Richard Lloyd Jones: It hits you out of nowhere for no apparent reason. Its effects are paralyzing. Fear of elevators, of leaving the house, of fear itself. In the middle of it, you feel like you'll never climb out. In those moments, it's exactly as Goethe so eloquently put it. Even in the greatest of evils, the fear of the worst continues to haunt us. I'm Richard Lloyd Jones.
Today, I'm Thinking with Somebody Else's Head, we'll penetrate the mysterious world of fear, panic, and phobias. If you're a sufferer or know someone who is, you'll find some real clarity today. These conditions are not as murky or impenetrable as you think. And hey, my book offer is still open to you. I'm giving away copies of Dr. Norberto Keppe's fantastic book, Liberation of the People, the Pathology of Power.
You might think this has no connection to today's topic, but Keppe's books are therapeutic in the deepest sense of that word.
His studies into psychopathology are unmatched in the history of psychological, philosophical, or even theological thought, and I know any introduction to his work will open your eyes to a deeper understanding of all aspects of the human condition. So just write me at rich at richjonesvoice.com if you'd like a copy of this great book. You know, like most of us, I've had friends who've suffered from the debilitating effects of fear and panic.
From the outside, it can seem so ridiculous. How could you be afraid of that, we say with disbelief? But to the sufferer, it's all too real. I had a friend years ago who couldn't walk out on the roof of the old office building we worked together in because he had a great fear that he'd jump off. Actually, you know, I've felt that sensation myself from time to time.
When I came to Brazil six years ago and I began to study Keppe's work, I began to understand many neurotic conditions like this one.
I began to see that all of our outside difficulties have personal psychological connections inside us. Our reaction to outside events is more a question of the outside thing mirroring something to us about what's going on inside us. That's what we'll look at today. Oh, and by the way, I think my friend's fear of jumping was consciousness to him of how self-destructive he was in his life, but didn't want to see.
On the roof, he had consciousness of this, but thought the feeling was uniquely applied to being on the roof. Let's, if you'll pardon the pun, dive in and see if we can demystify this area. Leo Lima is a psychoanalyst at Norberto Keppe's Integral Psychoanalysis Clinic here in São Paulo. He attends clients in person and by phone from South America and Europe. Leo, I was looking up the definition of a panic attack the other day and they said "it's a sudden surge of overwhelming fear that comes without warning or obvious reason."
How do you understand this condition.
Leo Lima: From our therapeutic experience, we can see that this fear is not fear of nothing, as people think. It's fear of something. But what is this something? This something is some consciousness people have, and they are afraid of facing. Because, you know, people are not familiar with the idea of having consciousness. People think consciousness is only moral consciousness.
But consciousness is perception of everything. So people don't need to do anything to have consciousness. This is spontaneous in ourselves. But not always do we want to follow what consciousness shows us. Usually it shows us what we should do, what's best for us, best for people, and not always are we prepared to follow it. So what we do usually, we hide ourselves from consciousness.
And then consciousness will come, will emerge, will manifest to us through other objects, through other people.
Richard: So the thing that we're afraid of is not really the thing we're afraid of. We're afraid of what the thing represents in some way. Is that what you're talking about?
Leo: Exactly. For example, let's suppose people have this panic attack. They don't know what they are afraid of. But if they stop and they make an association, they will see they can be afraid of usually of their wrongdoings against even ourselves.
For example, we hinder our development all the time. We are envious of other people's successes. We don't study as much as we could and should. We don't work as much. I mean, always something against the development of ourselves or other people. And we do this all the time, even not realizing that we are doing this. So usually people are afraid of something in this area, some wrongdoings they're making, and they are afraid of facing.
Can you
Richard: think maybe of an example to help us clarify this?
Leo: For example, at work, this situation is very common. I see my colleague succeeding very well, And I don't like that. Even I know this is wrong. I wish I was very happy with his success. But many times inside we are not. So this envy, this bad attitude, this bad feeling against my colleague, it's very difficult for one to face.
