Understanding and taking over apathy

Have you ever been in a situation when you just can’t seem to understand what you feel or why aren’t you feeling motivated. The kind of greyish feeling where there’s no good no bad, no bright no dull, and you are just confused why don’t you feel any fulfilment or contentment. It is very likely that you might have felt like this at some point in your life. It is an attitude of indifference, unresponsiveness, unconcern, dispassion and detachment where people just don’t seem to care anymore, they don’t want to care about anything. And this leaves the person feeling disoriented, fatigued, and lethargic. What makes it unique and unusual is the feeling of actually not feeling, the lack of drive, an emotionless emotion. People may altogether stop confronting life’s challenges, lying on the couch entire day doing nothing, and if not treated, the person may altogether lose the hope to feel happiness and contentment and as life starts to feel this empty, the psyche of the person may trick himself down into the spiralling dark hole of depression accompanied by many other possible mental disorders. So what causes a person to feel this way? Well, there are a number of conditions which may result in apathy:

• Alzheimer’s disease
• Dysthymia
• Frontotempolar dementia
• Parkinson’s disease
• Schizophrenia
• Stroke

There are a number of possible biological and psychological scenarios and even certain medications which may result in a person feeling apathetic, but apathy is something, onset of which can occur on its own too. If you currently feel apathetic in your life, there are other reasons also why you may be feeling this way lately.

How can apathy take over you?

• Having negative thoughts about oneself

Thinking negatively about oneself may trigger these apathetic feelings in a person. And not only apathy, negative thinking can have an overall poor effect on your mind, self worth and self confidence as an individual. It can have way more destructible consequences than you can think of.

• Fear of failure

It might be possible that a person who fear failure, as a consequence, is also afraid to try out new things in life, have inferiority complex, may think of himself as incompetent and feel worthless. These things can be viewed as a hindrance which maybe preventing that person to live a productive lifestyle.

• Disappointment from a loved one

Life can be packed with disappointments and changes in people may be unpredictable, if you have gone through such a phase in life where you have been hurt terribly by a loved one, whom you have trusted on blindly, it may have had a devastating result on you, both emotionally and psychologically. People after suffering from such incidents tend to close up their emotional passageways and form a seemingly protective walls consciously suppressing their emotions in order to not get hurt one more time.

• Worn down from daily tasks

People tend to get bored following similar tasks on a daily basis, for example, the same 9 to 5 job, the same desk, the same exercise regime. When you have to carry out the same task over and over again, it leaves you bored, frustrated and lethargic, and it might leave you feeling listless, sluggish, tired and suck all the joy from your life.

Now we know about the multiple reasons as to what makes a person apathetic, we now work on controlling those factors which can be in our control and finally start working on ourselves. Finding out the cause is the first step and bringing out the change in ourselves is the second, and after that, we can be ready to give apathy the fight of its bloody life. So what are the steps and changes which can be undertaken in order to eliminate apathy? Let’s have a glace over to the hands on solutions to this particular problem

What can you do about it?

• Alter of the outlook

Whenever there’s any problem which can’t seem to be solved, what you do first is you change the perspective, and changing the perspective can help you look over that problem in a different way. You need to first look around, understand and grasp all the negatives and the positives, and then behold all the positives. Just a slight shift in the outlook can have a major impact. And most precious of all, learn to give yourself love, compassion and empathy, it can make all the difference in the world.

• Take baby steps

Changes cannot be made overnight, habits cannot be formed in a click, so take small steps everyday, and make an effort to be consistent with what you decide to do. Gain an understanding of what is going wrong, what works for you and what doesn’t and work on the basis of that particular understanding, being practical is what will help you in the long run in fighting off this evil.

• Novelty in routine

Incorporating something new in your daily routine can be a basic step, something which gets you in rythm, maybe a new workout regime, or some musical instrument, changes in diet, a nice trip or maybe something completely unfamiliar. The idea is to bring a good change in your daily routine which makes you feel excited.

• Set your goals

Setting practical and achievable goals can prove to be very beneficial. Completing a goal gives you a feeling of achievement and fulfilment, so setting up regular realistic and achievable goals can shirk up that little spark of attainment and works wonder in getting you going.

• Seeing a professional

The thing I always mention is that whenever you feel bothered more than you should or when a behavioural pattern is affecting your daily life in a defeatist way, you should talk to a professional. If after trying your level best with all of the methods, you are still feeling the same way, it is in your best interest to talk to someone professionally trained to tackle these issues.

Your priority should be your well being, whether its physical health or mental health, your overall health is what you should abide by, and whenever you feel anything is hindering that, then just remember that you are strong and courageous enough to eliminate that very thing or aspect from your life.

P.S. If you feel you have something to share, any incidence, your struggles, any memory of yours, or whatever negativity you are going through, and you feel the need to communicate that with somebody, feel free to pass on any negative feelings to me in exchange for positive replies!