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Applied Behavioural Analysis (ABA) in 5 Minutes! - Phinity Therapy

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Romeo and Juliet, Helen and Paris, the list goes on, but I won&#8217;t. These are stories of lovers who might have benefited from a class in &#8220;how to stop obsessively thinking about someone&#8221; but that class was overbooked that semester, so go figure. But in all seriousness, we&#8217;ve probably all been there at some point, and to some degree felt out of control with our feelings about someone, vowing to never let it happen again. Because it only feels good when the other person feels the same&#8230;.often it&#8217;s not quite like that. And if you&#8217;re the one feeling distracted and preoccupied, okay, a bit obsessed, then it can feel disempowering. Why? Because it is. And sometimes it&#8217;s not even a romantic prospect but someone who&#8217;s aggrieved us in some way. So how do you take your power back? As the saying goes, they&#8217;re living in your head and they ain&#8217;t paying rent, so it&#8217;s time to evict them. This article will tell you how to serve that section 21 and learn how to get someone off your mind.

Introduction

So how do you stop thinking about someone? Indeed it&#8217;s a complex issue that requires articles and whole books on it. It also lands many people in therapy. But with some effort it is possible. First, let&#8217;s discuss why it&#8217;s so hard. Attraction is one reason and it&#8217;s not necessarily a bad thing because it&#8217;s quite normal during the early stages of a romantic relationship. It only becomes problematic when it starts to take over. For example, if you&#8217;re phone watching to see if they&#8217;ve read or replied to the message you sent just ten minutes ago or, if you can&#8217;t focus on your work because your mind keeps wandering with thoughts about them (good or bad).
Another reason why it happens relates to attachment. If you notice a tendency to become obsessive with partners, and even friends or co-workers, this might relate to your Internal Working Model (IWM), a concept coined by Attachment theorist John Bowlby. Your IWM is a blueprint that is made from your earliest relationships and which will guide how to behave in relationships.
Sometimes mental health problems like anxiety, low self esteem, loneliness, and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) can also play a role. Similarly, personality disorders like borderline personality disorder (BPD), dependent personality disorder, obsessive compulsive personality disorder (OCPD), or narcissistic personality disorder can predispose someone to these kinds of interpersonal problems.

Why Is It Hard to Get Someone Off Your Mind

When you&#8217;re thinking about how to get someone off your mind, you&#8217;re probably wondering how long it takes, especially when you and others around you start to worry it&#8217;s been too long. But there&#8217;s no definitive answer to this. It depends on how close you felt to the person, how attached you were and likely still are, and not necessarily how long you knew them. The deeper the connection, the longer it will take but this does not mean you&#8217;ve been sentenced to a passive limbo state. It&#8217;s important to be proactive. Start by asking yourself some questions, for example: how to get someone off my mind, and how to stop obsessive thinking about someone? These are the starting point of your journey. They will carry you to the next step which is learning the how, and next, doing it. The reason this is so important is because the how long question is directly impacted by your thought process. If you&#8217;re thinking about the person, imagining conversations, reliving memories, you&#8217;re still stuck. This extends your sentence. But, if instead, you&#8217;ve realised what is going on, and rather than let yourself indulge in this state, you ask the right questions, you can move to the next stage and lessen the sentence.
&nbsp;
<h3>Soulmate Myth Busted! </h3>
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe loading="lazy" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/L8eNyeblNCA?rel=0" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen">﻿﻿</iframe></div>

How Long Does It Takes to Get Someone Out of Your Head?

