“Soultache”, “mental anguish” – a painful feeling of internal tension, accompanied by longing and a feeling of heaviness (or pressure) in the chest, in the heart area.

The feeling that “the soul hurts” is familiar to almost every person who has experienced the bitterness of losing something important.

The severity of suffering and the expressiveness of “heartache” can reach such a degree that it becomes unbearable and suffering that is difficult to describe.

There are two types of behavior in pronounced heartache: stupor (when a person freezes in horror, “freezes” without movement) and agitation (marked, cannot find peace, accompanied by screams and aggression towards oneself).

Unexpressed heartache may not manifest itself externally. Only upon questioning can one learn about the presence of such suffering.

The mechanism of the development of the feeling of “pain in the soul” is associated with a violation of the ratio of excitation and inhibition processes in the brain, activation of the hypothalamic-pituitary system of the central nervous system, a change in the balance in the sympathetic and parasympathetic systems.

The feeling of “pain in the soul” may be accompanied by:

Insomnia, early awakening or increased drowsiness;
Feelings of anxiety, apathy, longing;
Pain or unpleasant sensations in various parts of the body;
Increase or decrease in temperature;
Temporary and reversible disorders of the digestive system (constipation or diarrhea, lack of appetite), cardiovascular system (heart palpitations, arrhythmias, fluctuations in blood pressure), respiratory system (shortness of breath, feeling of lack of air, feeling of incomplete inhalation).
Weight loss;
Hormonal and immune disorders (usually reversible).

Mental pain is a normal reaction of a healthy organism to a severe loss, to grief, but it can also be a symptom of a disease of the nervous system, a mental disorder.

On the other hand, mental pain is a strong emotional experience that accompanies change. This is a meeting with the inevitable. A meeting with the truth about this life and about oneself

Three sources of mental pain:
– External crises (serious illness or death of a loved one, forced relocation, sudden destruction of significant relationships, etc.)
– Borderline situations. That is, those situations in which there is a real danger to life. (The term was introduced by Jaspers)
– a meeting with what has long been inside, what we have accumulated throughout our lives, have not lived, could not share with a loved one, encapsulated.

Pain can be suppressed or repressed by a feeling of high intensity: fear, anger, horror, powerlessness, despair, and even, for example, restrained tenderness or love.

A person usually comes to therapy in the hope of salvation from mental pain. The hope is that “it will stop hurting.” This is similar to a child’s illusion of omnipotence. To make this pain not feel at all.
And this idea of “salvation” actually interferes with living.
Therefore, an important step in experiencing pain will be such a feeling as despair. Despair helps to face reality.
Stop hoping that the pain will go away. And find the strength and courage to continue living, experiencing many different pains of life.

It is impossible to get rid of mental pain, because it concentrates very intense unlived feelings. You can only live them, make this pain more bearable.

Our psyche can use various methods of avoidance.
Variants of such anesthesia:
-anesthetize your pain through addictions (alcoholism, workaholism, other “isms”, food addiction),
-Go into isolation, so as not to contact others, not to be disturbed again in your pain.
-Fall into “emotional freeze”, ignore your vitality. A lot of control, which in turn is only carried by tension. Life lives “on automatic”. The “squirrel in a wheel” mode is a great way to avoid a collision with yourself.
Avoiding experiencing emotional pain, a person increasingly loses the opportunity to live life to the fullest.

Strategies in therapy
The therapist is no longer protected from pain, he simply knows that he is experiencing it. Three strategies are possible, depending on whether the therapist has experienced his own pain.
1. Avoid yourself and help the client avoid pain. “Everything will be fine, don’t despair, but watch the sun shine.”
2. Not being very aware of your pain, on the contrary, “poking” the client in the sore spots.
And if the therapist has his own experience, then
3. Being sensitively and slowly present, being in it, relying on his own experience of experiencing pain, knowing that it is normal.

Fear of emotional pain is often less than our ability to endure it.
In other words, the therapist helps the client to develop tolerance for emotional pain.
This leads to a greater fullness of life, experiencing a more authentic self.

Sincerely experiencing emotional pain gives a person the opportunity to be alive.
To truly live means always balancing between safety and risk, suffering and joy, tears and laughter, emotional pain and beautiful clothes.

Emotional pain is not a place of emptiness. It is a place of concentrated life. By crying the tears of loss, we recognize the significance of the connection with the one we have lost. This path leads us to discovering our values and love. Only that which is truly of great value to us can become ill

To dare to live so that your life is full is what it means