Each individual has their own way of describing individual mental health symptoms. Some have learned their vernacular from previous therapists, their community, parents, or even television shows. The way we speak about mental health is important— so important that it can even inadvertently shape our thoughts and symptoms.
Over the last few decades, we have positively improved the way we speak about mental health. We have worked hard to de-stigmatize therapy and normalize mental health struggles and diagnoses. However— I still find many clients falling into one articulation trap in particular: internalization. Internalization is the thought or expression that you are your symptoms. It is the idea that these symptoms are a part of your identity and in summation, they’re not going anywhere. They are engrained.
Some examples I hear often are:
“I am just an anxious person. That’s me.”
“I am messed up. I am useless.”
“Depression is a piece of who I am.”
This is not to say that when we struggle for something for years, or even our whole lives, that it doesn’t begin to feel like a part of us. Especially with survivors of childhood trauma, maybe this is all we know. Maybe we have latched onto this part of ourselves as a safety net— “Anxiety has always been there. I don’t really know another way to live. And thinking about living without it makes me feel strange!”
This is where externalization comes into play. Externalization is the method and mindset of separating the problem from the person. Through therapy and cognitive rewiring, we can begin to sever those ties and build our identity in a way that is separate from our symptoms. The stronger our sense of self becomes… the easier it is to talk back to and challenge that negative voice.
If externalization seems as foreign as a different language to you, talk to your therapist about slowly building other, more positive parts of your identity. What other parts of yourself make up who you are? Strength? Intelligence? Humor? Sometimes by identifying the other parts of yourself, it can become easier to see why mental health symptoms don’t belong in the same category. Over time, externalization can empower our sense of self and help us understand ourselves a bit better. It can also create a sense of control over your thoughts and reactions to things.
Externalization can help us go from “I am an anxious person” to “I am struggling with anxiety.” This redefines anxiety as a symptom of an external struggle or problem, rather than an embedded negative trait. Awareness of our thought patterns and the way we view ourselves is an important first step towards healthy, happy minds.
Comments