NO. WE ARE NOT THE SAME: THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE PSYCHOLOGIST, PSYCHIATRIST, PSYCHOANALIST AND PSYCHOTERAPIST.

I have many times spoken to people that have told me that they would like to receive professional help and they talk about the psychologist, of the psychiatrist and the psychoanalyst as we were the same, but with different names. They also think that we also prescribe medicine, or that we do hypnosis. I consider this a serious problem of our society, and in the same time a reflection of the little or non importance given to us concerning these professionals that are responsible for the care of our mental health. The regrettable consecuence for this is that many people decide not to look for professional help, because they don’t know what each of us do, and also because there’s still the idea that “this is for crazy people”, product of disinformation and ignorance. Therefore lets make a brief review on the differences between these three professionals, so that when we need help, we know exactly whom to look for and why. In the first place we have the psychologist, who studies the professional career of psychology in university. Psychology is the science that studies the behavior and other phenomenon of the human mind. The psychologist centers his work on the following aspects: cognitive (thoughts, memory, intelligence, perception, etc) emotional-affective and conduct. By the same way psychologist can belong to different psychological models, that is to say that it depends on the psychotherapist model (the style that he offers), among them we have: cognitive-behaviorisms that work from the reformulation of the interpretation of supposed hypothesis and believes that generate our emotional disturbance, personal, familiar, laboral, etc. Gestaltgics that focus there work mostly on emotional aspects, looking forward to closing the circle or close the gestalt, that the experienced conflicts on the past could have generated, working with them in the here and now. The Systemics who work in function to an integral analysis of the different subsystems that conform a person, such as family, friends, the laboral environment, etc. These are only three of the many psychological models that exist. Each model counts with its own way of interpreting the problem that the person is passing through, for which they use different therapeutic technics. There are psychotherapist schools for the many models mentioned before, that are encharged of forming psychotherapist in a period of two years aproximately, for which it is not necessary to be a psychologist. It is important that patients and people that are interested in receiving psychological help learn about the model with which the therapist to whom they wish to attend works. It is also our obligation to instruct and give examples about our work from the beginning, for many theorics sustain that you can’t affirm that one model is better and more effective than the other in treatments, and that this depends mostly in the ability of the therapist. One can affirm that one model can be more effective than the others in the treatment of some problems or disturbances, for example, cognitive-behaviorism therapy: in depression, compulsive-obsessive disorders and panic disorders. Psychodynamic therapy: on disociative disorders, etc. Sistematic therapy in a disfunctional familiar dynamic, etc. On the other hand we have the psychoanalysts (Psychoanalysis was founded by the world wide known Sigmund Freud), who received their knowledge in a psychoanalysis institute, (after having achieved professional studies in any carrier, not necessarily psychology). The Psychoanalysts consider that the symptoms that generate a disorder are generated by unsolved conflicts in the first state of the psychosexual development, that stay in the latent state in the unconscious and the solution is found in that the person rises to the conscience state that which generated the mental conflict and to become aware of it by himself (with the guide of the therapist ofcourse). The psychoanalysts state that the mind is composed (in the second topic of Freud) by three structures: Super Ego, (conformed by all those social norms that are basically learned through parents, school teachers, etc). Ego (the conscient state). Finally, Id, composed by all our desires or life impulses (Eros) or of death (Thanatos). The Super Ego (the structure of censure) and the Id (structure without censure) in being totally opposed, find themselves in constant conflict most of the time between “what we want to do and what we should or have to do”. For example: “I feel very much like approaching that person and kissing her, but, I should not, because they’ll think bad about me”. The State of tension that the Ego experiences (for being the intermediary between the Super Ego and the Id) takes it to generate defense mechanism to protect itself (like for example repression, projection, etc) that block the mental energy, forcing it to stay in the unconscious (causing at the same time the state of neurosis or emotional disorder), of which the person is not conscient. This constitutes the real challenge for the psychoanalysts, and is the center of their therapy, recognizing and managing those defense mechanisms so that the mental energy leaves its latent state and manifests itself, and in this way solve the problem. I personally consider that the Psychoanalysis theory is of great importance and offers great explanation of the function of the mind. Nevertheless, I do not recommend their therapies (this is just my opinion) for they are of long duration and (may)? of the therapeutic procedures turn up being counterproductive. This was also sustained by Albert Ellis himself and Aaron Beck, fathers of cognitive psychology whom in their beginnings were partidaries of psychoanalysis. Never the less I will offer further explanation on this respect in another opportunity. Finally we have the psychiatrist. To be a Psychiatrist you have to study medicine and then specialize on psychiatry, that is to say that it is one more medical specialty, as is also cardiology, traumatology, etc. The psychiatrist centers his work with a person from the biological point of view. For which its treatment is pharmacological. This is due to the fact that all mental disorders have a neurochemical base and are the result of an unbalance, like for example the one that I explained in the publication on depression. NONE OF THE THREE ARE FOR “CRAZY PEOPLE”. All people have problems of different characters and difficulty, and we all have the right to receive specialized help. When I was a teenager I was against psychologist, for I believed that it was enough with the help of my friends and family (and it is true that family and friends are the main aspect for coming out of any problem) but then I realized that there were problems that they were not able to identify and manage (like in the case of depression, which is one of the disorders of mayor prevalence), not because they did not want, but because they did not count with the knowledge and preparation with which a specialist counts. Lets create conscience and dedication for what mental health is. In this way we can help ourselves and others when they really need it.

