Coping Mechanisms

Building a life you don't have to "cope" with.

Coping mechanisms are tools and any tool can be used to help or harm. Coping mechanisms exist on a spectrum of harm and help. Whether a coping mechanism is helpful or harmful is dependent upon the mechanism itself, the amount being used, and how harmful or helpful it is in relation to current coping mechanisms in place. A coping mechanism is something that creates temporary relief for a problem or trauma that cannot be solved with the current perception, resources, or circumstances. The majority of our coping mechanisms are set up subconsciously in childhood. However, what most people fail to recognize about coping mechanisms is twofold: one that often the very thing a person is trying to avoid ends up being perpetuated by the coping mechanism. Two, that you cannot solve a problem with the same mindset, tools, and behaviors which created it. Coping mechanisms are internal or external soothers, things we alter about ourselves, our environment, or others as a way of attempting to change or avoid negative feelings or circumstances. Coping is a form of unconscious manipulation rooted in core beliefs of low self-worth and powerlessness which came from feeling unable to meet one's needs directly and consistently throughout life. Coping mechanisms are always about creating an illusion of or partial supply of security, safety, or connection when the being sees no alternative. Not to be mistaken with consciously changing something you dislike or find painful, that is the proper use of your free will.

For the sake of this conversation, I am going to make the statement that there is no such thing as a positive “coping mechanism”. Of course, some of this is semantics as “positive” coping is a spectrum that is context-dependent. For example, it is healthier to cope consciously than unconsciously. Before I list examples of coping mechanisms it's important to note: This is not a black-and-white subject. We are dealing with entire false identities based around survival, not knowing what is authentic to you, and having to have context-dependent nuance around what we label as “good and bad” coping mechanisms. The healing process takes place in layers. And certain coping mechanisms fall into a gray area and could be considered positive or negative depending on the context. For example, one person watching TV under a blanket to avoid responsibility could be getting so out of hand that all aspects of their life are unmanaged. For another person watching TV under a blanket to avoid overstimulation could be a fantastic way to regulate themselves as they work to crank themselves down from fight or flight. Be very careful here not to allow your ego to trick you into believing you’re the second example when you’re the first. For one person the activity is enabling their current coping mechanism which is total avoidance. For the 2nd person, this is an intervention against the impulse to continually overstimulate with work projects. In either scenario, we have to resolve the deeper dis-harmonic emotional, physiological, psychological, and spiritual patterns.

You see so, this isn’t about saying you can never “Cope” with life. It’s to understand what it is and orient towards building a life you don’t have to COPE with. To cope implies no deeper change can be made and so we must endure pain on some level. Of course, the mechanism itself was designed to save our lives so in that sense the intention is quite pure. However, coping is not the same thing as healing. To heal is to successfully and consciously employ strategies that shift the overall awareness, harmony, and strength of our being and system. Shifting coping mechanisms comes in two parts: One is awareness and deconstruction of the current pattern and two is the introduction/ownership of a missing or suppressed truth, energy, or behavior with the sole purpose of being in reality and meeting your needs.

Examples of Coping Mechanisms

Altering personality traits, if being quiet and compliant got you, love, I will identify with those qualities as a way of coping with my fear of abandonment or rejection. The same goes for any quality which was favored by the social group raising you or that you learned to adopt as a way of surviving.

Other examples include using humor or self-deprecation to deflect shame, being self-serving in an environment where you learned everyone was out for themselves, being emotionally guarded when you learned emotions make you a target, hyper-responsibility to avoid feeling out of control or not good enough, perfectionism to avoid feelings of self-hate, being a chameleon to avoid abandonment and rejection, not engaging in life and laying around to avoid feeling like a failure. Other coping mechanisms include consciousness and mood-altering substances, drugs, alcohol, exercise, watching TV, meditation, your spiritual practice, scrolling on social media,

One thing all coping mechanisms have in common is they ALWAYS end up creating the very thing it was designed to keep away, pain. Sometimes this pain is the same pain the coping mechanism was created to avoid. And other times it’s a new vulnerability that emerges from the suppression of certain aspects of self. See the examples below.

