Dear Fellow Avoidant,

More often than not, humans avoid the unpleasant.  It is, after all, our animal instinct and human birth-right to direct our own boat.  There, generally, has to be some compelling reason to head into the extremes of the cold storm or dry desert.  From an emotional landscape perspective, our systems generally offer the whole template; and many of us would live out our entire lives without ever going in the uncomfortable zones of ourselves.  We’ll sometimes go so far, as to avoid any external circumstances that may remind us of those internal landscapes.  The cost, all too often, is a limited worldview and experience—a cost many are willing to pay never to have to ‘go there’. 

This is a completely understandable choice, with absolutely no cause for shame or embarrassment. The only problem is that, for a great number of us, the landscapes do not stay quiet.  Tired of being ignored, these avoided places inside can become oppositional to our plan for a ‘pleasant life’ at the cost of ‘staying limited’.  They come for us in our dreams, social interactions, sleeplessness, physical symptoms, and emotional discomfort. They come intrusively and without warning, generally at the wrong times. Of course, for the avoidant, there is not a ‘right time’.  

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And, there’s always a choice here.  We often increase the attempts at avoidance, at least initially.  If we have used an addiction or obsession, we will just turn up the volume in an attempt to drown out the sense of the intrusive.  If we have used pain as a distraction, that pain will often ‘have’ to increase in order to continue its important job of avoiding.  If one has cleaned to stay external, that house will be utterly spotless.  You get it.  

​The other choice is to go there.  That’s right, turn into the storm and have a look. So, here’s the caveat.  We actually need to do it differently this time around, so that we have actual resources.  These landscapes often formed in the face of isolation during trauma, or emotional exile in times of great pain.  The corrective experience we can provide does not look the same for everyone, but new resources are paramount if we are to heal. 

New resources can be anything: good therapy, meditation, new routines, coloring (for Goodness sake)!  All that matters, is that the new resource fills some void of the time when the landscape formed inside of us.

​Then, armed with a potential, corrective experience, we can feel the dryness of that internal desert long enough; until the desert can become watered by the new resources we hold. It often takes some help, and the road can definitely be uncomfortable at times.  But the payoff is a wider worldview, greater tolerance for experiences, and no more need for this uncomfortable experience to be intrusive in life.  That seems to be the general range of options.

So, it goes without saying, that the inner discomfort generally has to be great in order to choose this road. That is animal. The human aspect is that we can choose a road that looks hard, in order to help life be more fulfilling in the long-run.  If life is easy, then why choose something hard, unless of course your friends are noticing your limited consciousness. There might be something there.  

Thanks for reading, and feel free to share this link to the webpage.  Know that you can comment or reach out for any reason. And, from one avoidant human to (possibly) another, have a trauma informed week.   

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