You've Done Self Care. Now Try This.
June 16, 2022
During the pandemic, organizational psychologist Adam Grant wrote about languishing: “a sense of stagnation and emptiness … as if you’re muddling through your days, looking at your life through a foggy windshield.” It's a combination of fatigue, low-grade depression, fueled by a little anxiety added in for good measure. Grant called it "the dominant emotion of 2021."
Well here we are in 2022, and this phenomenon doesn't seem to be going away.
What do you do when you're languishing? When you're "in a funk?"
Sometimes when we're languishing and feeling exhausted — emotionally, physically, socially or spiritually — the best thing we can do is rest. But at a certain point, rest creates inertia. Our minds and our bodies are as recovered as they’re going to get. Yet we still feel off. At this point, we might benefit from enacting a psychological concept called behavioral activation.
Behavioral Activation
First developed in the 1970s by the clinical psychologist Peter Lewinsohn as a way to help people work through depression, apathy and negative moods, behavioral activation is based on the idea that action can create motivation, especially when you’re in a rut.
To be clear, this is not really about trying to think positive thoughts, like Norman Vincent Peale's "The Power of Positive Thinking." Not only is it true that positive thinking can only get us so far; research also shows that it can backfire.
Sometimes we initiate action in spite of our feelings, and then find that our feelings change as we take action.
The challenge with behavioral activation is mustering enough energy to start acting on the things that matter to you: Make that phone call, schedule that walk with friends, write that email, get off social media and start on the creative project you’ve been procrastinating on. This may sound simple, but when you are languishing, simple does not mean easy.
But a mind-set shift can be a powerful tool. When you feel down, unmotivated or apathetic, you can give yourself permission to feel those feelings but not dwell on them or take them as destiny. Instead, you shift the focus to getting started with what you have planned in front of you, taking your feelings, whatever they may be, along for the ride.
Doing so gives you the best chance at improving your mood.
To be sure, behavioral activation is not a be-all, end-all for people experiencing depression, anxiety or other mental health challenges. But it can be an extremely effective tool, along with medication and therapy as needed.
Morita Therapy
Although the term isn't used, behavioral activation lies at the heart of Morita Therapy, a mental health strategy pioneered by Japanese psychologist Shoma Morita in the early 20th Century. Unlike many Western approaches, Morita therapy doesn't place much of an emphasis on the clients' feelings. When feelings come up in the session, the therapist would say something like, "Okay, yes, you're feeling that.
That makes sense." But then, he or she would change the subject. The real focus is on the question: So now what will you do?
Greg Kretch is a Western psychologist who's written several books about Morita therapy. In “The Art of Taking Action” he says this:
“Feelings are sensations. The ability to tolerate sensations we’d rather not have is supremely important. Without such tolerance, our lives remain needlessly vulnerable to our wild and fickle feelings, and our plans get needlessly derailed. Without such tolerance we can become preoccupied to an unhealthy degree with our private internal experience, and thereby become distracted from the world around
us, the needs of others, and the tasks at hand.
"Notice the feeling, recognize it for what it is, take a deep breath, and shift your energies to that which needs doing.”
Brad Stulberg is an executive coach who writes about performance and mental health. Here's the mantra he uses and recommends to others:
“This is what’s happening right now.
I’m doing the best I can.
Just get going, and see what happens.”
He concludes by saying: "I remind myself that sometimes the kindest thing I can do for myself is also the hardest thing to do — and that what seems hard today might just make tomorrow feel a bit easier."
Sources:
- This article is adapted from Brad Stulberg, who wrote about "languishing" for the NYT in February of this year. Some of the language is his, some is mine. For Stulberg's full article, click here .
- To read Adam Grant's article on Languishing, click here
- To read "The Problem with Positive Thinking," click here