<h3>Stop Stalking on Social Media</h3>
This is a very modern problem that can keep you stuck with the ghost of someone. So one tip for how to get someone off your mind is to get them off your screen. As the saying goes: out of sight, out of mind. This may sound like a cliché, but clichés exist for a reason &#8211; there&#8217;s truth and wisdom in them. When clients are anxious or depressed and they watch things on social media or the news that make them feel more anxious or low,  I ask them to reduce this, and usually we notice an improvement. If you virtually stalk the object of your ire or affection, you keep them ever-present in your mind and life, so they ain&#8217;t going nowhere. And maybe that&#8217;s why you do it. But it only harms you, as they get on with life, you watch them getting on&#8230;but you&#8217;re just a speck in their rear-view, so it&#8217;s time to move off. This might mean you come off social media for a time if the urge is too strong. Logging each day you&#8217;ve abstained can also make you feel accomplished and motivate you to continue.
<h3>No-Contact Rule</h3>
This one may seem obvious when considering how to take your mind off someone but it&#8217;s astonishing how many people will break this rule. Even when they&#8217;ve broken it before and returned to someone who&#8217;s bad for them, and rinsed and repeated. So when clients ask me: How can I stop thinking about someone? One thing I will always ask them to do is stop contact. This is difficult but it&#8217;s necessary. Think of it like the addiction it is. Our video about addiction explains how we can become addicted to almost anything. Addiction is a chemical and emotional issue and when you get that contact, you feel relieved, safe, and eased to some extent. You also get that hit of dopamine and maybe some oxytocin, the &#8216;love hormone&#8217; as a side. Stop contact and stop feeding your bad habit and over time the withdrawal lessens.
<h3>Get Rid Of Nostalgic Items</h3>
If you want to know how to stop thinking about someone, decline nostalgia. Nostalgia is like an emotional memory that makes us feel warm and wistful. But when you&#8217;re wondering about how to stop fantasising about someone, it&#8217;s important to get rid of any keepsakes, this might even be messages you&#8217;ve exchanged, and while you&#8217;re at it, get rid of those rose-tinted lenses too. If this one feels too difficult, put all the cards, soft toys, and other gifts in a bag and give them to someone to store. Maybe down the line when you&#8217;ve mastered how to take your mind off someone (i.e., the person of interest), you can go through the bag and (responsibly) conduct a therapeutic burning ceremony, or sell or give away any items you deem of monetary value, and recycle the cards. I remember seeing a copy of Final Fantasy XIII in Computer Exchange with the message &#8220;To the best girlfriend ever&#8221; scrawled on the front&#8230;it&#8217;s good to see that said girlfriend decided to make her fantasies final by exchanging the game and maybe one day, a new beau too.
<h3>Stop Trying To Figure Out What’s Going On Inside Their Mind</h3>
Something that is a fruitless task and can feel like a torturous one when you&#8217;re wondering how to get someone off your mind, is when you spend your precious time trying to get in theirs! People can spend minutes, hours, days, weeks, and even months and years trying to make sense of the situation by trying to get inside the head of the other person. But all you&#8217;re doing is keeping that person present in your present. That person has likely moved on, and probably thinks of you rarely, if at all, but you&#8217;re not able to let go and are still trying to figure them out so you can understand what happened and why. Therapy might help you here and it&#8217;s understandable, but if you want to learn how to take your mind off someone, you have to realise you can never know another&#8217;s mind, and anything you conclude is your conclusion alone.
<h3>Stop Living In False Hope</h3>
There&#8217;s always a part of us that wants to keep the possibility of reconciliation alive. So when you&#8217;re thinking about ways how to get someone off your mind, there will be a part of you that might resist and fight. This is the internal battle that rages. You want to move on because your rational brain knows the truth &#8211; that it&#8217;s over. But your emotional, relational, attached brain will not so easily want to give up hope, even when you know on some core level, it&#8217;s false. But the falsehood of this wish is like the Siren&#8217;s call, it lulls you as the trap closes in. You aren&#8217;t able to truly let go and move on while you&#8217;re hanging on to this idea. You have one foot in, and the other barely out. You have to walk through the door and close it. Because when one door closes&#8230;
<h3>Respect Yourself</h3>
When clients ask me How to get someone off my mind? One thing that I try to emphasise is the idea of respecting themselves. This is one of those things that is so obvious its obviousness is taken for granted and becomes missed. Family and friends might try to hint at this when they say things like &#8220;you were too good for them&#8221; or &#8220;you deserved better&#8221; but it&#8217;s more than that. It&#8217;s about recounting all the times when you were disrespected, and realising how you allowed that to happen because you weren&#8217;t respecting yourself. Or maybe the person did nothing wrong, maybe you caused the end. If this is true, you have to respect yourself now. You have to bow out with dignity and grace and give them, and yourself space and time to learn, heal, and move forward.
<h3>Learn To Redirect Thoughts </h3>
But what if like Kylie, &#8220;I just can&#8217;t get you out of my head&#8221; is your daily mantra? Well, thoughts are not so easy to control and we can&#8217;t just tell ourselves to stop. So one way you can learn how to stop obsessive thinking about someone is to redirect your thoughts. This can be done in different ways. One way how to stop thinking about someone is with formal mindfulness practice. This means finding a quiet place where you can sit comfortably and focus your mind toward your breath, slowing it down, whilst focusing on different sensations, like the taste in your mouth, the feeling of the chair or ground under you, the sounds you hear, etc. Pick one sense to focus on in turn and spend some time with it as you slow your breath. If you cannot practice formally, you can try informal practice. This is simply noticing the thoughts and consciously moving away from them by first accepting them without judgment and then choosing to let them go.
<h3>Allow Yourself To Feel The Pain</h3>
This one might seem strange because as Freud said, most of us seek pleasure and try to avoid pain. But this isn&#8217;t seeking out pain. This is processing the pain that already exists. A reason why you struggle with how to get someone off your mind is because it&#8217;s painful to lose them. So not thinking about them means you lose them yet again, but by thinking about them, you can hold on &#8211; it&#8217;s a strange logic but logic nonetheless. And in some strange way this appears to minimise the hurt. Why is this? Because you&#8217;re also processing what happened, which helps. Even though some of the other suggestions in this article would seem to contradict this one, they work together. That is, you must give yourself some time to feel the pain&#8230;.this is grief. But grief can become complicated and this is detrimental. Feel, process, but accept and heal.
<h3>Stay Active</h3>
One of the things I emphasise is the mind-body connection. Staying active is important because it helps us release important mood-regulating hormones like endorphins. These offer a natural chemical high and can promote our healing process. Staying active also means the focus is on the body, allowing us to come out of the mind and we can also incorporate mindfulness, especially if running in the outdoors (recommended, on grass not concrete!). Plus, you&#8217;ll feel accomplished because you&#8217;re taking care of your body as well as your mind. Staying active can also help us to feel strong, as we physically get there, we emotionally do as well. So don&#8217;t rule this one out so easily. As with any of the tips, I would also recommend you give each several attempts, because you might not feel the benefits, or motivation, right away.
<h3>Practice Mindfulness</h3>
Mindfulness has already been touched on but it should be emphasised when we&#8217;re asking how do you get someone off your mind. Why? Because the ancient Buddhist teachings of mindfulness teach us to be present. Buddhists use mindfulness meditation to do three important things: to know one&#8217;s mind, to train it, and to free it. When we are worrying about how to stop obsessive thinking about someone, our mind is like a yapping dog in a cage. We have to throw it a bone here and there so it can relax. Eventually, the yapping becomes quieter and less frequent, until we are free of the stress. It&#8217;s no surprise then, that studies report mindfulness helps manage stress, cope with illness, and improve mood and self-esteem. Many also found it increased the ability to relax, and offered a newfound enthusiasm for life. All great when on the road toward how to stop thinking about a person.
<h3>Express Yourself</h3>
This one might seem counter-intuitive when you want to learn how to get someone off your mind but it&#8217;s an important one. Just as it&#8217;s important to feel the pain you may be carrying about the person you want to evict from your mind, it&#8217;s also important to express how you feel, what you think about them, and what&#8217;s happened. But again, with a caveat; this part of the process should be limited to a degree. Indeed, you know what it&#8217;s like when someone you know fixates on, and talks incessantly about someone. At first, this is okay because you understand they need to do this. But, as time went on, so did they, on, and on, and on. It&#8217;s important to be compassionate toward yourself and others when this happens but also focus on moving through the stages of the process, so that the person on your mind, isn&#8217;t squatting there forever.
<h3>Enjoy Life </h3>
So how can enjoying life help you learn how to stop fantasising about someone? Because you live in your lifeworld, rather than in your mind. This means starting to do things you once enjoyed but perhaps let slip away. This might need to be forced at first but I assure you, when taken in tandem with some of the others on this list, you&#8217;ll fake it until you make it so at some point it won&#8217;t feel forced. Something I have seen many clients do is dwell on and indulge their sadness because in a strange way, they take comfort in it, it understands. But this is not the answer, it&#8217;s Stockholm Syndrome, you&#8217;ve become attached to your captor, who is actually you. Instead do something you&#8217;ve always wanted to do. Indeed, when we try or learn something new, we gain a multitude of benefits: we create new experiences and opportunities, pick up new skills, socialise, and facilitate mood-regulating rather than stress hormones.
<h3>Keep A Journal </h3>
This one might not be for everyone but many clients report the benefit of keeping a journal even if it&#8217;s not about how to stop thinking about someone all the time. But when the goal is how to get someone off your mind, there are benefits too. When you write in a journal, you can focus on yourself, and reflect on your experience. This ties in with the idea of feeling your emotions and expressing yourself. It offers you a personal place where you can put pen to paper and offload what you carry, process it a bit, and without judgment. You might even learn things about yourself and you can use journaling to log what you&#8217;ve tried to help yourself when it comes to how to stop constantly thinking about someone, and notice what seems to be working, and what you&#8217;re finding less helpful.
<h3>Imagine A Bright Future</h3>
When it comes to how to stop thinking about someone, imagining a bright future is crucial. I&#8217;m in the business of helping people to be rational and realistic, not fantasists so this is not about fantasy or falsehood, or lying to yourself. There&#8217;s something called a &#8216;self-fulfilling prophecy&#8217;. Pessimistic people view situations through a negative lens and make bad things happen &#8211; how do they do this? Well, if I don&#8217;t believe things will improve, I will likely behave in ways that make it true. For example, I will avoid socialising, I might take to substances for relief, and I&#8217;ll sink deeper. But if I believe things will get better, I will act in ways to make it true. I will do the kinds of things recommended here so I can help myself, and create a positive self-fulfilling prophecy, and a brighter future.
<h3>Avoid Substances </h3>
So if, for example, you want to learn how to stop thinking about someone you can&#8217;t have, what do you think drugs, like alcohol, will do?
A: Help you stop thinking about them and lead a productive and successful life, or 
B:  Cause you to ruminate and become more vulnerable to mood and anxiety problems due to the hormone depletion caused by some substances?
Another thing that substances do is keep people stuck, and withdrawn, and eventually affect functioning in the day-to-day, such that getting out of bed and doing one&#8217;s work might seem really hard to do. They pose a risk to life as well. This is because drugs affect us physically and can lead to numerous health problems, but the mental toll could lead to suicidal ideation as one&#8217;s world becomes darker and smaller due to an inability to function and heal. So, when we&#8217;re especially vulnerable, it&#8217;s important to avoid substances that might appear to feel better in the shorter term, but actually lead to a world of pain in the longer term.
<h3>Try To Forgive </h3>
If the reason you struggle with how to not think about someone relates to being wronged by them in some way, it&#8217;s important to come to forgiveness. Many people will stubbornly react to this suggestion with a &#8220;no, never&#8221; but that&#8217;s because they think they&#8217;re doing it for the other person or because they think it means they accept the transgression. It means neither of these. When I recommend forgiveness it&#8217;s first and foremost for the benefit of the wronged person. Nelson Mandela said something like: &#8220;Resentment is like drinking poison and hoping the other person will die&#8221;. When we hold onto grievances, we chip away at our own ability to be happy. So forgive and put the poison down. This does not mean you&#8217;ve accepted the wrongdoing. It means you&#8217;ve accepted the reality that it happened and chosen not to burden yourself any longer because they don&#8217;t deserve more than they&#8217;ve taken.
<h3>Talk To Friends and Family </h3>
This one may also seem to contradict the intention of how to stop thinking about a person but it&#8217;s not strictly the case. Often just talking to someone about how we feel in situations that trouble us can feel like a weight off. It comes back to the idea of expressing oneself, and feeling and processing. But it&#8217;s important here to not simply use others as a soundboard for indulging in someone you want to learn to let go of. This means the focus might be better placed if it&#8217;s on your feelings about the situation, rather than on the situation itself. Or you might talk about other things to help you come out of your head. This one is important because it keeps you connected to your social network, and socialising is important when you want to practice how to stop thinking about someone all the time.
<h3>Talk To A Therapist </h3>
So sometimes I&#8217;m working with someone in therapy on one particular problem, and their relationship abruptly ends, or they suffer a bereavement. This becomes the focus of the work and they have that space to validate and process their pain, anger, whatever it is. They express themselves. They learn ways to redirect their thoughts and make sense of the loss. They might learn some mindfulness techniques to ease anxiety and panic. And at some point, they might ask: How do you stop thinking about someone? Depending on the reasons for the loss, the answer can vary. Talking to an impartial, skilled, and empathic therapist who can provide a facilitative space to process and heal can help you learn how to live for you and those who are around.

Tips on How to Get Someone Off Your Mind

When you are battling <span data-sheets-value="{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:&quot;how to get someone off your mind&quot;}" data-sheets-userformat="{&quot;2&quot;:4291,&quot;3&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:0},&quot;4&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:65280},&quot;9&quot;:1,&quot;10&quot;:2,&quot;15&quot;:&quot;Arial&quot;}">how to get someone off your mind, there is no one size fits all solution and as you probably know, it cannot be switched off. But we can help ourselves along the way, and these tips may help you. It is a process but it doesn&#8217;t have to be a long and winding path, it can be made smoother and straighter, so you can get to your destination faster, with fewer challenges, until you&#8217;ve mastered it<span data-sheets-value="{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:&quot;how to get someone off your mind&quot;}" data-sheets-userformat="{&quot;2&quot;:4291,&quot;3&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:0},&quot;4&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:65280},&quot;9&quot;:1,&quot;10&quot;:2,&quot;15&quot;:&quot;Arial&quot;}"> so you take your power back, evict the unwanted tenant, and live more fully and freely.

