Reality: Words influence whether you feel sick and do something about it
Reality is actually a bit of what you see, smell, can touch and the like. This often also gives you a feeling and that causes everyone to have their own reality. As you sometimes hear, everyone has their own view on how the world is, everyone has their own reality.
Language has a big influence here. For example, Russians have many more words for the color blue than we do. As a result, they also see more shades of blue than we do and can distinguish them better than we Dutch with light blue, dark blue and plain blue
Greeks also have more colors for blue and research also shows that Greeks see more shades of blue than Britons due to the difference in language[1].
So words cause us to perceive our reality differently. We receive factual information and our brain does something with it. It then makes the best estimate of what we see. It projects that as it were and you see it as real.
Research also shows that words and images are linked to images that show what the word means in order to determine what reality is[2].
Then it also turns out that groups of people understand what what words mean, but sometimes don't[3]. So culture or something like that can affect how you interpret the word.
In this, you have a lot of nuances. Eskimos have lots of words for snow and therefore they can differentiate what snow is right now. We don't have that. For us, snow is snow, but they see differences in this.
Again, we have an awful lot of words for rain and people who don't can't even distinguish between drizzle and normal rain or a downpour.
Japanese have no word for green. This is actually quite crazy. So the grass is as blue as your jeans? This is the same word. For us, this is quite separate because we do have different words for this.
Language and mental disorders
What’s interesting is that in cultures where the word “depression” doesn’t exist, people don’t suffer from it either. Of course, they can still feel down and crappy and things like that. But if you can’t label it, then it’s not depression.
Of course they suffer from things, but it is not labeled.
This is what bothers me about the DSM-5, the psychiatry bible as it were. In the 1950s we got the DSM-1, which had 120 pages, now we have the DSM-5 which has 1200 pages. Thin and with small print and it has all these syndromes in it.
Those were invented. In the 1950s, those didn't exist. Then you can say, yes but now we've seen it and observed it. Then I say, "You went looking for it."
At some point you started labeling that and then you can turn it into a disorder.
Very interesting things do come out of that. For example, people who very often stand at the window looking out the window have a disorder in the DSM-5. Then you're just sick in the head if you stand in front of the window looking at your neighbors, or children playing or whatever is happening outside.
"Oh, that's not good boy, then you have a disorder."
I thought that was just a village thing, because that happened a lot where I grew up. But apparently those people are just no good.
There are many more things like that in there that make you think, "Now we're going a few bridges too far. Many psychiatrists agree, but so the book just got thicker.
What I find so interesting is a certain consistency.
In the 1950s, there was psychotherapy. Then if you had a problem, you got rid of it with 500 sessions on average. Then you were covered for 5 years.
Then there were 2 people Ellis and Beck who developed cognitive behavioral therapy. Only after 40 years could scientists prove that it was effective, even though it was effective all along.
But what is interesting is that with this therapy, you only needed 15 sessions. They were first pulverized at the time, because it didn't make sense that you could go from 500 sessions to 15 sessions, did it?
Of course, it was also much more attractive for psychiatrists to keep a client for 500 sessions or 5 years at a certain amount per hour. Nice easy money you might say.
Then suddenly 2 young guys came along who could do it better, faster and differently. They didn't want that, of course.
But in those 40 years, the DSM also changed. Suddenly there were many more disease states. So many more clients and so income could stay the same (at least that's my theory).
Instead of people staying longer, there were more people staying shorter.
The first antidepressants were also developed in the 1950s. Suddenly, they’re no longer just for people with depression, but also for anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and general feelings of being unwell. They’re prescribed for all sorts of things.
Even children get it.
So I just bloody hate the DSM-5 book. So I'm going to burn it once in a video ritual. I flipped through it. If you look at it with humor you can still laugh at it. That you think, "Gee, how do they come up with it?"
Unfortunately, it's not for laughing, because very intelligent people wrote this. This is a little different than smart. But that aside.
Then they’ve come up with all sorts of things, like ADHD. You can make that up.
Of course, people can be affected by it. This is not a reason to insult people. But if you have ADHD and you’re given that label, you might think it’s normal and that it’s okay. If, as an adult, you take Ritalin and it helps you function better, that’s fine, too.
What bothers me is that there are also kids who you think, "Do they have it now? Or are they doing it (unconsciously) because it gives them all kinds of benefits?" Then suddenly those get all kinds of pills and then I go along to one of those school camps and I walk with a bag full of medicine for all those kids. For only 2 days ... that used to be very different.
I think that's just real madness, because there are better methods.
But again, if you are over 18 and can function better with medication, fine. Because by then your brain is already better developed. Even better is over 25, because then your brain is even more developed. Then it is "grown out." I think that's better than if you're already on medication when you're 8 years old.
Another thing you often see with adults is that they feel better and feel free, but with children you see them use the labels for "I can't help it," but that's just not true.
If you are going to say you "do" something, then you claim it and you can also learn to do something else, for example.
There are 2 ways you can look at this when someone says, "You're like this and can't do anything about it."
The first way is by accepting that it's in your genes and that you have other connections in your brain or something.
But the second way is to get the suggestion that you can't do anything and then you're not going to do anything about it.
If you claim to be doing something, you can also say even with my other connections in my head I'm going to look at how I can do things differently so that I suffer less.
Be sure to listen to this podcast as well:
https://www.buzzsprout.com/195236/1790293-verbrand-het-fokking-boek?play=true
Masculinity and acceptance of mental labels
Perhaps my views on mental health and the influence of words also come a bit from myself. Research shows that masculine men (and since I do crossfit, that's me) are less open to finding medical help than less masculine men. Men who consider the standards of what makes a man a man less important[4].
But this same study also states that doctors themselves are less open to finding medical help when they have a mental problem. Still pretty interesting if you ask me. What do they know that we don't I wonder then.
Changing your reality with words
So words can change your reality and even make you feel like something is wrong with you. So the beauty is that you can also consciously use words to change your reality.
So if your reality does not suit you because you see or experience many problems, you can look at how to change it with language.
Psychotherapists use neuro-linguistic programming (NLP) for this—or, to put it simply: programming your brain’s connections through language.
NLP is also used by hypnotherapists who also work a lot with language, helping you figure out why you see the world the way you do and how to change it.
Want to know how this works?
Please join us for a free online master class on hypnosis.
Or enroll in one of our training courses.
Sources:
[1] https://www.pnas.org/content/106/11/4567.short
[2] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0022537184904997
[3] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2FBF01077415
[4] https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2012-32446-001