“New year, new life”🇧🇷 The famous phrase, which everyone knows, is probably one of the most thought of at this time of year. But there seems to be more than meets the eye.
As the new year approaches, we naturally tend to look back and think about what will bring us what comes next. This is indeed the annual balance sheet ritual many of us embrace, where goals set for the year that is about to end are analyzed – and new goals and dreams are set for the year ahead.
Psychoanalyst Antonio Coimbra de Matos used a metaphor that alludes to the way we live life, often focusing in the rearview mirror – on the past -, ignoring the large frontal window anticipating and flourishing the future. With this, we do not want to diminish the importance of the past and its impact on the present and the future, but we do want to reinforce the importance of looking forward – a look that is expected to transform in the three times: past, present and future. At the end of the year, this back view seems to become more apparent and weighs on us more, when we tend to criticize what has not been achieved, and belittle even the small gains that have been made.
Unfortunately, we still live in a society that encourages pointing fingers at others and ourselves, a society that promotes guilt and comparison with those around us. It is known in social networks and in clinical practice, namely with adolescents and young adults, that there is an “inner whip” that manifests itself in discourse as “low self-esteem” and “low confidence” and in behaviors of social isolation, crisis anxiety and panic, which promote the development of personalities that are more defenseless For security about herself – and about herself in relation to others. This scenario, more often than not, is the culmination of a journey begun and conceived with my mind-boggling eyes fixed on that rear-view mirror.
At this time of year, the pressure of this “inner whip”—which was often present—tends to manifest itself in the “goals I missed” in the face of last year, in the dynamic of punishment and guilt, as well as reinforcing feelings of inadequacy and inadequacy.
We could, if it makes sense, do a retrospective of the past year, but it is important that this journey through the past not only go into the exclusive confrontation of places that foster suffering, guilt and anguish, or places of loneliness and helplessness. If such thinking is accompanied by dissatisfaction and suffering greater than psychological well-being, then perhaps this is a sign of the need to understand the suffering as a manifestation of turbulence in flight and the possibility of seeking professional help.
I would say the pandemic has brought a greater awareness of mental health, a little more revelation of its central importance in the lives of all of us, and the opportunity to finally be able to look “with eyes” to see the past, but above all the the present and the future🇧🇷 At this point in the year, when we look back over the past year, it would be good to think about the journey we’ve been on and the way we’ve been doing it.
Can we sit in the car, look in the rearview mirror, but above all focus on the path that lies ahead? This is the view into the future—to the dream—that highlights psychological well-being, rather than the guilt and anguish of an annual balance sheet. But it is not always possible to do this Rebound to the past without suffering.
This prospect, to look forward to, can be intimidating, but it is also very rewarding and valuable. It may allow us to embrace what we have not achieved, for example, and resume our journey, and perhaps even accompany us, if we feel the need, in an attempt to understand what has not been achieved, but above all the reason for the non-compliance. He has a great weight in our lives.
What if travel could be transformative this year? Indeed, mental health is of paramount importance in our lives, and when New Year’s Eve reflection becomes more painful than fun, it can be important to have a travel companion on the side seat, such as a psychologist. Someone to follow us, guide us and light the way forward – and accompany us through the mishaps, fogs and storms we’ve been through. Above all, help us support and understand the pathways that make up the journey through the unknown that forever wants to be known.
I travel accompanied. what about?
Clinical Psychologist at CUF Tejo Hospital