1st Example,

Patrice is terrified of being rejected, her parents only liked her when she was compliant and quiet. When she gets into conflicts with other adults or customers at her job that have more dominating energy than her she caves and feels small. She goes against her boundaries and accommodates others when she doesn’t want to or has the energy to. Patrice has subconsciously decided it is better to lose herself than it is to lose a customer at work or make someone upset. That feeling was so intense for her as a child that she does everything including REJECTING HERSELF to avoid that feeling. Patrice is doing to herself the very thing she hopes to avoid from others. So what is Patrice to do? First, she must recognize the impulse to please and subdue herself for external safety with her social group. She must recognize the harm she is doing to herself by going against her own needs and truth. That must be more uncomfortable than her desire to fit in or keep the peace. Now the hard part, Patrice is going to have to walk through the fire of terror she has when she speaks her boundaries. Her whole body may be shaking, but she holds her inner child who is afraid of being attacked or rejected. She will have to hold firm in her knowing that no one is going to protect her energy but herself and she must want to be true to herself no matter what. She is now more committed to being authentic with others than she is living in a false sense of security. She realizes she never had a connection with people she made herself small around, they only love her for what she does for them. She is angry that she let people walk all over her for so long and decides she isn’t doing anyone like that any favors by allowing them to continue to play out their manipulative behavior. The cycle ends with Patrice and as hard as it is, it’s the kind of world she wants to live in, so Patrice takes a stand with her life and how she carries herself and her energy. The coping mechanism she used to please others ultimately left her feeling like she rejected herself and resentful of the people in her life. She realized there has to be a better way to go for what she wants directly, even if it's uncomfortable.

2nd Example,

Hanson is a pretty emotionally walled-off person, his father wasn’t around much and never paid him any attention when we cried. His older brothers beat on him for being the youngest and would call him names like “sissy boy”. He couldn’t ever fully turn off his sensitivity but he found a way to make it look like he did. As an adult, Hanson gets into fights, he is completely identified as being a tough guy. He became so good at inhabiting the identity he created that even he believed it. Hanson suppressed his vulnerability and innocence for so long he can’t feel himself anymore. He is angry and finds it hard to connect with other men. He always feels like he is competing with them and turned to partying early on to numb the feelings he tried so hard to keep at bay. Hanson has subconsciously decided it's better to silence his sensitivity than lose the connection with his brothers and father. The fear of loss that mattered as a child as a matter of life and death, has now become generalized and it is completely controlling his life and self-concept. He is depressed, struggles with anxiety, never feels like he belongs, and hasn’t been able to cry in years. So what is Hanson to do? Based on where Hanson is at, it’s likely his life will have to completely fall apart before he can recognize the pain he felt back then created an entire lifetime of inauthentic choices and identities. He is terrified of showing emotion or vulnerability but also feels incredibly ALONE. The very thing that kept him “connected” all these decades left his sense of self in a thousand pieces. Like in the story of Patrice, Hanson never really felt completely loved because he was never allowed to show his full spectrum of emotions. He felt only conditionally loved for what other people wanted him to be. Hanson does end up hitting a rock bottom. He decides to look for men's groups in his area, something he briefly saw on some guy's Instagram he follows. Something he never thought he would do. He meets a man who seems to be more in touch with his feelings and for the first time, he doesn’t reject this man. He shares a little bit of himself, scared of what will happen if he does, but unwilling to continue to live a lie and decides its worth the risk. After all, the coping mechanism that originally saved his life, started to feel like a cage and a muzzle.

3rd Example (short)

Gary is an alcoholic, the problem is, drinking used to be something that made him feel invincible and confident and forget about the things he had done and that had been done to him. But, after a while, it stopped working and started creating other problems for him. His health is deteriorating and the longer this goes on, the more out of control his life feels, which only compounds the desire to drink. Gary is aware that he is sitting on a massive pile of unresolved pain and yet the fear of facing himself fully sober is still stronger than the pain of stuffing his pain down. Gary will have to reach a breaking point where the alcohol and all of its consequences are far greater than the fear of facing his demons.

Conclusion

You see for most of us, we don’t change until the moment we acknowledge the coping mechanism has left us vulnerable by not addressing our deeper needs. At that point, the pain of keeping the coping mechanism is greater than the pain we will have to feel by healing and stepping into the unknown.

It’s important not to throw the baby out with the bath water when it comes to coping mechanisms. As I said before, it is much better to cope consciously than unconsciously. That is often the first step to changing an ingrained behavior. We realize what we are doing and how it is or has been serving us up to this point. We examine what needs this is filling. What pain is this attempting to keep me out of? Is it working? How well is it working? What are the negative consequences I risk having by continuing this coping mechanism? What needs don’t get met by doing this? You see, ANY tool can be used as a coping mechanism to avoid pain or suppress an aspect of your personal truth. And ANY tool can be used to bring balance and harmony to a system depending on what it needs. So, the key is to examine the actual NEEDS and how best to get them met as directly as possible.

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