Explanations: Our Natural Anxiolytics

In a world governed by rational logic, the type of verbal language that is used, as a basic form of communication, falls under the category of indicative language,  that is, the verbal language of description, interpretation and explanations. This is the language of linear causality, whose reasoning process consists of the search for the origin (cause-effect).

In dialogues, it is common for people, in the face of a certain phenomenon, to activate an automatism of the search for the origin, the first causes and the explanations. This tendency to find the reasons for a fact, as a bastion of explanation, is translated into verbal language through the why. Now, why do we do it and what is it for?

The search for why, explanations, knowledge and then calm

The human being is concerned with answering the questions that life produces, in an attempt to be certain about things. He does not tolerate doubt, the “no answer”, something that immerses him in “not being able to have control” over situations, people, things.

The explanatory principle was the beginning of the classical sciences, which conceived a purely deterministic universe. A universe in which certainty, truth and a real reality summoned an order that maintained a fairly balanced world.

Edgard Morin points out that the principle of the explanation of classical science saw in a contradiction the sign of an error of thought. This principle was not only applied to scientific research, but it came to be installed as a sociocultural cognitive style, as a way of processing knowledge. Unlike all this, postmodernity recognizes and confronts contradictions, and understands that there can be multiple points of view on the same thing.

The logic of causal-linear why

Now, the logic of the causal-linear why is part of the usual discourse in the interaction of human beings, to a greater or lesser extent, depending on the culture.

Surely the use of why , both in question and answer, is used to explain and understand everything from trifles to the most complex situations to solve. For example: if our stomach hurts, we immediately think about what we have eaten, what could have made us feel bad; And if a friend had a disconcerting attitude, we wonder what was the cause that led him to have it. It is automatic that we think about the why of things.

In therapy, patients are listened to wondering: “ but…. Why is it happening to me … ?; Why me?; What am I doing?; Why do I do it? Why, why and why ”, as if this were the formula to achieve – finding the cause – the resolution of the conflict.

The exercise of why is developed from the upbringing. In childhood, our questions about the why of things make our parents answer us basically, and in a linear way, cause and effect . Over and over again, facing our ” so … why?” , our parents respond, with more or less tolerance, and raise questions with linear and safe answers.

The term why is one of the most used on a day-to-day basis. It is a powerful word that constitutes a bridge that makes it possible to accumulate more information, based on the answers. It is a term that opens the game to new knowledge, that makes us think, reflect, search in contexts, characters, in our past.

These causal explanations can refer to a multiplicity of motives:

• It could be due to the relational context (an interactional why). Example: “I reacted like this because the other yelled at me.”
• Frequently the recursive path is not continued: “the other reacted like that because I told him not to bother me.” Therefore, only a section of a relational circuit is read.

Other more frequent explanations result in the search for the origins in the past, in childhood or adolescence, doing a wild psychoanalysis. Following this line of thought, perhaps the emphasis is not on circularity or linearity, but on the need to search for the motives of things, which is inserted as a structure or pattern of mental functioning in the human being.

People, in the face of disorder and the entropy of experience, try to place a quota of order in order to function. In this way, the social, religious, cultural and family norms are constituted, which imprint the correction and rectification of errors in the face of learning.

For its part, verbal language, isomorphically, maintains communication through its own coding and, to a certain extent, guides interaction through a syntax of discourse and semantic articulations.

Explanatory Rivotril: the antidote to the anxiety that the search for explanations produces?

Faced with a fact that generates uncertainty and consequent anguish, the tendency to want to find the origin of its determination produces momentary or lasting sedative effects. So the desire to find a why is something like an explanatory Rivotril.

This input of new information, such as a linguistic construction that generates the understanding of the event, leads the person to feel a certain security that gives them stability in the system in which they are immersed.

In short, the system in which one is involved remains stable. However, in the face of the irruption of an event or a critical event (which may be a death, a move, a job dismissal, etc.), the balance breaks (crisis) and immediately the question “ why do I Did this happen?

Thus, the explanation of the fact makes it possible, through understanding and action, to reestablish security, as the first step in acquiring a new equilibrium.

Some types of explanations and their effects

There are explanations that serve to quickly get out of a moment of tension, but they do not change the situation. They are those in which the information provided as to why is superficial. Its purpose is to momentarily maintain the balance prior to the appearance of a problem. In this sense, they are palliative and do not lead to redimensioning the perspective of the construction of the problem.

For example, rationalizations and intellectualizations are defense mechanisms that can be considered explanations of this type, insofar as the person endorses with justifications why what happens to them, such as conflictive attitudes or some symptomatic feature. These are anxiolytic explanations, they resolve the anxiety momentarily and explain the phenomenon by the category in which it is located.

Let’s remember that we put all the things in our world into categories. This, faced with the appearance of a problem, tries to explain the category in which he is placed, for example : “he is a bad student because he is lazy; He drinks a lot because he is an alcoholic ”.

However, anxiolytic explanations are also frequent in which the person wonders why a certain state of mind, such as sadness or anguish, without apparent and undifferentiated motivation, and immediately the need to find its origin arises.

In general, this can cause a naive or superficial external element to be placed as a response : ” I feel sad because it is raining, … the day is gray” (attributing the meaning of sadness to the rain); It is also common to involve an emotionally close person (friend, family member, etc.), whose reactions are used as a cause of a disturbance or alteration: this happens to me because you make me nervous.

Explanations, Actions, and Growth

The anxiolytic explanation or explanatory Rivotril is widely used, but it is confused with other types of explanations that do cause a modification in actions and promote growth. It seems that when we categorize what happens to us, we feel calmer, even though this does not lead to a change in actions. In other words, what happens to us is given a name, avoiding navigating the sea of ​​uncertainty that originates from not knowing.

But the certainty of the explanation does not ensure a change in the interaction. The issue remains stranded there if something is not done to change. It would be interesting to consider how the mechanism continues based on knowing the cause, that is, how I can carry out a new action in the concrete plane and solve the problem. Explanatory rivotriles are pseudomotives that do not add content or cause a change of thought.

The true explanations consist of recategorizing, that is, placing what happens to me in another category in order to reformulate it. It is the restructuring explanations that promote change, those that wisely produce a category modification and with it new actions.

Meanwhile, it seems that anxiolytic responses help us to survive in a world that fills us with uncertainty …