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Behandling af angst og lavt selvværD
... en tidligere klient anbefaler (engelsk)
As a scientist, I spend most of my day inside my head—that is, thinking. I became very used to thinking hard about everything that happens in my life. After a few years, it became clear that that was not a good state of affairs. Largely due to thinking too much, anxiety would build up over the smallest shortcomings I’d have, even in the moments when I was generally having good experiences.
My thinking mind would take that as evidence that the experiences were ultimately bad and that I shouldn’t do them again. And so I did fewer and fewer things, and even for the few things I used to always enjoy, there was little joy left. Eventually I started telling myself to stop worrying about things. Later I found that that doesn’t work: first, it’s like telling someone "don’t think of a white bear"—they’ll immediately think of a white bear—, and second, I don’t really want to be a careless person.
As I learned through my treatment with Berit, things aren’t so black and white: while worry and anxiety make us uncomfortable, sometimes there are good, specific reasons to be worried. But the fact is, there’s no way to find out whether it’s wise to be worried through thinking alone. Here, there’s no substitute for experience. Berit taught me that there are healthier ways to relate to my experiences, and that it is possible to use the feedback I receive from them in a productive way, and not just as fodder for more rationalization.
And as a result of that, I can say that anxiety is no longer a constant presence. I learned that although anxiety cannot be eliminated, I can choose not to engage with it. Once I stop having thoughts that increase the anxiety, it eventually loses its momentum and goes away. And this frees me to deal with real-life issues in a more rational way, and to learn from them without fear. I always knew we can learn from our experiences but somehow I thought that the learning process ends in the brain, but now I know that it is a two-way street. The fact that I can train myself to be more in touch with reality is a fascinating insight that I learned thanks to therapy.
"Carlos", young South-American expat after treatment for anxiety and low self-esteem
My thinking mind would take that as evidence that the experiences were ultimately bad and that I shouldn’t do them again. And so I did fewer and fewer things, and even for the few things I used to always enjoy, there was little joy left. Eventually I started telling myself to stop worrying about things. Later I found that that doesn’t work: first, it’s like telling someone "don’t think of a white bear"—they’ll immediately think of a white bear—, and second, I don’t really want to be a careless person.
As I learned through my treatment with Berit, things aren’t so black and white: while worry and anxiety make us uncomfortable, sometimes there are good, specific reasons to be worried. But the fact is, there’s no way to find out whether it’s wise to be worried through thinking alone. Here, there’s no substitute for experience. Berit taught me that there are healthier ways to relate to my experiences, and that it is possible to use the feedback I receive from them in a productive way, and not just as fodder for more rationalization.
And as a result of that, I can say that anxiety is no longer a constant presence. I learned that although anxiety cannot be eliminated, I can choose not to engage with it. Once I stop having thoughts that increase the anxiety, it eventually loses its momentum and goes away. And this frees me to deal with real-life issues in a more rational way, and to learn from them without fear. I always knew we can learn from our experiences but somehow I thought that the learning process ends in the brain, but now I know that it is a two-way street. The fact that I can train myself to be more in touch with reality is a fascinating insight that I learned thanks to therapy.
"Carlos", young South-American expat after treatment for anxiety and low self-esteem