Psychological Flexibility: a predictor of change

The human being longing never to suffer or for anything has ended up causing more suffering and for more things. The incongruity we can say is living in a world that we perceive as "more pleasant, safer, less painful” and find ourselves overwhelmed by the suffering generated precisely by that world designed to seek the happiness. Modern society has contrasted the concept of suffering with that of well-being, conceiving the latter as normal, positive, desired and on the contrary, suffering is socially paired with thoughts of impotence, of incapacity, as something abnormal, negative and inappropriate.

• We recommend you read: "Resilience: definition and 10 habits to enhance it"

Why is it so important to be psychologically flexible?

Consequently, This has led to the perception of suffering as opposed to being in a position to act for what one wishes, we have been sold the obligation to feel good and avoid suffering, unaware that this is a fundamental part of life. life and it is something that we cannot avoid, but if we manage, living a life without pain happens to be the priority objective of many people.

Thus, if we were to inquire about what is expected of life, a common part of the responses would very likely include the desire to live well and be happy by avoiding any event or situation that entails “negative” emotions or discomfort, more specifically, they seek to feel loved, have clear ideas, be motivated or want to do things, think positive about themselves and about life, about so that when the pain arises, the bad moments, the doubts, the negative thoughts, the insecurity in oneself, the sensation of not being loved, of not being successful, one suffers and all that becomes as a priority objective of avoidance, which, depending on what the person values ​​and conceives, can become destructive and trigger a series of physical and psychological illnesses by resisting the change.

It should be emphasized that one of the tools for achieving a full life that human beings have is Psychological Flexibility, which we could define as the ability to be in contact with private events that arise without the need to avoid or escape them. This implies living in the present, open to experiences and moving in the direction of things that are important to us. In other words, it is being open to other types of experiences, sensations, emotions, thoughts, memories and images and have the ability to make decisions based on the things that really matter to us and we value.

What we achieve with psychological flexibility is living our lives not based on trying to eliminate or avoid unpleasant sensations or events, but rather having the ability to accept that Things will appear in our daily lives that seem negative and uncomfortable to us, but they are part of life and the important thing is to really move in the direction we want. move. When we are psychologically flexible, we do not judge if thoughts are true or not, we analyze them based on whether or not they help us to achieve our goals, if they help us not to live a full and satisfactory life, that is, if they help us or not to head in the direction we want to move, when they do not help us what we should do is not merge with thoughts, that is, take a certain perspective and distance to change the relationship with these thoughts, accepting their existence as something inevitable for the change.

In itself, we can say that Psychological flexibility helps us to have a better reading and adherence to the situations that we experience daily, enabling personal progress., it is an important skill that helps change and benefits emotional well-being, to the extent that it seeks to help the person to manage his internal events to direct his action towards what he considers valuable, that is, synchronize his feeling, thinking and acting.

Strategies for shaping psychological flexibility

Here are the main ways to foster this ability:

• Help the client come to grips with the long-term consequences of behaving inflexibly: that is to say, living lost in thought, entangled in your mind and disconnected from the present, avoiding certain experiences, sensations, emotions and thoughts that are unpleasant to us turning life into running away from unpleasant experiences, which leads to not having the energy to move in the direction that we want to move, but we are simply reacting, avoiding experiences of suffering and remaining immobile before the change.

• Develop the ability to frame private events in a hierarchy with the SELF, so that the person can take a step back from those events that are not in line with their values ​​and/or objectives.

• Help the client refer how you can behave to advance your values, identifying pleasant experiences and events or unpleasant events that arise throughout life and that need to be recognized and experienced as guarantors of the change.