LET'S NOT SABOTAGE OURSELVES

Psychology, grosso modo, helps us perceive the best of our potentialities. In all its areas, Psychology is person centered and sees us as the builders of our own history, able to positively organise our lives despite the daily conflicts we have to cope with. As Rogers, a North American psychologist, states, a person is able to “move towards a self understanding, and to take constructive procedures so as to solve his or her own problems” (1977:139). Undoubtedly, moving towards self understanding implies, first of all, accepting oneself. From self-acceptance one starts the movement to self-understanding. We cannot understand something if we don’t accept its existence. Thus, we may think that “knowing oneself” isn’t an easy process. It’s about lying before the challenge of “being who we are”, and not “who we want to be” or “need to be". In our contemporary world, it has become easier for us to live as if we were characters of a big theatre play. We live what is expected that we live, be it in the family, or group of friends, in the working environment, or elsewhere. Maybe it’s way easier to give away the oars of our boat to someone else. The responsibility to take on the course of our own lives is, sometimes, anguishing. It isn’t easy to be true in a social environment that overvalues characters instead of real persons. It’s not a mission of Psychology to nourish such characters. Maybe that’s why Psychology may bother some people, once it is a constant invitation to seek our truth. When one does not accept themselves or do not admit being what they are, they sabotage themselves. They cheat their real essence, and run away from what they really want. However, there comes this emptiness inside that we neither know where it comes from nor where it is going to. It is our true self asking to be heard. Therefore, Psychology is supposed to contribute to the improvement of human abilities. An improvement based on the truth of what we really are, without unnecessary and destructive lies, which do not collaborate on the growth and strengthening of our existence. In order to look for a licensed psychologist, we do not need to be “crazy” or suffering. We should only want to get to know ourselves better. That’s the preventive character of Psychology in people’s lives. Brazil has not yet got a preventive approach in terms of health, let alone in terms of mental health. Yet, this is a way for us to positively invest in our quality of life.

Adalmir Sandro L. Oliveira
Psychologist