Conclusion

Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and loss: Vol. 1. Attachment. Basic Books.

Insight Meditation Center. (n.d.). Mindfulness Meditation as a Buddhist Practice.

National Institutes of Health (NIH) - News in Health. (2012, January). Mindfulness Matters. 

How to Get Someone Off Your Mind

Imagine you&#8217;re sitting across from your partner at the breakfast table and asking yourself: &#8220;Is it normal to have doubts in a <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://youtu.be/f8Ry2o1cx3c?si=T7GItt65GZn2Ne5G">relationship</a>?&#8221; Well, this might be more of a reality rather than an imagining because it is normal to have uncertainties and fears in life, so why should it be any different in relationships? If you haven&#8217;t already experienced doubts about relationships then you likely will. Or you could be having doubts about your relationship right now. This article will explore why it is normal to have doubts in <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/understand-how-to-communicate-in-relationships/">relationship</a>, as well as how these can doom a relationship. It will also offer a useful distinction between healthy doubts and actual red flags. We will also review the signs that indicate doubts and the most common ones, but also the reasons. The article ends with some useful ways to reduce relationship doubts. So if you want to know what to do before ending a relationship because of doubts, read on.

Alongside the question of: &#8220;Why am I having doubts about my relationship?&#8221;, you will likely have asked: &#8220;Is it normal to have doubts in a <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/an-introduction-to-couples-therapy-part-iii-how-couples-therapy-can-help/">relationship</a>?&#8221; The answer is a resounding YES! Sometimes we partake in magical thinking, believing that if we&#8217;re having doubts, there must be something wrong and we should trust our instincts. Now, this is not necessarily untrue, sometimes doubt in situations is due to intuition or instinct which are there for a reason. But, there are times when we mistake doubts as signs, when in fact, we&#8217;re reacting emotionally rather than rationally. This is normal too, we&#8217;re emotional beings, all of us. But, we shouldn&#8217;t always act on our emotions. We should explore and understand them so we can learn what they&#8217;re trying to tell us. For example, doubts in a long-term relationship are quite normal. This does not mean one should be emotionally reactive and end the relationship. It would be more helpful to try to make sense of the doubt because otherwise there&#8217;s the risk of losing a perfectly good partner and <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/birmingham/divorce-or-uncoupling-therapy/">relationship</a>&#8230;

Is It Normal To Have Doubts In Relationships?

Which brings me to the next part. You might ask: &#8220;Is it okay to have doubts in a relationship?&#8221; It is. But when we act on doubts about <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/an-introduction-to-couples-therapy-part-ii-doubts-about-couples-therapy/">relationships</a> rather than think things through, we end up cutting off our proverbial nose to spite our proverbial face. I had a client who during her <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/midlife-crisis/">midlife crisis</a> (which she was unaware of at the time) thought her husband repulsive. It&#8217;s safe to say she was no longer attracted to him and having doubts about relationship. What did she do? She reacted &#8211; prematurely. She ended the long and supportive marriage to live her best life and guess what her husband did? After picking himself up and dusting himself off, he did the same and found happiness with someone new. My client ended up in therapy because after she moved through the <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/major-life-transitions/">crisis</a> of her midlife, she realised she loved her ex-husband and desperately wanted him back &#8211; but he&#8217;d moved on. He was all loved up. So the all-important question of: &#8220;Why am I doubting my relationship?&#8221; should be asked and thoroughly explored, as otherwise, you could suffer a similarly regretful fate.

When Relationship Doubts Become Relationship Doomed

So as you can imagine, it&#8217;s very important to understand the differences between healthy doubts and actual red flags when doubts about relationships crop up because the consequences can be dire if uncertainty in relationships creates &#8216;dealbreakers&#8217;. We should try to understand the warning signs of misread red flags so we don&#8217;t let doubts about relationships turn into relationship suicide. But it&#8217;s not always easy to understand the difference between healthy doubts and red flags. For instance, if we take my client as an example, she viewed her sudden lack of physical interest in her partner as a red flag. This created deep feelings of uncertainty which she wrestled with, primarily alone. She wishes that she&#8217;d consulted with a <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/therapists/rehanna/">relationship therapist</a> so that she could have understood how the midlife crisis affected her. She would have realised that her internal conflict and questions of: &#8220;Why am I doubting my relationship?&#8221; is a common experience for many who experience the crisis, and therefore a healthy doubt when taken in context. This would have enabled self-understanding, tolerance, and patience. She could have learned that her doubts were normal, and she&#8217;d still be happily married now.

Difference Between Healthy Doubts And Red Flags

Most Common Relationship Doubts

There are many things to notice that might indicate when one is experiencing doubt in relationships, these include. 
<ul>
<li>Relationship sabotage: This is when people do things that will harm the relationship. They may do this knowingly (for example, cheat because they know they won&#8217;t be forgiven), or unknowingly (by re-enacting a self-sabotaging unconscious pattern).</li>
<li>Overcompensating: Some people will try to make their relationship appear perfect to everyone, and in the process, they lie to themselves. This might be their way of hiding the unwelcome truth, that there is something wrong.</li>
<li>Causing arguments/conflict: D<span data-sheets-root="1" data-sheets-value="{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:&quot;doubts about relationships&quot;}" data-sheets-userformat="{&quot;2&quot;:4348,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:[{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0}},{&quot;1&quot;:0,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;3&quot;:3},{&quot;1&quot;:1,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;4&quot;:1}]},&quot;6&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:[{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0}},{&quot;1&quot;:0,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;3&quot;:3},{&quot;1&quot;:1,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;4&quot;:1}]},&quot;7&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:[{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0}},{&quot;1&quot;:0,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;3&quot;:3},{&quot;1&quot;:1,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;4&quot;:1}]},&quot;8&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:[{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0}},{&quot;1&quot;:0,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;3&quot;:3},{&quot;1&quot;:1,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;4&quot;:1}]},&quot;9&quot;:1,&quot;10&quot;:2,&quot;15&quot;:&quot;Arial&quot;}">oubts about relationships can be seen in those who will seemingly create discord where there need be none. They try to provoke a reaction and escalate issues because they&#8217;re trying to steer the relationship toward ruin.</li>
<li>Badmouthing your partner: If you&#8217;re frequently telling anyone who&#8217;ll listen about your partner and their issues, or your dissatisfaction in the relationship, you&#8217;re in a mire of doubt.</li>
<li>Distancing yourself: Some people will stay in a relationship they have doubts about but behave in ways that show their disconnect with their partner and relationship.</li>
<li>Low mood or anxiety: Some people will start to feel one or both of these because of their <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/depression/">sadness</a> and fears about the relationship and life. If you notice this in yourself or someone else, it may be about relationship doubts.</li>
<li>Destructive behaviour: This may include vices like <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/types-of-addiction/">alcohol or other drugs</a>, a behavioural addiction like shopping, or anything that shows a need for escape from an unhappy relationship and therefore, life.</li>
<li>Avoidance/withdrawal: You may avoid people who notice your doubts about your relationship because they remind you of them when all you want to do is avoid them.</li>
<li>Lying to yourself/others: This links to the previous one. Some people convince themselves and others, that they&#8217;re happy when they&#8217;re not. This allows them to avoid confronting their doubts by avoiding their truth.</li>
</ul>

Signs Of Doubts In A Relationship

<h3>Keep Journaling</h3>
Journalling is a very helpful way to help us introspect and reflect on our thoughts and feelings. When I recommend it to clients I ask them not to simply write their thoughts and feelings in an automated, check-list, going-through-the-motions kind of way, but to write them in a present way and interrogate them as well. This means for example, not simply writing: &#8220;I have doubts about my relationship&#8221; but also asking: &#8220;Why am I doubting my relationship?&#8221; and then exploring the reasons, all on paper, in a thoughtful deliberate, purposeful way. This is also a great way to help one rationalise and come out of emotional states that may feel overwhelming at first.
<h3>Don’t Talk About Your Doubts To The Wrong People</h3>
So if you have friends or family who have a bias against your partner or are jealous, or in some cases do not have your best interests at heart, then telling them: &#8220;I have doubts about my relationship&#8221; is like adding a massive side of mega-doubts to your initial doubts. Then there are those friends who may have good intentions toward us, but perhaps don&#8217;t have the best judgment, or they just agree with whatever we say &#8211; all unhelpful. Too often we talk to our close others about all sorts of things, when some of our friends are better with some things than they are with others &#8211; so it might be worth considering who we think will be of help with the specific issue.
<h3>Focus On What’s Good In A Relationship</h3>
It&#8217;s so easy to focus on the negatives and even create some while we&#8217;re at it. When we do this we can lose sight of the good, and this further enhances the perceived bad. In <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/understanding-cognitive-behavioral-therapy-cbt/">cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT)</a> this is known as minimising and maximising, a thinking style that entails disregarding the positive or what contradicts one&#8217;s negative bias or narrative and honing in on the things we don&#8217;t like. For example, you may form the narrative that your partner is selfish because they took you to a restaurant that wasn&#8217;t your first choice. You do this because you maximise that it wasn&#8217;t your choice, but lose sight of their kind intention to take you out for a meal.

