Page 14 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - November 2013 Edition

10 Psychological States 10 Psychological States You've Never Heard Of... and When You Experienced Them Everybody knows what you mean when you say you're happy or sad. But what about all those emotional states you don't have words for? Here are ten feelings you may have had, but never knew how to explain. 1. Dysphoria Often used to describe depression in psychological disorders, dysphoria is general state of sadness that includes restlessness, lack of energy, anxiety, and vague irritation. It is the opposite of euphoria, and is different from typical sadness because it often includes a kind of jumpiness and some anger. You have probably experienced it when coming down from a stimulant like chocolate, coffee, or something stronger. Or you may have felt it in response to a distressing situation, extreme boredom, or depression. lives. That feeling of abjection gets re-activated "the desire to return to an earlier state of things." when we experience events that, however On the surface, a repetition compulsion is 2. Enthrallment briefly, cause us to question the boundaries of something you experience fairly often. It's the Psychology professor W. Gerrod Parrott our sense of self. Often, abjection is what you urge to do something again and again. Maybe has broken down human emotions into are feeling when you witness or experience you feel compelled to always order the same subcategories, which themselves have their own something so horrific that it causes you to throw thing at your favorite restaurant, or always take subcategories. Most of the emotions he up. A classic example is seeing a corpse, but the same route home, even though there are identifies, like joy and anger, are pretty abjection can also be caused by seeing shit or other yummy foods and other easy ways to get recognizable. But one subset of joy, open wounds. These visions all remind us, at home. Maybe your repetition compulsion is a "enthrallment," you may not have heard of some level, that our selfhood is contained in bit more sinister, and you always feel the urge to before. Unlike the perkier subcategories of joy what Star Trek aliens would call "ugly bags of date people who treat you like crap, over and like cheerfulness, zest, and relief, enthrallment mostly water." The only thing separating you over, even though you know in advance it will is a state of intense rapture. It is not the same as from being a dead body is . . . almost nothing. turn out badly (just like the last ten times). love or lust. You might experience it when you When you feel the full weight of that sentence, Freud was fascinated by this sinister side of the see an incredible spectacle — a concert, a or are confronted by its reality in the form of a repetition compulsion, which is why he movie, a rocket taking off — that captures all corpse, your nausea is abjection. ultimately decided that the cause of our urge to your attention and elevates your mood to repeat was directly linked to what he called "the tremendous heights. 5. Sublimation death drive," or the urge to cease existing. After If you've ever taken a class where you all, he reasoned, the ultimate "earlier state of 3. Normopathy learned about Sigmund Freud's theories about things" is a state of non-existence before we Psychiatric theorist Christopher Bollas sex, you probably have heard of sublimation. were born. With each repetition, we act out our invented the idea of normopathy to describe Freud believed that human emotions were sort desire to go back to a pre-living state. Maybe people who are so focused on blending in and of like a steam engine, and sexual desire was the that's why so many people have the urge to conforming to social norms that it becomes a steam. If you blocked the steam from coming repeat actions that are destructive, or kind of mania. A person who is normotic is out of one valve, pressure would build up and unproductive. often unhealthily fixated on having no force it out of another. Sublimation is the Continued on Page 15 personality at all, and only doing exactly what is process of redirecting your steamy desires from expected by society. Extreme normopathy is having naughty sex, to doing something socially punctuated by breaks from the norm, where productive like writing an article about THE ‘X’ ZONE normotic person cracks under the pressure of psychology or fixing the lawnmower or RADIO & TV SHOW conforming and becomes violent or does developing a software program. If you've ever WITH something very dangerous. Many people gotten your frustrations out by building ROB McCONNELL experience mild normopathy at different times something, or gotten a weirdly intense pleasure Monday - Fridat in their lives, especially when trying to fit into a from creating an art project, you're sublimating. 10 pm - 2 am Eastern new social situation, or when trying to hide Other psychiatrists have refined the idea of LIVE & AROUND behaviors they believe other people would sublimation, however. Following French condemn. theorist Jacques Lacan, they say that The World sublimation doesn't have to mean converting 4. Abjection sexual desire into another activity like building Check Your Local Radio Station For Times There are a few ways to define a house. It could just mean transferring sexual or Listen Live Online at abjection, but French philosopher Julia Kristeva desire from one object to another — moving www.xzoneradiotv.com/listen.htm (literally) wrote the book on what it means to your affections from your boyfriend to your experience abjection. She suggests that every neighbor, for example. The ‘X’ Zone Radio & TV Show human goes through a period of abjection as with tiny children when we first realize that our 6. Repetition compulsion Rob McConnell bodies are separate from our parents' bodies — Ah, Freud. You gave us so many new Dare to Beleive, Dare to be Heard this sense of separation causes a feeling of feelings and psychological states to explore! extreme horror we carry with us throughout our The repetition compulsion is a bit more A REL-MAR McConnell Media Company complicated than Freud's famous definition —