You don't need to confess to other people. But inside, you recognize to yourself, admit that you have this bad feeling. If you admit this, you will cope with the problem and will even accept better. If you accept other people's success, you will accept your own success. So it's very bad when we are against someone else's success. Because we will be against ours as well.
So it's very good to perceive this kind of bad feeling, this envy.
But people usually think it's bad. If I perceive, then I will be envious. If I don't perceive it, everything is okay. So I try to hide. And this kind of fear sometimes seems vague. You are afraid of something, you don't know what it is. But this is just because you are repressing this awareness.
Richard: But when people have a panic attack or a neurosis or something, they're afraid of nothing then?
Leo: They are afraid of something, they just have to find out what it is.
Richard: They think it's the thing. They
Leo: think they are avoiding a danger from outside. So they can start from this point. They see, I'm afraid, I'm going to have an exam, or I don't know what I'm afraid of. They can start from this point and then try to see what that is in themselves.
Immediately, ideas will come to their minds, you know. It usually is an attitude against your well-being or someone else's well-being, usually.
Richard: Are you saying that the external event, the external circumstance, then is just consciousness to us of something that we're doing to ourselves?
Leo: Yes. Something similar to panic attack is phobias. For example, people are afraid of dust. And for you to understand these panic attacks, this dust, they have to see what this external dust means. It's a symbol of something that's going on in their inner life.
We ask the client, think of dust. What's the first idea that comes to your mind? Usually they say something bad, something harmful, dirt. What would this be in your inner life, psychologically speaking? They say, oh, bad feelings. Can you think of some bad feelings of yours? Immediately, they recognize some bad feeling. And then it's, oh, yes, yes, I'm angry at something. I'm jealous.
Jealous, envious. And then
Richard: you transfer this consciousness that they were seeing outside to their inner lives.
And the phobia is gone. And the panic attacks as well. It's so interesting. I just was thinking of an experience I had with a student here very recently, a young woman who is very perfectionistic. She has great difficulties to speak English because she doesn't like to make any mistakes. And I was, I don't know how it came up, but a couple of us were asking, "what do you like?" And somebody said, "oh, I love animals," somebody said.
And this girl said, "oh, I hate animals." Well, I've never heard a young teenage girl say she hates animals. I said, "wait a minute, dogs and cats and horses, yes, everything hates them." So I asked her for some associations, as you're suggesting, and she said, "dirt." And I said, "can you perceive that you don't want to have any contact with the dirt in yourself, the mistakes in yourself, the errors in yourself?"
You're terrified to see errors, any kind of uncomfortableness in yourself. And that is manifested outside into these animals. Do you have any more examples that can help us understand this better?
Leo: I had a client who was phobic against birds. And I asked him the same question. I said, "what do you see in birds? Why are you so scared?" And he said, "their beaks." I said, "but what do you see in their beaks?" And he said, "I'm afraid they are going to peck me." So I said, "think of your feelings, your inner life.
What is this? Is there any similarity? Something that you could associate in yourself," and he could see how he packs himself all the time. He has this obsessive-compulsive disorder, and he won't let himself do anything, everything he prohibits himself from doing. He doesn't even go out very much from his flat because of many fears.
And
Richard: then thinking that the outside world is scrutinizing him.
Leo: He never had this fear of birds anymore, after he realized it had nothing to do with birds and their beaks. It was his own attitude. This was a symbol for him. Some awareness that he was hiding, avoiding in himself, was manifested outside. So
Richard: people who have this kind of social phobia, this desire not to go into public, this fear even of being in public, just the general sense of not wanting to have contact with people outside, is it always related to this inner dialogue that's going on?
Leo: Yes, because we project ourselves into the outer world, don't we? Usually people associate other people with affection, human contact, usually it's like that. Because there is not a ready interpretation. You always ask case by case. You ask the person, what do you see in this thing?
But usually they associate people with affection, contact, proximity, etc. And so they are afraid of having this contact with themselves, their inner selves, their feelings, people who are terrified of knowing themselves. They want to avoid themselves. And this is what they avoid, not people, themselves. Now, talking about elevators is another common phobia, isn't it?
Richard: Yes, claustrophobia, right?
Leo: Claustrophobia. What usually people associate with that, with being suffocated.