THE HARMFULL IGNORANCE OF BELIEVING THAT LOVE IS JUST A FEELING

This is a problematic that I consider of great importance. Love is a subject that moves the world. Nevertheless there is very little information on its respect, which is truly of worry and regrettable. I say this due to the lack of understanding from part of much youth and adults on what love is and what they believe to experience as such. It has taken many people to make mistakes that end up on all sorts of tragedies, and those which not end up in tragedies turn into life experiences of which sadly many times people do not manage to learn from, and continue to make the same mistakes over and over again. Much of this could be avoided and changed if there could only be more education on love in schools and homes. What most frustrates is that it is a subject that is much less complex than the majority of the people believe, but they wont be able to see it this way unless they count with the proper guide and information.

Love is not just a feeling. Love is also cognition and behavior. It is cognition because love envolves single superior processes proper of human beings such as sincerity, honesty, loyalty, respect, trust, communication among many others. On the other side love is conduct. Because as many say “it is worthless for you to tell me that you love me if you don´t demonstrate it”. Never the less this must be actions that reflect the cognitions mentioned lines above, that is to say that my acts demonstrate to the person that I love that I am sincere with her in the name of what I feel and think, for it is the congruence of what we think, feel and do what allows the other person to know that we love them and viseversa. An incongruence for example is what we use to call the prove of love and even as ridiculous as the phrase sounds and being almost out of use it is still frequently occurring sadly at earlier ages and like this there are many more cases of people that day by day live in the name of love with much incongruence, like in the case of those many people that continue with relations in which there is no love, but instead it is attachment and emotional dependance. Also those relations in which passion is confused with love, when the first is an emotion and not a feeling and as such it characterizes for being of great intensity and short duration, and in general it can be experienced with much frequency when starting a relation or in those which have a short period of time since they started, and when disappearing people think that what disappeared was love, when in truth it was not this that kept them together. Passion, in being an emotion has the characteristic of dominating our thoughts and actions, taking people to comitt suicide or to kill the person whom they said they loved, only because he gave for ended the relation, or because they believe there partner is with another person. The same happens with those relations that like I mentioned before keep together because of attachments and/or dependence. By this I mean to say that there are many reasons, sensations and emotions that are alike love, like dependence and passion, but they are not.

In conclusion, love is cognition, feeling and action. And if you are just going to center yourself in one of this three aspects it is probable that what you are experiencing is not love, or if your concept of what love is, is based in possible incongruences, that regretfully could lead you to hold on to disfunctional relations, which is not healthy. PLEASE, IF YOU HAVE EVER THOUGHT ON THE POSIBILITY OF TAKING AWAY YOUR LIVE OR HAVE INTENDED TO DO SO AND THE IDEA KEEPS CROSSING YOUR MIND, I ASK YOU TO CONTACT ME. My intention will not be of persuading you but to help you to evaluate with objectivity the situation before you take a decision. Remember that many times we FEEL there are no other paths to walk, but what we feel is not necessarily what is. For example I once met a person that was very charming and attractive, and had lots of admireres and almost everyone told her how beautiful she was. Nevertheless she didn´t feel that this was true, even dough it was a fact that she was, she had even worked in many opportunities as a model and hostess. Thank God and the opportune help, she became aware of that the way that she saw herself was in function to what her “incongruent in love boyfriend” did to her when treating her with despite and humiliation. When he finished with her because she discovered that he was unfaithful he told her that she was horrible and that he has lost his time spending it with her. She then felt horrible and assumed that it was for this reason that he had cheated on her and left her.

