Life instinct is imbedded in human nature. Our ancestors thought about how to survive. Their actions and thoughts were focused on how to provide food and protect themselves from the wild. Through the struggles for survival, fears and defenses had evolved.
If we analyze ourselves or others we will easily see that most of our behaviors are the outcome of our efforts to protect ourselves. One may wonder why this is a problem? Sounds reasonable wanting to protect oneself. Defense and fear mechanisms have evolved in our efforts to survive, but now we struggle to live by them because we have allowed our fears to control our lives.
Modern man is not endangered so much by wild animals in everyday life as is by his thoughts, fears, and feelings. We can imagine a girl who would like to have a quality relationship. Let's call her Sara. She seemed to have achieved what she had always wanted. She acted per her values, was kind and gentle towards her partner, loved and respected him. One day, her partner leaves her for another. She felt that her whole world was falling apart.
It was not long before she healed her broken heart and her interested in man rekindled. She was a little tight at first, her head filled with thoughts expressed from her fear that she would be hurt again. The voice of fear had slowly weakened. Sara relaxed and behaved again according to her values, she was a kind, and tender girlfriend. After a while, this relationship had also failed. Her partner stopped having feelings for her and left. The pain was worse than the previous experience. It felt as though her head is going to explode from all the thoughts. She began to question her self worth and started to believe that love is not existent.
Fear gained a dominant role in Sara's life. Whit every new acquaintance came the possibility of being hurt again. This brings her to the decision to not love again as love equates pain. She was afraid to express tender feelings because she associated them with pain. Sara no longer behaved according to her values, and was no longer tender and kind to men. As time went by she was continually moving away from herself and her values. She thought that her present self was stronger. She fell into her own trap of thoughts. The truth is that by avoiding new experience due to fear and the end she is causing her more pain than her ex-partners ever did. The pain you feel after a breakup is normal. Lack of willingness to feel discomfort pain, turns the pain into trauma, and then the pathology comes in.
So back to the question - What is the problem if I want to protect myself? So we think by building walls we are protecting ourselves from unwanted thoughts, feelings and recurring pain, but in fact, we are being trapped and falling victim of continually trying to protect ourselves. If we lose ourselves and our values are we protect ourselves? If we are always alert to never hurt again, we will never relax.
Through therapy we learn to give space to all our emotions, because in our life when we move towards what is important to us it will not always be easy, we must not stop at the first hurdle. Remember and reconnect whit little kid in you, re - establish your true values and live by them.
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