They are afraid of not being let out. But isn't it what they do in their lives? They suffocate themselves in many senses, professionally, affectionately, even physically. If they don't perceive that they are doing this, they will project this in the outer world.
Richard: I heard of one woman who was so terrified to go into public that in order for her to go from her front door to the mailbox at the end of the walk, she had to tie a rope to her waist with the other end to the door handle and let herself out very slowly so she never lost contact with the door.
It was such a terrifying experience to go into public. And what you're suggesting then is that this is being very terrified to see inside them.
Leo: Yes, but what keeps people from realizing this is that first they think that if they see the problem, then they will have the problem. And the other thing is that if they see these problems, they will develop.
And then there is an attitude of ourselves of keeping ourselves from developing, no matter how illogical this might seem, but we do that.
Richard: Because we can always blame the external circumstance for the reason we didn't develop, right? Exactly. Because of
Leo: that elevator. I could have been a Mozart, but that damned elevator.
Richard: One of the ways that they're treating this now, these kinds of panic attacks, panic disorders, as they call them, is this cognitive behavioral therapy where they expose the person intentionally to the symptom to give the person experience with the situation, thinking that increased exposure to the situation and then rationalizing, you see, it wasn't so dangerous, you see, it wasn't such a problem, that this will actually help them to solve what's going on.
How do you see this? Well,
Leo: I think that this might diminish their fear to the symptom, only the symptom. I mean, if they are afraid of birds, they may diminish their fear of birds, but they will develop another fear. Because this deals only with the symptom, not with what is behind it. So sometimes it's even dangerous because if you, the person is already suffering because his sensors go into the cause of the problem.
And if the therapist does the same, because by treating, by addressing only the symptom, you are censoring the problem. So you are going to add to the person's anxiety. He will develop another phobia. He will be more unconscious, more and more and more away from the cause of it. And this can be a disaster.
Richard: Dr. Cláudia Pacheco said that "anxiety is very good for us." Many people, I think, will have the same idea I had in the beginning.
Anxiety, good. How could it be good?
Leo: Yeah, it's uncomfortable, but good. Because it's uncomfortable, we see it as a problem. But if you think, why is it uncomfortable? Because you're avoiding it. You are struggling to keep it away from your awareness. That's what causes us discomfort. Because when you feel anxious, it's because some awareness is about to emerge in your mind.
Richard: Something is trying to come forward.
It's like a warning signal, like a fever in the body. Exactly. Okay. You
Leo: know, there is anthropological research studying tribes who are cannibals. And these cannibals, they eat human flesh. Many people say, no, this is a taboo, a social idea. If you are used to eat human flesh from the beginning, no problem. It's just because you learn in society that this is wrong.
So this research showed that these tribes this is a common practice they are cannibals but nevertheless after their rituals they have this cleansing rituals.
Why? Because they feel guilty. It's normal, it's tradition it's common, it's their practice but nevertheless they feel guilty why? If it's something acceptable because it is inhuman people know that you should not eat each other's flesh, right? So, anxiety is the same. When you do something wrong, even if you try to convince yourself it's okay, like a thief, he says, "ah, okay, I don't have something, I have to steal it.
It's okay." He knows it's not okay. So, he will feel guilty, no matter how much he denies it for himself, you know. And this shows that even when you don't want to face something, your consciousness knows if you did something wrong. And anxiety comes when this awareness is about to come to your mind and you want to push it away. Then you feel anxious.
So if you accept, "no, wait a minute, let me see what I'm trying to avoid."
If you see, "oh, I'm avoiding this, this was wrong." And if you accept, anxiety disappears.
Richard: So we have to always see if we have anxiety or fear about something or a phobia about something, we have to try to see what's underneath that. Because it's not the thing. It's not the spider or the dust. It's not the real fear. Not the real fear.
And I feel this with things like public speaking, which I do a lot of work with, that underneath the fear is a deeper thing. Underneath the shyness is something deeper. Let's talk about a couple of specific things then, Leo, if you could. The fear of heights is a popular one. Any sort of general ideas? As you said, you have to analyze each case individually.