Ways To Deal With Doubts In A Relationship

So if you&#8217;re experiencing doubts about relationships it&#8217;s clear that you should take some time before making a decision that may be regretted later. It&#8217;s important to interrogate your doubts. By doing this you can understand them better and also learn if they are founded or not. And, even if they&#8217;re warranted, you can ask yourself if they can be resolved without it meaning the relationship has to end. This is assuming you want to make a decision rationally, rather than reactively. At least this way, you will be less likely to regret your decision, because you know it will have been thought through. So you can journal, talk to the right people, <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/birmingham/couples-counselling/">a therapist</a>, but don&#8217;t forget, maybe your partner too!

Ending A Relationship Because Of Doubts

So having doubts about relationship is normal, and can happen for all kinds of reasons, making it common as well. But it doesn&#8217;t have to mean the end of your relationship. It might instead mean that you have some things to think about. It&#8217;s helpful to think this through rather than avoid your concerns as this only makes them grow. It may seem like a daunting task to talk to your partner about your doubts but it&#8217;s very important to do this sooner rather than later. This can avoid a lot of hurt in the long run, especially if you&#8217;re having serious doubts. It may also mean that you start something like <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/birmingham/couples-counselling/">couples counselling</a> before the doubts move into more dangerous territory. Remember, doubts are normal and there are all kinds of reasons for doubts, sometimes to do with them, and sometimes you. So if doubts endure, talk about them so you can understand why.

Doubts In Relationship: Dealing With Uncertainties In Love

One of the issues that comes up a lot in <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/demystifying-applied-behavior-analysis-aba-how-it-works/">therapy</a> is when a client tells me they have no motivation to do anything. Sometimes this can be a symptom of a condition, for example, <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/5-lies-your-mind-tells-you-when-youre-depressed/">depression</a>. But sometimes it can actually be the cause of depression. People will find they do not have a purpose to strive for, or even if they have something others could only dream of, for example, a flourishing career, they just cannot access that &#8216;pep&#8217;, that feeling we all need to want to do something and take enjoyment from it. They feel no motivation and this can cause feelings of despondency, <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/apathy-anhedonia/">apathy</a>, low mood, and depression. Life just doesn&#8217;t seem to have any meaning for them. They wonder to themselves and ask me: &#8220;Why am I struggling with motivation?&#8221;. They may even feel like there&#8217;s something very wrong with them, especially if they know they have things that others might be excited about. Some of my clients can actually be quite worried about this because they feel bored with life and even though they don&#8217;t want to die, they also don&#8217;t feel engaged with their lives. It&#8217;s a serious issue that can have a serious impact on mental health. This article will discuss what to do when you have no motivation.

<h3>Avoidance Of Discomfort</h3>
So one reason why you might not be motivated to do anything is because of a fear of discomfort. According to Freud, people will do all kinds of things to experience pleasure and avoid pain. So when you have no will to do anything, it might actually be underpinned by a deeper need to avoid discomfort. For example, it often requires hard work, energy, resources, and time to do a good job and this might cause discomfort if one prefers an easier life. Discomfort might also be related to an aversion to the risk of failing, causing one to do nothing instead. So avoidance of discomfort might even be about suppressing your own self-doubt.
<h3>Doubting Yourself</h3>
So let&#8217;s talk about how <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/limiting-beilefs/">self-doubt</a> creates a loss of motivation. It&#8217;s essentially a self-fulfilling prophecy. What we think and feel affects how we behave. So if I believed that I was incapable of passing my driving test, I would find it very difficult to book my test. I&#8217;d probably procrastinate and make excuses whenever the topic was raised. Even IF I managed to book my test, I might miss it, or because of my self-doubt I might expect to fail, this of course is my prediction and it will affect my anxiety levels. Because I&#8217;m nervous and <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/calm-the-chaos-manage-your-anxiety-response-and-take-control/">anxious</a> about failing, I cannot concentrate and I end up failing &#8211; self-fulfilling prophecy &#8211; I made my prediction come true and this reinforces my self-doubt but I didn&#8217;t fail because I&#8217;m incapable, I failed because I expected to and made it happen.
<h3>Being Overwhelmed</h3>
A lack of motivation and energy can also occur because one is feeling overwhelmed. This can happen when we try to do too much or take on something that makes us feel we aren&#8217;t capable. This can impact self-confidence, and over time, our <a style="color: #0033cc;" href="https://admin.phinitytherapy.com/issues/self-esteem/">self-esteem</a>. It makes us feel out of our depth. Remember what I said about avoiding pain? Well, this is why one might feel demotivated when something feels too much, or too difficult. For example, if your <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/workplace-stress/">job is overwhelming</a> you, you might experience no desire to work anymore. This feeling only heightens when mood is impacted.
<h3>Mental Health Issues</h3>
Indeed, feelings of low-confidence, low <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/are-your-relationships-building-or-taking-your-self-esteem/">self-esteem</a>, stress and overwhelm can all contribute to other mental health problems like depression and <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/learn-about-your-anxiety/">anxiety</a>. But, as mentioned, a lack of motivation itself, can cause depression or be caused by it. When we&#8217;re feeling down, our usual day-to-day obligations can feel effortful and even overwhelming. People often want to seek comfort instead, and this is usually in the form of withdrawal and inactivity. But these behaviours keep people stuck in depression because there is a strange kind of comfort in depression and withdrawal, that combined with no drive is a vicious cycle that makes it feel as if you can&#8217;t do anything.
<h3>Lack of Commitment</h3>
Some people will start tasks and rather than see one through to completion, whatever that might look like, they will leave it unfinished and move on to something else. Some &#8216;disorders&#8217;, like <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/exploring-adhd-in-women-symptoms-and-treatment/">ADHD</a> feature this tendency, but it is something that can be a part of one&#8217;s personality. When one loses motivation toward things in this routine way, it demonstrates a lack of commitment to any given endeavour. Sometimes it&#8217;s easier to start things than it is to see them through. So if you notice yourself lacking motivation toward something you&#8217;ve started, and are thinking about starting something new &#8211; call it out &#8211; you may be using the new thing to distract yourself from your lack of commitment.
<h3>Bad Attitude</h3>
If for example, you have no desire to work anymore, this might be to do with emotional issues. But sometimes it might be something else entirely. Some people experience what&#8217;s known as a poor work ethic. They do not hold themselves accountable to their responsibilities and they may even blame their employer for their problems, or resent them for being more successful. Who hasn&#8217;t heard of the person who does nothing but complain about their employer and when you suggest they look for a new job, they dismiss it. This is someone who is not taking ownership for themselves and their life, and simply wants to blame everyone else, when in fact it is this bad attitude that is their downfall.
<h3>Not Specific Enough About Goals</h3>
You might have some ideas about things you want to achieve and still experience a sense of no motivation and not even understand why. This might be because you haven&#8217;t clearly defined your goals in a clear and structured way. When we make our goals SMART, that is., Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Time-bound, we create clarity and accountability. We can have a time-frame for every small part of the plan, and troubleshoot when things aren&#8217;t working to schedule. So, take heart, your lack of motivation toward that goal you&#8217;ve had for ages might not be impossible. Instead of looking at the misty tip of the mountain and feeling dejected, you can look ahead at the first check post you see in the near distance.
<h3>Being Burnt Out</h3>
If you&#8217;ve experienced no motivation or energy to do anything and even had the thought that &#8220;All I want to do is sleep&#8221;, then you might be burning out. Burnout is exactly that; a state of complete exhaustion, physical, mental, and emotional. It&#8217;s no wonder then that, when this happens, we cannot muster the energy or drive to engage in life in the usual way. Put simply; you&#8217;re in need of rest so you can recover. Trying to find a sense of purpose, or meaning when experiencing this level of exhaustion is just going to add to your exhaustion and make you feel hopeless and even more demotivated .
<h3>Experiencing Toxic Stress</h3>
<a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/post-traumatic-stress-disorder-ptsd/">Stress</a> is a normal part of life and we should not think we can avoid stress all of the time. In fact, some people find a small amount of stress motivating. These are the people who like to leave essays or work commitments to the last minute and can do well because the <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/academic-stress/">stress</a> of the approaching deadline motivates them to do better. This is healthy stress. Then there&#8217;s toxic stress. Called so because it&#8217;s harmful rather than helpful. Stress might become <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/how-toxic-masculinity-harms-everyone-inc-men/">toxic</a> when it relates to an acute issue that is particularly impactful and pressure-ful, or when we experience lots of stressors or a build-up. Think of stress as an elastic band, over time, it gets tighter, and then some relief is had which offers some slack. But when there&#8217;s no slack, it just gets tighter and tighter, until it snaps &#8211; likely burnout. When this happens we might feel we can&#8217;t do anything.
<h3>You May Not Have a Lot of Activities That Interest You</h3>
Some people might wonder why they&#8217;re not motivated to do anything without realising that it&#8217;s not a general lack of motivation that they&#8217;re experiencing. They are simply finding it hard to engage with whatever they have going on in their life at that time. For example, when people become <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/post-natal-depression-pnd/">depressed</a>, they stop doing what they once enjoyed. This makes them think they have no will to do anything, but if they restarted some of the things they once enjoyed, or something new, they might find they feel good and accomplished. This often reinforces the action and provides more motivation.