Love begins with oneself. 90% of the people that I ask if they love themselves ask me something that I once asked myself, “and how do you that?”, “How do I love myself?” The answer is easy, feeling, thinking and doing the same thing that you do with the people you love. The part that most complicates people is the part where they get to experience love for themselves. What happens with this is that this is totally linked to selfsteam and maybe the most important variable of selfsteam is self knowledge, one does not love what one does not know, and if one has not giving oneself the time to know themselves to feel love for themselves becomes complicated. On the cognitive side of love is it not that when you love someone you give them your trust, your sincerity, care, spoil them, your understanding and your forgiveness, etc? Then why not do it with yourself, and finally take it to love-action, take care of yourself as if you were the love of your life, as if you were your own child.

Well this is all for now, but we will continue to deepen on the subject in another opportunity.

TO FORGIVE IS NOT TO FORGET

Through out my life I have learned to forgive many things. To learn to forgive is a personal challenge. It is hard in the beginning, for you don’t know how to deal with your emotions and also one does not know how to control painful memories. When people use the term “to forget” referring to forgiveness in reality it seems to what they are referring to is to “erase” memories, and this is not possible. This way of thinking does not lead us to forgive, but to evade and avoid what has happened which does not solve anything. Forgiveness has a process. The first step in this process is the “Emotional Burst”. Attempt to liberate all the emotional energy. Go out and run, put a pillow on your face and yell as loud as you can, hit your bed until you get as tired as to go from rage and tension to tiredness and relaxation, in this way you will be able to think with more clarity and make better decisions. It is also important to allow yourself to experience what you are feeling, specially if it happened recently, don’t repress it. Then comes “comprehension” which consists in trying to know and understand bit by bit the experienced situation, the reasons “which might have logic or not” and the story of the person who might have with or without intension hurt you. For example, today I met a great person, who told me that when he was a child his father got home drunked many times and beat his mother and brothers brutally. But then he told me that he had learned to forgive his father mainly in wanting and trying to comprehend why his father behaved like this. He discovered that his fathers life had been incredibly hard. He did not justify his father, but it did help him to forgive and comprehend. Then comes the step of “accepting what happened”, which as I have said can many times lack of logic, but it is good to understand that not all actions that people make are logic. For example, once I knew a person that people generally considered good, that never intended to hurt anybody. This person had a long time relation, one day he discovered that his girlfriend had been unfaithful in many opportunities, even dough the relation seemed to be going very well. So in order to forgive he decided to put into practice the three steps which I have mentioned. First he allowed himself to experience the whole love-hate that he felt towards her and enter a gym where he liberated all the emotional energy. Then he comprehended her story and this helped him to understand what had happened. And last he accepted that things had already occurred in that way, and that they corresponded to his past, and that he could choose between living his present and his future bitter for what had happened or to forgive and live happily without resentments. This person chose the second option. The last step consists on “letting go”, one can go through many days or months in the process of forgiveness but if you choose to stay in resentment you can spend years or your whole life stuck on it. If you choose to forgive, learn to let go, don’t get stuck on the subject, carry on with your life, recreate, reinvent and improve yourself. The process of forgiveness can take time and one can get used to living with that emotion and not let it go. To let go, is a decision that requires determination and persevearence.

And last, it is important to know that maybe the most difficult thing in this process is to understand that memories activate emotions, but it is just that, an emotion and for its own nature it will disappear on time. For the brain to remember is “to live again” for the same neuronets that where active in the time of that specific experience activate. If you make an effort to follow these steps bit by bit the emotion will cease to relate with those memories that disturb you so much. Forgiveness is one of the best guaranties for happiness.