is off your body.

What if I keep throwing the same bucket full of sand on you each time I encounter you outside your Bathroom. I am sure as hell that you're going to get annoyed and scream from your bathroom.

But you simply have no option with you. Each time I see you outside the Bathroom. I am going to make sure that the bucket of sand is empty & you are the one who is drowned in it.

This way a time will come when either you won't come out of your bathroom or you'll learn how to deal with the sand bucket.

The moment you realize that the bucket is anyways going to get empty on you whether you go out after a bath or without one. That is the exact moment when you've sensitized yourself to the upcoming scenario. This is what Systematic Desensitization is.

This simple concept is what I think can be applied to our current scenario. We were all living a decent life and spending our weekends with our families and friends until one day when the Nations started undergoing a complete shutdown.

This worked as a Flooding stimulus for us, we were unaware of the seriousness of the disease and this started building a sense of fear in our minds.

Gradually the number of cases started to rise, we lost our near & dear one’s and it completely shook us all. But we started adapting ourselves to the situation and tried to accept the New Normal- including Zoom Classes, Online Meetings, Family Face Time, etc. This is when Systematic Desensitization came into play.

Still many of us are struggling to get out of the Covid phobia and trying to normalize our lives. This is going to take time and each one of us being a different personality would take a different time to come out from the same situation that everyone has faced.

But during this comeback phase, many of us have a feeling of being incapable of performing the tasks that we used to perform pretty normally before the Pandemic started, to make the decisions of our lives that really matter.

Is this just because we have lost touch with the external world or the company of our colleagues?

What can be done to overcome these circumstances?

1. Avoid Getting Carried Away

During these tough we have faced many situations where we need someone to be with us, to accompany us, but what we have forgotten is that we are getting carried away in the decision-making part of our lives.

We have actually forgotten that there are a few decisions which are to be made only by us and no one can and should help us in making such decisions.

In my life one such situation was about visiting my paternal aunt when she was quite sick, she was not in a condition to even have a normal 2 minutes conversation with me. It was at this time that I gave a thought to visiting her during my ongoing examinations, which I later did.

But in the duration between visiting her and deciding to go visit her I received a thousand concerns and suggestions from a few very important people in my life to not take such an abrupt decision and expose myself to the ongoing Second Wave of COVID-19.

I knew they were very concerned about my health and wellbeing, but since I was pretty determined about visiting my aunt so I did.

Here I am not suggesting that you stop listening to your family and take decisions you shouldn’t have, instead, I am telling you to listen to yourself for once and think what is important as well correct for you at the moment.

2. Have Your Own Opinion

As I already mentioned that we are surrounded with technology all around and like never before, so are we surrounded with ideas and suggestions!!

This is exactly the time when you should send your heart on a trip and start thinking from your own brain.

This is not something new, people always have the best ideas in their minds when it comes to suggesting others. You too would’ve suggested a lot to your relatives or friends or colleagues. But when it comes to suggesting our own selves we find ourselves stuck in a muted position.

All this was already happening prior to this Pandemic and Lockdowns, it’s just that with so much technology it has now become a bit easier to poke into someone else’s life and suggest them with our opinions which sometimes might not be even related to the situation where the individual is stuck.

Taking into consideration the current scenario, I’ve learned to not blindly listen to what everyone else is talking about and instead and give the situation a second thought before coming to a decision that really matters to me. I suggest you follow this too.

Conclusion:

1. The world is evolving continuously at an exponential rate and so are the problems associated with it, the only way we can catch this running train is by deciding the appropriate station for ourselves.
2. Flooding and Systematic Desensitization are inevitable life phenomena, it's better to make a smooth shift to systematic desensitization.
3. We are surrounded by apparently smart people at all times, these people have magical powers to advise other people with their wonderful life-changing thoughts, however, you should definitely give a second thought to whatever these magicians tell us.

Thanks for giving this a Read. You can visit my profile to read my previous articles.