What Causes Lack Of Motivation?

So you may have noticed this apparent overlap between a lack of motivation, and depression and this is because they are very much connected. Our <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/brain/">brains</a> and bodies., that is., our physical, mental, and emotional health are intricately connected. When we are well, we experience the production and release of mood-regulating, or &#8216;feel good&#8217; hormones. These are chemicals that affect the way our bodies work and how we feel. We might become depressed due to a deficiency in some of these <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://www.bacp.co.uk/news/news-from-bacp/blogs/2022/9-may-evaluating-life-for-loneliness/">hormones</a> (what doctors call a &#8216;chemical imbalance&#8217;). Alternatively, there could be another reason for our depression but even so, the depression and its symptoms prevent us from being able to create the hormones we need, and instead we experience stress hormones. It&#8217;s complex, but either way, &#8216;motivation&#8217; is not going to be the motivation when we are feeling this way. A lack of it becomes one of the symptoms instead.
Now when we are well and not depressed, we can still experience a lack of motivation. Why? Because motivation is that &#8216;get up and go&#8217; feeling, that &#8216;pep&#8217;, that drive. It&#8217;s the thing that helps us move in some direction. And as mentioned above, you will notice there are a number of factors that can lead to loss of motivation, many of which do not have to start with depression. But this does not mean that they might not cause it, which further compounds the issue. So first it&#8217;s helpful to understand the cause of your lack of motivation because this will provide the antidote, or at least the roadmap to the solution. Below are some of the things that may help you get your mojo back, depending on the reason for lacking motivation.

Lack Of Motivation Vs. Depression

<h3>Create a Routine</h3>
If you&#8217;re asking yourself &#8220;Why do I have no motivation to do anything?&#8221; you might simply need to force it. It may seem strange but it&#8217;s an actual psychological technique from <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/understanding-cognitive-behavioral-therapy-cbt/">Cognitive Behavioural Therapy</a> (<a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/services/cbt-birmingham/">CBT</a>), and it works! When you&#8217;re feeling that you&#8217;re not motivated to do anything, do what Nike said all those years ago: Just Do It! You have to rebuild your routine because we humans are not so different to our cat cousins, we like a bit of routine and structure. By gradually building your routine, so that it doesn&#8217;t overwhelm you, you will notice your motivation return.
<h3>Use the 10-minute Rule</h3>
This is another one from <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/transforming-behavior-and-rewiring-the-brain-cbt/">CBT</a> and the time can vary, but ten minutes is a nice neat number. Here&#8217;s what you do: when you&#8217;re experiencing a lack of motivation, and therefore procrastination for a particular task, force yourself to do this very thing for ten minutes only. The idea is that you will get past the barrier of starting, and perhaps find your flow, and therefore drive to continue. So just imagine that things you&#8217;re putting off will only take ten minutes, do what you can, and if you find it hard to continue, stop. You can then try again for another ten minutes, at a later time. But, you may find that you&#8217;ve gotten over the hardest part, and be able to finish the task!
<h3>Practice Self-Compassion</h3>
When people wonder &#8220;Why do I have no motivation to do anything?&#8221;, they often come from a position of blame and criticism toward themselves. Now how do you think this will affect the lack of motivation? It will feed it. Indeed, imagine if you have no desire to work anymore, do you think you&#8217;ll regain it if your boss criticises you, or if they support and show kindness? Yes, we respond better to care, rather than criticism. So when we <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/what-your-therapists-title-really-means/">therapists</a> ask you to show yourself kindness and compassion, we&#8217;re doing it for good reason, because you deserve it and because it helps.
<h3>Work Out</h3>
<span data-sheets-value="{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:&quot;not motivated to do anything&quot;}" data-sheets-userformat="{&quot;2&quot;:4348,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:[{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0}},{&quot;1&quot;:0,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;3&quot;:3},{&quot;1&quot;:1,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;4&quot;:1}]},&quot;6&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:[{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0}},{&quot;1&quot;:0,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;3&quot;:3},{&quot;1&quot;:1,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;4&quot;:1}]},&quot;7&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:[{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0}},{&quot;1&quot;:0,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;3&quot;:3},{&quot;1&quot;:1,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;4&quot;:1}]},&quot;8&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:[{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0}},{&quot;1&quot;:0,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;3&quot;:3},{&quot;1&quot;:1,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;4&quot;:1}]},&quot;9&quot;:1,&quot;10&quot;:2,&quot;15&quot;:&quot;Arial&quot;}">When you&#8217;re not motivated to do anything, this one will be a toughie, but hear me out. Remember those lovely mood regulating hormones I mentioned before? Well two of those are endorphins and dopamine. The production of these can be boosted by exercise! Imagine; we have this amazing ability to give ourselves the chemicals we need to feel good, and driven! So, even if you don&#8217;t feel like getting out of bed, try the ten minute rule. Take a ten minute walk, or jog and see if you can continue from there. It&#8217;s likely you will find it much easier to, the more you do it! 
<h3>Break Large Goals Down Into Smaller Tasks</h3>
<span data-sheets-value="{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:&quot;all i want to do is sleep no motivation&quot;}" data-sheets-userformat="{&quot;2&quot;:4348,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:[{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0}},{&quot;1&quot;:0,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;3&quot;:3},{&quot;1&quot;:1,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;4&quot;:1}]},&quot;6&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:[{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0}},{&quot;1&quot;:0,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;3&quot;:3},{&quot;1&quot;:1,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;4&quot;:1}]},&quot;7&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:[{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0}},{&quot;1&quot;:0,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;3&quot;:3},{&quot;1&quot;:1,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;4&quot;:1}]},&quot;8&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:[{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;5&quot;:{&quot;1&quot;:2,&quot;2&quot;:0}},{&quot;1&quot;:0,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;3&quot;:3},{&quot;1&quot;:1,&quot;2&quot;:0,&quot;4&quot;:1}]},&quot;9&quot;:1,&quot;10&quot;:2,&quot;15&quot;:&quot;Arial&quot;}">If your response to that one was &#8220;All I want to do is sleep, I have no motivation&#8221; and the ten minute thing doesn&#8217;t help you then how about this &#8211; let&#8217;s break things down. Remember, when you&#8217;re focusing on the summit of the mountain, it can look very daunting from all the way down here. So, think of the thing you need to do, and just think about one step in that process. Let us say, you&#8217;ve got to start an essay. The first thing you could do is give yourself some time to make an &#8216;essay plan&#8217;. This would be clearly outlining the days and times you can spend on the essay, what the tasks might be on each day, with the deadline in mind. When done this way, we have a more clarified goal, one that does not feel as big and vague. 
<h3>Manage To-Do List</h3>
Another thing that can help when you&#8217;re experiencing no motivation is a to-do list. This is a bit like the previous point. By placing things on paper or PC, whichever works better for you, you can instantly take away a bit of pressure and regain some cognitive bandwidth. This is because you no longer have to remember all of the things you have to do, and when you do this, you may also notice that things don&#8217;t seem as many or as unclear as they did before. This clarity also helps you to regain that headspace, you no longer have to worry or wonder, or work hard to suppress what you&#8217;re trying to avoid &#8211; another good reason to get it on paper.
<h3>Reward Yourself for Working</h3>
Just like Pavlov&#8217;s dogs, we all like to be recognised and <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/the-many-benefits-of-gratitude-practice/">rewarded</a> for our hard work. So if you&#8217;re thinking to yourself &#8220;I have no motivation&#8221; then when you take some of the steps mentioned here to regain it, you should also reinforce this good effort with a treat! Not only will it give you an additional incentive to work for, it will also make you want to do it again. And, it doesn&#8217;t have to be extravagant as this would be hard to maintain. So treat yourself to your favourite meal or drink (<a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/alcoholism/">non-alcoholic</a> preferably, unless you&#8217;re of legal age and it&#8217;s an irregular choice!). Or you might give yourself an hour to play your favourite video-game, or anything else you consider a reward.
<h3>Pair a Task with Something You Enjoy</h3>
If you&#8217;re feeling a lack of motivation to do anything, what if you become creative with it. One example is pairing with a reward, although that should be done anyway. But another way to make your task(s) more interesting, and therefore, easier to do is by making the process more appealing, not just the reward you&#8217;re looking forward to. For example, if you&#8217;re putting off some work you have to do on your laptop, take yourself to a coffee shop or library to do it. If you&#8217;re finding it hard to exercise, make a playlist that will get you in the mood! If you&#8217;re sick of eating takeaways but can&#8217;t get yourself to cook a healthy meal, call a friend while you&#8217;re cooking and catch up on some social time as well!
<h3>Go for a Walk in Nature</h3>
When you&#8217;re wondering &#8220;Why do I lack motivation&#8221; you might want to take a leaf out of the Ecopsychology book (no pun intended). It teaches us that we humans find ease and peace in nature. It seems to be the only thing that can help us feel close to our &#8216;true selves&#8217; and this might just be another way of saying that we can connect to who we are without all the modern-day distractions and noise that we&#8217;ve created and become embroiled in. We were not designed to live the way we do, our lives were once much simpler, and this might in fact be another reason why we experience demotivation and burnout, because in some ways, we&#8217;re fighting against our nature. So get back to nature and take those walks between your tasks, they might even be your treat!
<h3>Seek Professional Help</h3>
Even if after trying these things, you&#8217;re still lacking motivation, you might just need a helping hand. For example, if you experience no desire to work anymore, or think all I want to do is sleep and have no motivation toward your obligations or relationships, then there might be more at work. <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/act-therapy-demystified-enhancing-well-being/">Therapy</a> can help because you will have someone beside you who will remind you to be compassionate, to hold you accountable, and to reward your effort. But more than this, you will have a professional who will be able to help you explore and understand the cause(s) of your lack of motivation and find what works for you to help you shift this feeling and regain not only motivation, but also improve your quality of life.

