Moving Past Learned Helplessness
An international colleague sent an email recently, describing the social challenges people are facing everywhere. One observation felt particularly striking. It was described as the “learned helplessness” that has grown over the last 2+ years. So many parts of life have been turned upside down, in ways beyond our control. Those changes, plus consistent messaging that the only way to be safe and secure is through implementing outer measures—such as distancing, masks, shutdowns, ICUs—all can push us to feel a kind of helpless. The main locus of control moves outside of ourselves. But that discounts our own capacities. It’s incomplete, and now it’s time to find a counterbalance.
What’s been lovely to see in the last weeks and months is how so many people are working to create new patterns, right now, out of themselves. There are lots of changes: more clarity about priorities, new creative initiatives, more courage. A big part of that comes from moving away from that outer focus (aspects of which we may or may not be able to influence) and instead turning towards our more innate capacities. How do I strengthen and honor my own abilities to work with change? How do I find support for balance, for cleaning out, for letting go? How do I remind my body to do something better on its own? How do I move beyond waiting for outer conditions to harmonize, because I don’t know when that is going to happen…
Those last questions, about finding inner capacities, also seem to be part of almost every medical conversation right now. It comes up especially when the only kind of treatment someone has so far been offered will need to be taken indefinitely. Too often we go to those methods very quickly, like saying that high cholesterol can only really be treated with a statin drug, a chronic allergic processes only controlled with a steroid, lumbar nerve pain addressed through surgery. This may indeed be the ultimate treatment needed in some situations, but most of the time there are far more steps and options. Most of the conversations that work to include an anthroposophic perspective center around exploring a broader range of options, that work to help empower you to participate in your own healing process. Sadly, I cannot remember any specific time in medical school devoted to thinking about each human being’s innate capacities for health, growth and recovery. It was perhaps implied, but probably because it is hard to measure someone’s healing potential the same way we might check a temperature or blood pressure, it is mostly ignored. And without any clear recognition or description of that healing potential it becomes much easier to view our bodies like car engines that slowly break down over time. A car engine can't grow a new fuel pump—it has to be replaced from the outside. But we are not mechanical engines: we heal, grow and change much more than we appreciate.
It's good to see that empowerment returning. When we lean into our own healing process we can do a lot.