But is there a general sense of what this might
Leo: be? Yes, it makes many people suffer, for example, because they can't travel by plane and other heights.
But usually they are afraid of falling down. And when we ask for association, usually they associate falling down to reality. You know, falling down can only be to reality. So usually they have this idea that being in reality will crash them, We will kill them, we will destroy them if they are in reality, in their everyday lives. So they suppose being in fantasy, avoiding and being in things which are not real, will be better for them.
And they are afraid of being ground to earth.
Richard: What about insects?
Leo: Usually it's associated with poison. And what's poison in psychological life?
Richard: The way I poison myself, the way I...
Leo: With
Richard: wrong ideas, wrong feelings, wrong actions.
Leo: If you ask these associations and you invite the person to think about that in himself, immediately he'll come up with ideas because it's much richer than you can explain and each person he will know what's going on inside of him.
He'll say oh yes you're right, I can see what's going on and then they will mention facts that are going on in their lives.
Richard: And consciousness then is our big friend not our
Leo: enemy. But we
Richard: have a big inversion against consciousness
Leo: exactly, consciousness show us what we are doing against our lives and against other people's lives. So as long as you accept them you will develop yourself, you have a better life, better health, better professional life, then you have a real life.
Consciousness will help us see how we are hindering our lives and then we can develop.
Richard: And then taking drugs would be exactly the wrong way to go in terms of treating these phobias and things.
Leo: Yes, they will only cover even more the symptoms. People are already trying to cover something in their minds. And drugs will cover even more and they will become worse.
People will become worse.
Richard: Any thoughts about allergies? Is this in some way related to these phobias that we have?
Leo: Yes, it's basically the same process. People who are allergic to some kind of fruit, for example, chocolate. It's so amazing to be allergic to chocolate because usually it's something people like. And people who are allergic to chocolate usually associate chocolate with sweetness. So they probably avoid being sweet as people, you know.
I believe in that being sweet, they will be hurt. Or weak. Weak, right.
Richard: Someone will step on them in some
Leo: way. Step on them. So this kind of inversion they have and so they are allergic to this sweetness, psychological sweetness, not to... Chocolate. If you interpret one person like this, it disappears, you know, the phobia and the allergy disappears like magic. Immediately.
In
Richard: a sense, then, this seeing external things as the problem is a form of dishonesty with ourselves.
Leo: Yes, it's a dishonesty because we think that would harm us. But, in fact, it can only help.
Richard: Because it gives us consciousness of something that we're doing inside ourselves.
Leo: Interiorize, I mean, to bring things to your interior, to your inner life. We usually project our inner selves into the outer world.
So to interiorize is to do the opposite, to see what you are seeing in the outer world into your inner self. Then a whole world, a psychological world is powerful and huge, right? So if you go back, go inside yourself and to see what's going on there, People usually are afraid because we think that there is lots of wrong things and bad insects inside of yourself.
But mostly it's good things. It's your whole being there, wonderful, that you are attacking.
This is the bad part you are afraid to see.
Richard: You talked at the very beginning about if we see the problem, then we think we have it. Just clarify this point for us a little bit, please. For example,
Leo: someone might be singing a song in another country at this moment, and you don't know because you're not there, your internet's not on, your radio's not on, so you don't know.
But nevertheless, that fact, that person is singing. So something is going on in reality, but you're not aware of it. So it's not because you're not aware of it that the thing is not going on. It is going on. So, awareness of something is different from the fact itself. But in our minds, we mistake these two things. We put these two things as if they were the same.
If I see a problem in myself, then I think, oh, now I have a problem. People usually say, oh, today I'm so lost.
It's not only today. Today you are seeing it better. Probably you are lost many times or sometimes and you don't see. So, you think you're not, but other people see. So seeing is different from being. And when you are aware of something, you are seeing something that was already there, even before you saw it, and can only help you because you are aware. You have something more than before.
Richard: It's a big relief, isn't it? We aren't really victims of the outside world. Our inner world is much more powerful than we've imagined. We need to understand that better. And that's what this podcast is all about. I'm Richard Lloyd Jones. Thanks a lot for listening.