What To Do When You Have No Motivation

Health, D. D. (2022, December 1). Darling Downs Health. Darling Downs Health. 

No Motivation To Do Anything

Are you someone who has never fallen in love and wondered why can&#8217;t I love? If so, read on. It&#8217;s crucial to know why an inability to love is important to figure out. This understanding might come from the answer to another question: Why don&#8217;t I feel love? The answer to this question connects with the first one. We need to be open to love so that we, too, can receive and feel love. In this article, we&#8217;re going to look at 11 psychological reasons that could help you understand why you&#8217;re unable to love and in turn, experience love. But it&#8217;s also key to understand if the reason you can&#8217;t experience love is normal and then learn how you can overcome your fear around it. Yes &#8211; we need to know what the options are so that we can not only experience love but also fulfilment because as cliché as it sounds, we are social beings, and not only do we learn about ourselves through our <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/why-relationships-need-counselling/">relationships</a> with <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/family-issues/">family</a> members, and friends, but we also develop and grow through them &#8211; if we&#8217;re lucky.

<h3>Fear of Commitment</h3>
This is a commonly known reason for why some <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/understand-how-to-communicate-in-relationships/">relationships</a> break down &#8211; &#8220;he had a fear of commitment&#8221; but do we ever ask what this is about? Well, there are various reasons why someone might fear committing to someone but one of the deeper reasons for this is a fear of vulnerability. Some people may have never experienced loving relationships or healthy love and when they meet someone who seems to be offering these, they get scared, they simply do not know what to do with this kind of romantic love. They cannot give it what it demands of them; a deeper level of authenticity and connection. So these people do not experience long-term love, and when the <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/an-introduction-to-couples-therapy-part-i/">relationship</a> ends (because of relationship-destructive behaviours and mixed signals), they wonder &#8220;Why am I so hard to love&#8221; and end up reinforcing their belief that they were right not to trust the relationship &#8211; creating an unhelpful relational pattern that keeps them stuck and unhappy.
<h3>Past Relationship Trauma</h3>
Another reason that you might wonder: &#8220;Why am I so hard to love&#8221; is because you&#8217;re simply not ready for a <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/services/couples-counselling-birmingham/">relationship</a>. You&#8217;ve been in love or have experienced many failed <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/services/divorce-or-uncoupling-therapy/">romantic</a><a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/services/divorce-or-uncoupling-therapy/"> relationships</a> that have made you set up a fortress around your heart. Your heart is not trusting and open to potential partners because you&#8217;ve had it broken one too many times. This guardedness serves a very valid function for you, it keeps you safe, but it also means like Rapunzel in her tower, you remain alone and isolated. Even when you do venture out and allow yourself to meet new people you might see red flags where there are pink ones, or none at all. This makes you retreat into your safe world, your tower and remain isolated and alone. So if you&#8217;re wondering why don&#8217;t I feel love, think instead about whether you&#8217;re allowing love in, rather than assuming it&#8217;s because there&#8217;s something wrong with you.
<h3>Childhood Trauma</h3>
Many people have experienced problems in their childhood, and for some children, this can be traumatic. It can help explain why they find it hard to experience healthy relationships because they never really had any or something happened that affected their ability to trust. As children, we need to feel safe to experience healthy connections with our caregivers. As adults this need for safety and sanctuary does not disappear. We might experience some of this with our friends and <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/services/family-therapy-london/">family</a>, but we try to create it with our significant other because usually, this is the person we want to be closest to. But, if you experienced <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/childhood-trauma/">childhood trauma</a> or (subconsciously) thought: &#8220;I don&#8217;t feel love&#8221; you might also find that as an adult you are unable to find trusting relationships. This may be because you seek the wrong partners and recreate unhelpful dynamics, or it might be because you do not even allow yourself to enter into meaningful relationships. Your childhood trauma has a far-reaching impact for your life.
<h3>Low Self-Worth</h3>
If you&#8217;ve ever had the thought: &#8220;Why am I so hard to love&#8221; you are also revealing something about how you view yourself. This statement assumes that there is a fault in you that makes you unlovable &#8211; it is a blaming question and needs to be questioned. When we believe we&#8217;re unlovable it&#8217;s because we&#8217;ve internalised messages from those around us, whether those were explicit or implicit. For example, if you were often criticised or shamed, your <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/self-esteem/">self-esteem</a> would be diminished. Or maybe you weren&#8217;t criticised but you felt ignored and invisible, or unimportant. This is what I meant when I said earlier that we develop through our relationships with others. If those around you, whether they were family, friends, colleagues, or partners, said or did things that made you feel bad about yourself in some way, they may have contributed to this core (subconscious) belief of &#8220;I am unlovable because I don&#8217;t feel love&#8221;. This lack of self-worth will affect you not only in love, but in all interpersonal relationships.
<h3>You Identify as Aromantic</h3>
Now if you have never fallen in love, it could be something else entirely. You may be what is known as aromantic, or &#8220;aro&#8221; as it&#8217;s also known. This describes a person who has little to no romantic attraction to others. This should not be confused with asexual, as some aromantic people can still experience sexual attraction, whereas some do not. Some people feel okay about identifying as and being aromantic as they are not bothered by a lack of romantic relationships because they do not experience a desire for them. However, for some, it can be a cause for concern, but one that they ultimately accept about themselves. But this does not mean that aromantic people do not get married or experience relationships &#8211; they do because companionship may still be important to them. But, if you have wondered: &#8220;Why can&#8217;t I love&#8221; then maybe consider that you may have a different <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/services/lgbtq-support/">relationship orientation</a>, especially if you notice something about yourself that seems to be atypical when it comes to traditional relationship norms.
<h3>Mental or Physical Illness Interfering</h3>
Sometimes not being able to fall in love might have to do with opportunity. If you&#8217;re experiencing enduring difficulties with health, whether that&#8217;s <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/chronic-physical-health-problems/">physical</a> or mental health problems, you may not be in the best position to find love. This does not mean that you need it any less you may feel the desire for a special someone even more keenly than you did when you were well. But when we are physically unwell, this also impacts our mental wellbeing. We might experience <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/5-lies-your-mind-tells-you-when-youre-depressed/">low mood</a>, <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/calm-the-chaos-manage-your-anxiety-response-and-take-control/">anxiety</a>, <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/stress-worry/">stress</a>, or all of these, and these can compound <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/isolation-loneliness/">loneliness</a>. Of course, if you&#8217;re feeling sad and lonely, or <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/learn-about-your-anxiety/">anxious</a>, rather than experiencing a <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/chronic-fatigue-syndrome/">physical health problem</a>, you&#8217;re likely going to experience these more strongly by the lack of love in your life. This further highlights the importance of social contact and connection and the need for safety in our relationships.
<h3>Fear of Losing Yourself</h3>
You may have made a decision and told yourself: &#8220;I can&#8217;t love&#8221; and you may or may not be okay with this deep down. But, let&#8217;s look at why this might be the case in the first place. Some people have had relationships, or come out of a long-term one that has made them learn about not only what they might want in a <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/an-introduction-to-couples-therapy-part-ii-doubts-about-couples-therapy/">relationship</a> if they decide to enter into one again, but also realise what they don&#8217;t want. Indeed, when we&#8217;re with a partner, we can become enmeshed with one another; forming similar routines, eating together, sharing friends and interests, and sometimes feeling restricted in ways, but compromising anyway. Then we sample life without the person, this may bring some very real difficulties but another thing it brings is more freedom and choice. At first, this can make one feel a bit lost and ungrounded. But when this passes, we feel the benefits and this is hard to give up, but can there be a happy medium?
<h3>Fear of Abandonment</h3>
If you&#8217;ve ever experienced abandonment, whether that&#8217;s been in childhood and/or since, you&#8217;ve experienced rejection. Abandonment and rejection form the root fear that most of us have when it comes to relationships. Indeed, we seek safety in our deeper connections, this offers a sense of security and trust and validates our existence in those relationships and at a deeper core level. When, however, we experience being left, hurt, rejected in ways, or <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/abandonment-anxiety/">abandoned</a>, we develop a fear because of how damaging this can be to us. This fear serves to develop a function in future relationships, it creates an internal working model for us, or a blueprint that we can use in future relationships. We learn that to be and stay safe, we must guard against abandonment, and how does one guard against being abandoned? One either does not enter into romantic <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/an-introduction-to-couples-therapy-part-ii-doubts-about-couples-therapy/">relationship</a>s, does but does not commit, or self-sabotages and leaves before being left. But all this does is falsely reinforce the deeper question that went unanswered the first time we were hurt: &#8220;Why am I so hard to love?&#8221;
<h3>Expectations Too High</h3>
If you&#8217;ve never fallen in love or have but never managed to sustain a <a style="color: #0000ff; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/an-introduction-to-couples-therapy-part-iii-how-couples-therapy-can-help/">relationship</a> and find yourself asking: &#8220;Why can&#8217;t I love?&#8221; it might be because your expectations are too high. Now this might sound like you&#8217;re being asked to settle, but assuredly, you&#8217;re not. Let me explain; when we grow up on a cocktail of Disney films, Hollywood, Bollywood, and all that jazz, we believe in a perfect partner that will sweep us off our feet and make the kind of grand gestures we see in all of that trite. You might say &#8220;Well, no actually, I don&#8217;t expect all that, just someone to understand/accept me/*insert other requirement here*. You may be right, but your expectations may still be a bit skewed. Indeed, no person in the world will be perfect for you, or exactly what you want or need. It&#8217;s because we&#8217;re all so unique and affected by so much in our worlds, that we simply cannot fit one another. We have to be malleable, and flexible, and this means making compromises, in our requirements first, and then, with our potential partners, as long as the important things like values, can align. Otherwise, we end up with no one.
<h3>You Love Being Single</h3>
This one may follow from not wanting to lose yourself, or perhaps it&#8217;s about wanting to explore yourself. You may enjoy your freedom too much and love your independence. This may be why it&#8217;s not a matter of can&#8217;t fall in love, but rather, why you don&#8217;t allow yourself to. You stop yourself from getting uncomfortably close to potential partners because you enjoy the early phases of a relationship, or you simply avoid them altogether and just date, or do situationships, or the friends with benefits thing. So if you&#8217;re ever asking yourself &#8220;Why can&#8217;t I fall in love?&#8221; you may want to think about how you feel about committed relationships and whether you value your singledom too much. If you do, that&#8217;s of course fine, as long as it is truly the case and not a cover for avoidance of commitment due to a fear of being <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/how-to-respond-to-hurt-in-a-helpful-way/">hurt</a>. If it&#8217;s the latter, you may find the shininess of single life begins to dull over time, but by then it will feel even harder to change.
<h3>Waiting For The Perfect Moment</h3>
Now you may not be asking why you can&#8217;t fall in love, rather, you may wonder &#8220;Why don&#8217;t I feel love&#8221;. This could be for many reasons so you would have to think about this for yourself, but one sure reason might be because you&#8217;re waiting for some perfect moment when the stars align and Jupiter is in Saturn&#8217;s orbit, and the cow flies over the moon. What I mean here is, that you may be focusing on your career, finding the &#8216;one&#8217;, feeling perfectly ready, or some other condition that you&#8217;ve placed on finding love. It is okay to do this if you&#8217;re simply unable to give time to a relationship, but, if it&#8217;s been this way for too long, or if the condition you&#8217;re placing is unrealistic, you&#8217;ve created an obstacle that allows you to avoid finding love, and being loved in the way we all need at some point. There is no perfect moment so you&#8217;re waiting for a time that doesn&#8217;t exist &#8211; what might this do?

