Compulsions: How and Why Our Lives Get Taken Over

1. 1 Compulsions: How and Why Our Lives Get �Taken Over� Jerome D. Levin, Ph.D.

2. 2 Recognizing a Compulsion How does it effect you? Effect others? Does it narrow, diminish or constrict your life? Behavior can be so ingrained, so much part of who we are, that we don't �see� them, let alone see them an problems They are �ego-syntonic,� as psychologists say Raising awareness of negative consequences makes them �ego alien,� not an integral part of us, but a foreign invader

3. 3 Compulsions Give Pleasure And/Or Satisfy a Need The question is, do they cost too much? Is there a difference between a compulsion and an addiction? The danger of pathologizing or medicalizing human problems

4. 4 Crossing the Line It�s not fun anymore, but I �have� to do it It used to be a choice, now I feel like a slave

5. 5 Common Compulsions Internet Spending Gambling Sex Television Exercise, as in exercise anorexia Thrill seeking Food Work

6. 6 What Drives the Behavior? Pleasure Escape from self Pascal and �busyness� Self-punishment A place to hide A way of reducing tension and anxiety Self-medication, i.e., depression All of the above

7. 7 Compulsions Are Biphasic Start as a means of adaptation and sources of satisfaction Serve as coping mechanisms Can, and frequently do, cease to be adaptive and satisfying and become a source of pain But the need remains, indeed intensifies, and we are trapped -- even enslaved

8. 8 Compulsions Are Self-Perpetuating The need they now satisfy is the compulsion itself, not the antecedent needs that initiated the behavior The negative consequences became so aversive that the compulsion is used to relieve the pain caused by the compulsion itself and we are caught in a not so merry merry-go-round

9. 9 A Changing Culture Communicates Differently An opportunity to make and maintain contact with a diverse range of people never possible before Danger is that so much is that so much is �communicated� that nothing is communicated Escaping the overload

10. 10 A Changing Culture Communicates Differently Loss of boundaries and intrusion into our lives causes so much anxiety that we turn to the very tool that causes the anxiety to alleviate it When new technology made long distance communication possible Carlyle asked, �What have we to say to India or India to us?� This is still a valid question

11. 11 More Malignant Compulsions Pornography Use of electronic communication to seduce and entice people into dangerous situations Role playing and deception

12. 12 Teenagers and Electronic Compulsions They grew up in the new world and it seems natural to them, yet it can take over their lives just as happens to adults Internet, e-bay, text messages, iPods Setting limits Warning of dangers �A common counseling situation: Upset parent--kid �What�s with you Mom, I�m doing what all my friends do.� It�s not easy to sort out

13. 13 Getting Help Try to do something about the problem yourself If that doesn�t work, you know you are truly in the grip of a compulsion By now, you probably feel ashamed and guilty You have lots of company, these are very common contemporary issues How counseling or therapy can help Self-help groups There are even rehabs

14. 14 Stages of �Recovery� Confronting the compulsion Recognizing �triggers� Learning new coping mechanisms Working through underlying problems

15. 15 Jerome D. Levin, Ph.D.