Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff production of I Heart Radio. Hey
Speaker 1: brain Stuff, Lauren Vogelbaum. Here, after a tragic loss or
Speaker 1: a traumatic breakup, we would all like to believe that
Speaker 1: there's a way to turn off the pain switch and
Speaker 1: get back to a normal life. So when well meaning
Speaker 1: friends and families say you just need to find some closure,
Speaker 1: we think maybe that's the answer. Once we achieve this
Speaker 1: mythical state of closure, we hope the pain will disappear
Speaker 1: and the bad memories will be wiped clean. The problem,
Speaker 1: psychologists say, is the closure, at least as we understand
Speaker 1: it in popular culture, doesn't really exist. By searching for
Speaker 1: permanent closure to our emotional pain, they say, we're closing
Speaker 1: ourselves off to healthier ways of processing difficult experiences. The
Speaker 1: concept of closure comes from gestalt psychology. Gastalt began as
Speaker 1: a way of understanding how the mind proceeds, eaves, and
Speaker 1: processes images, and one of the principles of gestalt perception
Speaker 1: is that the mind seeks closure. For example, if an
Speaker 1: image of a circle is incomplete, the mind still perceives
Speaker 1: it as a whole circle. Over time, this principle crossed
Speaker 1: over to the processing of life experiences. If you suffered
Speaker 1: an unresolved trauma in the past, Gestalt taught then you
Speaker 1: were unable to fully move on until the issue was
Speaker 1: closed in some way. This led to therapeutic techniques like
Speaker 1: the empty chair, in which participants would imagine the source
Speaker 1: of their unfinished business, say an abuse of parent or
Speaker 1: a deceased lover, sitting in the chair and speaking to them.
Speaker 1: While empty chair therapy often provided a short term emotional release,
Speaker 1: it didn't free the subjects from long term pain. Despite
Speaker 1: the questionable efficacy of gestalt therapy, the belief the closure
Speaker 1: is a panacea for emotional pain became deep embedded in
Speaker 1: American pop psychology. It's a favorite of the news media,
Speaker 1: where the families of murder victims or people affected by
Speaker 1: terrorist attacks are always looking for closure, and it's a
Speaker 1: cliche of daytime talk shows when a jilted lover is
Speaker 1: brought on stage to confront their lousy x so they
Speaker 1: can finally get some closure. But we spoke with psychotherapist
Speaker 1: Ashley Davis Bush, author of Hope and Healing for Transcending Loss,
Speaker 1: and she says that unfortunately, the kind of closure peddled
Speaker 1: by pop psychology isn't really achievable, nor should it be.
Speaker 1: Bush said, Americans like happy endings were a feel good society.
Speaker 1: We like clean cut things. We want to believe there's
Speaker 1: an end to pain. In reality, it's not that the
Speaker 1: pain ends, but it changes over time. When Bush sees
Speaker 1: clients who are grieving a lost spouse or close family member,
Speaker 1: she doesn't talk about achieving closure, which to her, is
Speaker 1: the equivalent of trying to close the door on honest,
Speaker 1: if sometimes painful emotions. Instead, she uses terms like healing
Speaker 1: and growth and helps surviving spouses learn how to live
Speaker 1: with loss or how to carry the precious memory of
Speaker 1: the loved one with them in positive ways. Bush said,
Speaker 1: I also call it living with the love, really allowing
Speaker 1: the memories of that person to fortify you, recognizing that
Speaker 1: you're a different person because you loved them, that they're
Speaker 1: still with you in certain essential ways, and not being
Speaker 1: afraid to honor that relationship. Honoring a relationship with the
Speaker 1: deceased spouse doesn't mean that the widow or widower is
Speaker 1: stuck in the past or will be unable to form
Speaker 1: new relationships. In fact, it's often the opposite. By not
Speaker 1: tempting to blunt or shut down their honest feelings, they
Speaker 1: remain emotionally alive. Bush has clients who, after passing through
Speaker 1: a period of intense grief, have fallen in love again
Speaker 1: and even remarried without sacrificing deep feelings of loyalty to
Speaker 1: their first spouse. But what about divorces and bad breakups?
Speaker 1: Is it still a bad idea to seek closure if
Speaker 1: you're having a hard time moving on from a painful
Speaker 1: end to a long term relationship. Bush said, that's a
Speaker 1: different situation. I do think that closure is more relevant
Speaker 1: when you have the end of a relationship. There really
Speaker 1: are elements of closure, whether it's signing the divorce papers
Speaker 1: or moving out of the apartment you shared. There's a
Speaker 1: more specific kind of closure that we think is achievable.
Speaker 1: Yet at the same time, we are always affected by
Speaker 1: our past relationships and will carry those experiences with us.
Speaker 1: Bush says, we still need to learn how to honor
Speaker 1: the relationship and gather wisdom from it, even if it
Speaker 1: didn't end the way that we imagined it would. The question,
Speaker 1: she says, is whether the emotional baggage we take away
Speaker 1: from the relationship will be heavy or light. One way
Speaker 1: to lighten our emotional baggage. Research has shown is to
Speaker 1: write about the breakup. Specifically, researchers asked a hundred people
Speaker 1: who had recently experienced a breakup to journal for thirty
Speaker 1: minutes a day for three consecutive days. A portion of
Speaker 1: participants were told to write exclusively about positive aspects of
Speaker 1: the breakup and how they'd grown because of it. After
Speaker 1: the writing exercise, this group reported no increase in negative
Speaker 1: emotions and a boost of positive outcomes, including comfort, confidence, empowerment, optimism, thankfulness,
Speaker 1: and wisdom. Today's episode was written by Dave Ruse and
Speaker 1: produced by Tyler Klang. For more in this and lots
Speaker 1: of other curious topics, visit how stuff works dot com.
Speaker 1: Brain Stuff is production of iHeart Radio. Or more podcasts
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