Can’t Fall In Love: Psychologic Reasons

If you believe that: &#8220;I don&#8217;t feel love&#8221; you may also wonder if this is normal. The answer is as complex as the question. Indeed, if you&#8217;re not feeling love, this does not mean you&#8217;re not loved, it may be a problem of perception. You are unable to feel love but it is there. For some people, it may be true that no one around them makes them feel loved, in which case, it is normal that they do not feel love. But we have to wonder why there&#8217;s no one to show love. It might be because you&#8217;re very guarded and keep everyone at a safe distance. Indeed, there are many reasons why it might be happening, and why when context is accounted for, we can see the logic in a lack of love &#8211; but this does not mean you&#8217;re unlovable.

Is It Normal To Not Feel Love?

<h3>Talk To A Therapist</h3>
Many of the reasons you may wonder &#8220;Why can&#8217;t I feel love&#8221; are likely to relate to fear, and this is even if on the surface that doesn&#8217;t seem to be the reason. Talking to a <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/therapists/rehanna/">therapist</a> will allow you to explore things more deeply, without judgement, and with safety. If for instance, after reading this, or even before, you know the reason you&#8217;re unable to fall in love, you still have much to learn. For example, what are the deeper reasons for your inability to love or be loved, how did they emerge, what do they teach you about yourself, how do they impact you, and what might change? These are just some of the things you can be helped to explore in <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/understanding-cognitive-behavioral-therapy-cbt/">therapy</a>.
<h3>Practice Opening Up to Others</h3>
If therapy isn&#8217;t an option for you for whatever reason, but you know you&#8217;re guarded when it comes to matters of the heart, you might want to practice opening up. This does not mean that you open up about your deepest and darkest fears to just anybody, it means think about the least threatening thing that you don&#8217;t share, for whatever reason, and start with that, with someone you trust and see what happens. If you feel encouraged, go further, but only if you feel comfortable doing so. The more you do this, the easier it will become, and the more you will do it.
<h3>Build Supportive Friendships</h3>
Another thing that can help us stop feeling and asking things like: &#8220;Why am I so hard to love&#8221; are our friendships. People can often get so preoccupied with finding love that they forget that they can get it in other ways, not just romantically. If you have few friends, or lots but still don&#8217;t feel supported, you may need to consider taking a &#8216;friendship inventory&#8217;. If after this, you notice that your friends bring you down instead of building you up in ways (and this can be subtle), then you have to think of what this is doing for your ability to love yourself. This is important because it impacts what you will accept in a potential partner too.
<h3>Think About What You Might Want in a Relationship</h3>
Now if you&#8217;re worrying because you often think: &#8220;I can&#8217;t love&#8221; you might need to think about the kinds of partners you go for. You might be picking the wrong kinds of people, or finding potential in places where there are a lot of the wrong kinds of people (online dating, anyone?). This is where you have to stop and take a break from the search and ask yourself, either by yourself or with a <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/the-value-of-confronting-self-doubt-as-a-psychotherapist/">therapist</a>, about what you want in a relationship. This may show you that what you seek, and the types you seek it from do not marry up very well (pun intended). Or, it may show you that you&#8217;re being unrealistic in some other ways, and you can reorient yourself before you resume the search. Maybe then, you&#8217;ll be, not luckier in love, but have increased your chances because you&#8217;ve reflected on things and made real adjustments.

I Can’t Feel Love: How To Overcome The Fear

<h3>Take it Slowly</h3>
Ever heard the expression &#8220;fools rush in&#8221;? Well, this is why you want to take it slowly. This is especially true if you notice a tendency to dive head-first into <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/why-relationships-need-counselling/">relationships</a>. This can feel intense for you and your partner, and add pressure. So, ease up on the gas and enjoy the ride.
<h3>Communicate Openly</h3>
If &#8220;I don&#8217;t feel love&#8221; is your mantra then another thing to consider when you do is how you communicate. When you&#8217;re feeling any kind of fear or <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/anxiety-disorders-what-they-are-types-treatment/">anxiety</a> about your partner or their words, or behaviour, be open but be constructive. It might help to sound things out with friends or a therapist first if you find you often feel this way, as communicating fears too often to a new partner can also add pressure and stress.
<h3>Try to Live in the Moment</h3>
This relates to the other tips. When we live in the moment, we&#8217;re present. We aren&#8217;t in the past, and we aren&#8217;t overthinking about the future. We live and love in the now, and this naturally influences the future, usually for the better. Try to treat this relationship like it&#8217;s a new experience, and don&#8217;t mire it with the old, or lose it before it&#8217;s begun.
<h3>Set Boundaries</h3>
Boundaries are important for all of our relationships, so they&#8217;re especially important when it comes to our partners. There will certainly be fewer boundaries but there should always be some. For example, just because you&#8217;re in love, you should not forsake your friends, family, hobbies, or your own needs. Your boundaries are there for a reason, so don&#8217;t lose them and yourself, in the process.

