Last update: May 07, 2018
Our emotional gaps remind us that there is something we cannot fill, which is causing us instability and frustration. We can try to fill that void with excesses, drinking alcohol until our senses cloud, destroying ourselves in the gym, eating continuously or compulsive shopping; but the feeling of despair will still be present, perhaps it will increase.
The feeling of emptiness can cause an emotional block that prevents us from facing reality face to face and leads us to a disordered life in an attempt to fill our shortcomings.
Fighting emotional emptiness is not easy, but excesses are not the solution. Much of the negative emotions and feelings we experience come together, making us feel that we are immersed in a very deep well. These emotions cause us a sense of helplessness that appears when we are unable to react to painful situations.
When we think we have lost everything, excesses seem the only solution to feel complete. Any normal pleasant behavior is replaced by addictive behavior. In fact, abnormal use could be made of normal behavior depending on the intensity, frequency, degree of interference in personal relationships.
"Excess is a defect, it is the poison of reason".
-Francisco de Quevedo-
Not knowing how to fill gaps like excesses
The excesses control our behavior, even going so far as to deny it in a manifest way. This vicious circle in which excesses increase our voids will end only when we address the cause of these "abandonment behaviors".
When we are unable to react to problematic situations, a barrier stands between us and them, creating a breeding ground for excessive behavior. Some signs warn us that perhaps we are falling into excesses to mask the reality that torments us. Avoiding certain activities, daily nervousness, fear and lack of motivation are the consequences of incorrect management of our voids.
Calling everything necessity can be the big problem. On the basis of our needs we find our voids and on the basis of our voids we find our excesses. Identifying the needs that affect us is fundamental to understanding our voids. A moderate need is normal and healthy, the problem occurs when it becomes overwhelming.
“The things that make us happy will lead to a game where the sum will always be zero: like an addiction that requires more and more doses; and even if you often have much more than others, it doesn't matter much ".
-Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi-
It takes courage to recognize what we lack
There is nothing better than knowing yourself to put an end to our emptiness. Many of the people who go to therapy and who say they experience a great sense of emptiness know very little about each other, have spent a lot of time without updating their view of themselves and who often look at them with a certain nostalgia.
They are aware that they are different, that the years have passed. They know they are no longer what they used to be, but they don't know who they are now. When the feeling of anhedonia invades us and we do not know what and / or why that happens to us, it is time to act, to be courageous and recognize that there is a problem.
Recognizing what we need requires a deep reflection on our emotional needs, beyond the mundane, the material and what others expect of us. It takes a lot of courage to recognize that we are a long way from living the life we ​​want or that we once scribbled on our horizon. Only a complete person is able to confess his shortcomings and recognize his mistakes and excesses.
Only a person who looks carefully and who puts affection in this gaze is willing to accept and integrate his desires into his identity, dynamic and mutant by definition, so that this fusion does not produce a dissonance.
"When you get rid of everything you have, you actually move on to possessing all the treasures of the world."
-Mahatma Gandhi-
