Emotional Paralysis or When You Fear Change For The Better: SelfWork #157
The SelfWork Podcast
Margaret Robinson Rutherford PhD
4.8 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 29 November 2019
⏱️ 24 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Depression, anxiety, and emotional paralysis can go hand in hand. But today we're talking today about fear – plain old unadulterated fear. But not fear about uncomfortable or destructive things. We're talking about fear of positive change the keeps you stuck in behaviors that are a problem for you. What are those potential fears? There are five that we'll discuss in this week's episode of The SelfWork Podcast.
- A fear of the loss of stability or what's known
- fear of emotional vulnerability
- fear of ambiguity or even failure
- fear of shame that you didn’t change before -- and
- fear of relationship change
Each one of these fears can prevent you from visualizing yourself being able to change in a direction that feels good and positive to you and can cause a real emotional paralysis. But we'll also talk about what you can do about it and how you can work with these fears.
The listener email is from a woman from South Africa who took advantage of the SpeakPipe experience and left me a message about her struggle to want to be with her family as opposed to her spouse. She wants to know, "Is there something wrong with that?"
Important Links:
A description of family systems theory (centrifugal versus centripetal families) by Dr.W.Robert Beavers
Episode 062 of SelfWork on Enmeshment
You can hear more about the aftermath of abuse and many other topics by listening to my podcast, SelfWork with Dr. Margaret Rutherford. Subscribe to my website and receive one weekly newsletter including my weekly blog post and podcast! If you’d like to join my FaceBook closed group, then click here and answer the membership questions! Welcome!
My new book entitled Perfectly Hidden Depression has arrived and you can order here! Its message is specifically for those with a struggle with strong perfectionism which acts to mask underlying emotional pain. But the many self-help techniques described can be used by everyone who chooses to begin to address emotions long hidden away that are clouding and sabotaging your current life.
And there’s a new way to send me a message! You can record by clicking below and ask your question or make a comment. You’ll have 90 seconds to do so and that time goes quickly. By recording, you’re giving SelfWork (and me) permission to use your voice on the podcast. I’ll look forward to hearing from you!
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is self-work and I'm Dr. Margaret Rutherford. |
| 0:13.0 | At self-work we'll discuss psychological and emotional issues common in today's world and what to do about them. |
| 0:20.0 | I'm Dr. Margaret and self-work is a podcast dedicated to you taking just a few minutes today for your own self-work |
| 0:29.3 | Hello and welcome or welcome back to self-work. |
| 0:33.0 | I'm Dr. Margaret Rutherford, I'm a clinical psychologist out of Fayetteville, Arkansas. |
| 0:37.6 | And I began self-work three years ago in order to try to reach those of you who already are very comfortable with psychological |
| 0:44.2 | and emotional issues maybe are in therapy but want some more information maybe to |
| 0:49.0 | those of you who've been recently diagnosed with depression or anxiety and |
| 0:52.3 | are looking for answers. |
| 0:54.4 | But also to those of you who may carry around some stigma about mental health treatment, |
| 0:59.5 | but are just curious enough to want to listen to a podcast and see what this therapy thing is really all about. |
| 1:07.0 | Before we get started, however, today, I want to let you know that if any of you are wanting to pick up perfectly hidden depression, my new book, |
| 1:14.7 | on the perfectionism that can cloak depression and actually be quite dangerous, it's on sale now on Amazon. |
| 1:22.0 | I didn't know what was going on of course you know with my |
| 1:24.3 | general pessimistic spirit about the book I thought maybe oh my gosh something bad |
| 1:28.7 | has happened but no my agent informs me that this is something that Amazon does every now and then to boost |
| 1:34.2 | sales but it's about 25% off so head over to Amazon and pick up perfectly hidden |
| 1:40.2 | depression how to break free from the perfectionism that masks your depression. |
| 1:45.6 | But now on to the 157th episode of Self-Works. |
| 1:50.3 | Today we're going to talk about fear, plain old unadulterated fear. |
| 1:56.0 | Discomfort, unease, whatever you want to call it. |
| 1:58.9 | You know, it's easier to talk about fear or see it when it's attached to something |
... |
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