What To Do If You Fall In Love

Bretherton, I. (1999). Updating the “internal working model” construct: Some reflections. Attachment & Human Development, 1(3), 343–357. 

Carvalho, A. C., & Rodrigues, D. L. (2022). Sexuality, Sexual Behavior, and Relationships of Asexual Individuals: Differences Between Aromantic and Romantic Orientation. Archives of Sexual Behavior. 

Can’t Fall in Love? 11 Reasons Why

On this website, you&#8217;ll find pages that discuss what <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/childhood-trauma/">trauma</a> and <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/workplace-stress/">stress</a> are. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a nuanced form of these and is also considered an &#8216;anxiety disorder&#8217;. 
If <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/post-traumatic-stress-disorder-ptsd/">PTSD</a> occurs, it relates to the experience of a traumatic event. The traumatic event that causes PTSD can be anything. It could be an experience in the home during childhood. It could be sexual assault. It could be witnessing a car accident. 
Almost anything that is difficult to process can cause PTSD. Two people may experience the same event, yet both may not develop PTSD. Its development depends on various individual factors. 
This article will discuss the symptoms of PTSD in Thomas Shelby (Tommy) from the BBC show The Peaky Blinders, exploring how PTSD is portrayed in the series. This will bring a greater understanding of what a person with PTSD might experience.
Because this is based on a fictitious character and is a case study about PTSD, some creative flair has been taken to emphasise how PTSD can be for some people. This article is solely the opinion of the author.

What Is Post-traumatic Stress Disorder?

Tommy experienced the horrors of serving in WWI. During the war, he will have witnessed bloodshed and death, horrific brutality, and perhaps even had to do things that he felt uncomfortable with.
Tommy lost his mother to suicide, and as the series progresses he lost his brother, wife, aunt Polly, daughter, and others. These losses, on top of what he lost in war, figuratively (parts of himself), and literally (comrades and friends) take their toll. This means &#8220;Complex Trauma&#8221; likely developed, this is when someone is exposed to several invasive and traumatic events that are varied and usually of an interpersonal nature.
Even though the war is over, Tommy will &#8216;relive&#8217; the traumatic events he experienced.

The Traumatic Event

Because of the horrors he experienced, and due to the nature of his day-to-day life, Tommy is often hyperaroused. He feels on edge and often experiences intrusive thoughts, which can come in the form of flashbacks, creating <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/panic-attacks/">panic</a>. This makes him feel out of control. Control is something he values highly, especially due to his difficult start in life.
He hates that he can become easily startled. He also feels frustrated that he&#8217;s unable to sleep. He often has trouble sleeping because he is hyperaroused and even when he falls asleep, he wakes up with terrifying nightmares about what happened to him and what he witnessed. It feels like he is reliving the experience all over again.
So he often wakes up, with a rapid heartbeat, and realises he is sweating and shaking. Physical symptoms like these can occur during waking life too when a person is reminded of the traumatic experience, for Tommy, the battle. 
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe loading="lazy" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/dfjKjMc39Wo?rel=0" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe></div>

Physiological Symptoms

Tommy often experiences very negative thoughts about himself. He feels guilty that he survived and others didn&#8217;t, believing he deserved to die and often wishing he had. There appears to be some depression at times, and suicidal ideation, all of which are compounded by one of his coping strategies; <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/from-substance-use-to-mis-use/">substance misuse</a>.
Tommy is ashamed he survived and also that he cannot just &#8220;get on with it and be okay&#8221;. This has left him feeling hopeless and resigned to his misery. Tommy has a lot to handle. His family depends on him, but it&#8217;s difficult for him to focus and make decisions. This further increases his <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/self-esteem/">feelings of failure</a>.
These feelings, alongside insomnia and panic make Tommy irritable, and <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/anger/">angry</a> which can make him reckless and self-destructive.

Emotional Symptoms

Tommy uses work as a distraction. Distraction is a form of avoidance. The more we avoid, the further down the spiral we go. This means issues are not dealt with and are there waiting to be triggered.
Another form of avoidance is Tommy&#8217;s use of <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/types-of-addiction/">alcohol and cigarettes</a>. These help him numb his feelings, and for a (short) time, feel some easement. More on this later&#8230;
Tommy avoids going to certain places and people &#8211; in fact, anything that might trigger a flashback, memory, and panic symptoms. This limits his lifeworld in ways and also maintains the problem. 
Tommy experiences a detached way of being in many of his <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/videos/why-relationships-need-counselling/">relationships</a>. He holds people at a certain distance, sharing only parts of himself and this demonstrates his fragmentation which requires integration. 
Anti-social behaviour: Although this is not strictly caused by Tommy&#8217;s PTSD, it does impact it. Tommy partakes in criminal activities and other forms of anti-social behaviour. His external world is chaotic, unpredictable, violent, stressful, and frightening, mirroring his inner world of flashbacks and nightmares, which relate to the war.

Behavioural Symptoms

Tommy uses <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/from-substance-use-to-mis-use/">alcohol</a> (whisky, neat) and he smokes. Aside from the obvious physical health implications, there exist emotional and psychological impacts as well. But Tommy isn&#8217;t aware that there is a cost to alcohol&#8217;s soporific effect. Even though it helps him feel drowsy and welcomed into the bosom of sleep&#8230;it&#8217;s not restful.
Because alcohol inhibits regular sleep cycles by disrupting the normal pattern of light and deep sleep. People may wake up during the night, which means sleep is interrupted. Each time they wake up, the sleep cycle resets, starting again from light sleep. 
This means they are precluded from deeper sleep which is needed to feel rested. So Tommy wakes up tired, and even more irritable, and this lack of sleep wears down his ability to regulate his mood and emotions, making him feel less resilient and more vulnerable.
Alcohol impacts brain chemistry and therefore neural activity. So even though people like Tommy take alcohol for emotional comfort, this is misguided because it offers only short-term relief. Over time, more alcohol is required to soothe because tolerance has developed. 
And alcohol is a depressant so it slows basic functions, including motor function, affect, speech, reflexes, reactions, and general movement. It also distorts perceptions of immediate surroundings, and people. We are less able to think clearly and make well-informed decisions, based on clear judgments.
Cigarettes can also be a misguided attempt at relieving stress and <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/anxiety/">anxiety</a>. This is because of the chemical nicotine, which is both a depressant and a stimulant. Nicotine causes the release of the hormone epinephrine, creating a stimulant effect on the nervous system. 
People become addicted to the drug because they enjoy the initial feeling it gives them. But anxiety is exacerbated rather than relieved by the stimulant effect, and yet the behaviour is reinforced due to short-term pleasure and addiction.

Substance Misuse 

So life quality suffers because Tommy does not create opportunites for pleasure but perhaps also cannot experience it. This is because Tommy buries and compartmentalises his feelings, which allows him to cope. Alcohol helps him avoid his feelings, as does his obsession with work, another distraction. Day-to-day functioning is impaired in many ways. 
Unfortunately, this strategy provides no long-term solution. Tommy is at a dead-end of loneliness, pain, and misery.

Daily Functioning

It&#8217;s easy to see why people like Tommy, who experience PTSD due to traumatic events might turn to alcohol or drugs. But this increases mental health problems because it exacerbates them and can lead to severe anxiety, panic, <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/issues/depression/">depression</a>, and <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/blog/why-is-suicide-so-prevalent-in-kpop-rip-moon-bin/">suicidal ideation</a> &#8211; as seen with Tommy. It is important instead to seek out a <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/therapists/rehanna/">mental health professional</a> who can offer treatment options for people with PTSD.
Treatments for PTSD include group therapy, or eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing (<a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/services/emdr-therapy/">EMDR</a>). These are more well-known options for trauma, however, <a style="color: #0033cc; text-decoration: underline;" href="https://phinitytherapy.com/therapists/rehanna/">other options</a> can work just as well and should also be considered, based on individual needs and goals.

Treating PTSD

Edgewood Health Network. (n.d.). Is Alcohol a Stimulant or a Depressant? Retrieved from 

Ochsner Health. (n.d.). Tobacco-Free Living: The Legacy - Tobacco-Free Resources. Retrieved from 

Reynolds, G. (2022, January 25). Alcohol Disrupts Sleep Regulation. The New York Times. Retrieved from 

PTSD: Case Study of Thomas Shelby

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