MIND MOVES:We often attribute our actions to a false cause, refusing to accept our own truths
AS A MEDICAL student, I spent a summer with my brother and his family in the US. Sometimes, it is the simple exchanges of everyday life rather than the peak moments that stand out in our memories. I recall one such moment from that time as if it happened yesterday.
I was sitting at the dinner table with my brother, his wife, and their children. Conversation was flowing. My three-year-old nephew was contentedly playing with the food on his plate with his fork.
His mother asked him to eat his vegetables. After a moment's thought, the boy replied "but I can't like these vegetables, mummy".
The conversation stopped in its tracks. The three adults at the table looked at each other, no one quite knowing what to say or do next. None of us had expected that answer. Initially, I was bemused.
It took me a few minutes to get my head around his words. I remember thinking, "what an ingenious answer". As he spoke, he peered, wide-eyed, deep into his mother's eyes.
The message was clear, and might be paraphrased as "honestly, mummy, I'm trying so hard to like these vegetables but I just can't. Believe me, if I could, I really would like them. In fact, I would love to be able to like them but it is beyond me. And because I can't like them, you can't really give out to me now can you, mummy?"
This little exchange awakened an interest in me regarding the answers we give to searching questions. In that situation at least, my nephew had mastered the art of giving his mother an answer which significantly reduced the chances of reprisals for not eating his vegetables. While the replies we give to others can be intriguing, the answers we give ourselves can be even more so.
A man in his 50s attended me some time ago. A lovely, gentle, reserved man, he had never been in a loving or sexual relationship. He almost was, once, over 20 years ago, but it hadn't worked out. He never risked entering a relationship again. He went to dances, sometimes plucking up the courage to ask a woman to dance. It never went any further. He never again asked anyone out.
I asked him about this. He replied that, whenever he was dancing with a woman, he would think: "There's no point asking this woman out, because next week I might meet a nicer, better woman. I would have to say goodbye to this woman, so why bother going to the trouble in the first instance?"
Over the years, he had managed to convince himself that this really was why he was not asking women out. The real reason was, I felt, more likely to be his great lack of confidence regarding his own masculinity, sexuality and women.
His considerable self-doubt, coupled with his sensitive nature, meant that the risk of rejection was to be avoided at all costs.
I also recall a woman in her 40s. One day we discussed the merits of crying. She immediately said that crying was a very good thing. She always responded to her children's tears with warmth, empathy and love.
She applied entirely different standards regarding her own tears, however. She determinedly guarded against ever crying. She hadn't shed a tear in over 20 years.
When we met, six weeks after the death of a family member, I asked how she was about her loss. She quickly replied: "Oh, I'm well over it now," adding that she has always lived by the motto that when something or someone is gone, they are gone - no point crying over spilt milk.
I had a hunch that this wasn't the whole story. In our work together we teased this out. She came to acknowledge that, for her, crying equated to being exposed and out of control.
If she started crying, she was afraid she would never stop. Her level of sadness was such that it terrified her. She said that acknowledging her terror around grieving and losing control felt good; it felt honest.
These two people were practising a common human pattern which I call logicalising: the creation of an apparently logical explanation for one's actions and inactions. By logicalising, we avoid having to face and address the real issue.
But logicalising has its down sides. We repeatedly accumulate unfinished emotional business which weighs us down. We remain stuck, out of touch with what is going on. Sadly, we stay stuck in our life, too.
It is better to acknowledge to ourselves the real reasons for our actions and inactions. It can be more painful initially, as we decide to address our fear, rather than run from it. By addressing the real issue gently, one step at a time, with the aid of whatever supports we need, we will usually find that we are well able to resolve it. In the process, we free ourselves to live a fuller, richer life.
• Terry Lynch is a GP in Limerick and author of Beyond Prozac