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Post Disclaimer
The information on this website is designed to offer self-care tips and recommendations based on evidence-based research and literature from professionals in each field. It is not intended to diagnose or treat any specific medical condition. Please consult with your healthcare provider before making any health-related decisions.
Understanding how to control your perceptions, faulty thinking, and cognitive distortions will empower you to overcome the effects of stress and anxiety. It will enable you to question the emotional thoughts that may lead to violent behavior. Many are unaware that their perceptions are slowly agitating existing medical problems.
On a Canadian Army Base, a military police officer drives through a hockey rink parking lot. He sees a man, whose car is parked in a handicap stall throwing his large black bag full of hockey gear into his vehicle. What emotions would you be feeling in this situation; when seeing an athletic man parked in a handicap stall carrying a large, heavy bag throwing it into his vehicle? Why would you choose to feel this way? I imagine most would be upset or angry.
There are two key points I want to emphasize. First, the automatic emotional response activated by your Limbic System, influenced by your assumed perception of reality. Second, your choice to allow a negative emotional response to stay in your thoughts.
The Limbic System, specifically the amygdala, can highjack our thoughts, leading us to commit violent acts or behaviors that will bring negative results to ourselves, families, and organizations that we belong to.
Continuing with what happened when the police officer approached the man parked in the handicap stall. The officer asked him for some identification and stated he was illegally parked in a handicap stall. The man bent over, removed his prosthetic leg, and said: “My parking permit is hanging on the mirror in my other vehicle, I forgot to grab it, but this is why I’m parked here.”
Many times our perceptions are wrong, as with this case. And when we allow our false perceptions of reality to create negativity, we allow for an increase in stress and anxiety. This amazing Canadian soldier lost his leg from a secondary device while defusing an improvised explosive device in Afghanistan-a Canadian Wounded Warrior Athlete-and I didn’t even realize he was missing a leg when I first met him. We project our definition of others based on what we perceive about those that we perceive. Even though we are looking through a small, often dirty window, that doesn’t provide us the entire picture.
“Thus, to look at the obvious is an obvious thing to do, though each of us has a different “obvious” And the narrow focus of what you look at to determine the meaning of the rest of the information.”
Beau Lotto, Deviate
Automatic Emotional Response
After entering various receptors of our five senses, the automatic emotional response is triggered via a few brain regions during the stimuli’ processing. The evaluation of the stimuli and the recommended emotional response determined by your brain is informed through evaluating the trillions of connections between neurons. These are connections that have developed in your brain from roughly the seventh month of your fetal life until the second the stimuli are received.
Upon evaluating the current stimuli, then comparing historical events stored in the brain and how one has reacted previously, including analyzing variables such as bias and beliefs, the brain will determine if a negative emotional response is required. Your Choice to allow the negative emotion to remain increases your level of anxiety. The fight or flight through the Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS) activates.
A minor emotional response is not as intense as a physical threat, yet it still activates the SNS to protect the body from your assumed perception of a threat. The response releases cortisol and prevents the release of oxytocin. Cortisol prepares the body for the fight or flight response and causes various interruptions to the body’s normal operation as its’ preparing for a fight. Oxytocin is the feel-good hormone. Your choice to allow a negative emotion to stay and linger in your mind will prevent and decrease any joy and happiness at the moment. After time these small amounts of emotional responses begin to build up. The snake slowly tightens around you as your overall health decreases.
Perception and Distorted Thinking
We do not see reality. We see our brain’s definition of reality. Our brain gives us a definition of what we see. We make sense of the current view based on our memory of experiences from previous exposure to what is currently perceived.
Our false perceptions of reality have been referred to as cognitive distortions. This is when we begin to have faulty thinking. It’s faulty because it’s false. You think others are against you, or someone cuts you off in traffic on purpose, or your spouse or co-worker is upset at you. Many times our perceptions create this false illusion. When we allow the negative emotions to continue, we choose to cause more damage to our overall health. The Limbic System, specifically the amygdala, can highjack our thoughts, leading us to commit violent acts or behaviors that will bring negative results to ourselves, families, and organizations that we belong to.
Our assumed perceptions of reality do us more damage than good when we do not question them. When we allow our negative emotions to continue and not question our initial thoughts, we will make poor choices and allow our brain to trigger an emotional response when it is not needed. We will allow our natural fight for flight to release hormones throughout our body when it is not needed.
I challenge you to start questioning your initial thoughts. Question what you see, have the courage to question your perceptual view of the world. Broaden your understanding, evaluate the decision and choose the correct emotions that will ensure you maintain a life of joy and happiness. It isn’t easy to do in the midst of an amygdala highjack, yet it takes practice. You got this. You can do it. Our nation depends on a transformational change, or we will continue on the path of violence and negativity that the media fires toward our brain daily.
