Interview with Casilda Jáspez: emotions and their relationship with the body

Let's see to what extent the emotions we experience influence what happens in our body.

What is the relationship between the mind and the body, and is there a clear distinction between the two in the first place? These kinds of questions are major philosophical issues that for centuries have attracted the interest of many thinkers. With the emergence of psychology, this topic took on new practical implications that have come down to us to this day.

What is the relationship between emotions and the body in which they are experienced? To better understand this question, we interviewed an expert: psychologist Casilda Jáspez..

Interview to Casilda Jáspez: the link between the body and the emotional

Casilda Jáspez is a psychologist expert in emotional and communicative problems, and works both online and in her office located in Granada. Here she talks to us about feelings and their relationship with what happens in our organism, from her perspective as a professional of psychological wellbeing.

Is it a mistake to consider that the mind and the body are two clearly separate entities?

The issue of mind-body duality has always existed throughout the history of thought, from Descartes with his "I think, therefore I am", to the birth of psychology in the 19th century, where the mind begins to be conceived as something that is not independent from the body. However, it is difficult to reach an agreement on this issue and there are those who continue to resort to this duality.

I think that we beings are made of a part of organic matter, where there would also be the mind as something tangible and visible, with its cells, structures, and chemical processes, which will give rise to mental processes such as perception, thought, memory, consciousness, emotions and feelings, and on the other hand there is the invisible and intangible mind with its mental states that will always be subjective and influenced by our emotions and thoughts, but that will also influence the processes of the organism, so that mind and body, the tangible and the intangible and subjective, are intrinsically linked, influencing each other.

The body undoubtedly responds to our way of thinking, feeling and acting.

Do you think that problems in the management of feelings are often overlooked because they do not generate symptoms as clear as physical illnesses?

There is no dissociation between physical and psychic ailment, there is no doubt that in every physical illness there is an influence and emotional and psychic component, I do not say cause although sometimes yes, I say relationship and I do not believe that the symptoms caused by emotional problems are not tangible and clear, they are there in phobias, panic attacks, generalized anxiety, depression and a long list, which will also influence the body as an organism causing physical illness, what is complicated and not very visible is to know what is behind that symptom, what responds to that emotional state, which is what is somehow making you sick.

What types of alterations in the organism can be caused in great part by a bad management of the emotions?

Some studies affirm that around 50% of illnesses have an emotional origin, others even raise it to 80%, making stress, that great evil of the modern world, responsible for a great number of pathologies.

It is scientifically proven that negative emotional states cause not only psychological depression, but also circumstances that depress the immune system making us more sensitive and vulnerable to certain diseases; constant common colds, pharyngitis, dermatological problems, and even Cancer may be the response to a persistent emotional state in which the cells surrender to a state of prolonged stress and go into shock resulting in an abnormal multiplication of these.

Digestive problems also have a strong emotional component, along with heart problems, hypertension, autoimmune problems, allergies, muscle contractions, migraines, and an extensive list of complications, let's not forget that some studies attribute more than a hundred ailments to stress.

And in the opposite direction, what kind of emotional alterations are usually produced by medical illnesses?

As I have been saying, psychological and physical alterations influence each other, but sticking to the question and not to extend too much, I could say that in general terms both anxiety and depressive states are typical of chronic diseases, in which significant changes occur in the environment of patients that affect their quality of life and well-being.

Anger and rage are emotions that take over a person when diagnosed with a disease, as well as anguish, fear or helplessness in serious situations.

Another of the emotions that can result from having a physical illness is guilt, thinking that we have not taken enough care of ourselves, and we cannot forget the feeling of shame that some diseases with a strong social stigma, such as HIV, can make us feel.

In those cases in which the feelings have led the patient to develop psychological and physical complications, what is usually done in psychological therapy?

Well, the first step is to listen, to let the patient speak, to help him/her express what he/she feels, what is happening to him/her and how he/she is experiencing it. We should not try to console him, we should allow him to unburden himself, since on many occasions he has not been able to do so, either because of himself or because the people around him, in their eagerness to help, have not allowed him to express his sadness or pain. Nor should we try to minimize their problem, even if their concern is disproportionate to the problem itself, because that is how that person is living it.

After these first steps in which the person has been able to express himself and put his emotions on the table, we continue working with this information, trying to get the patient to go deeper into his repressed feelings, because in every psychological problem there is always a real and tangible cause that is producing it and another, also unconscious, which is totally subjective and particular.

It is essential to find the true psychological origin of their ailments and work, especially those problematic emotions, trying to make the patient know about them, know what he has to do with what happens to him, only then he can do something with it, it is not about giving advice or offering coping tools, it is about each one finding his own. As Michel Foucault said, normality is a modern invention.

There are situations that cannot be changed as possibly also ways of feeling, but we can transform and do something else with them. A few years ago I attended a person who locked herself at home and broke all social contact after being diagnosed with a chronic illness, of which she was ashamed and did not accept having, her confinement lasted a few years, evidently she ended up overcoming it and accepting it, but it took time and the interesting thing about this case is that although she could not avoid feeling what she felt, she decided to start studying, she did it at a distance, and graduated in a discipline that today she practices and that brings her a lot of personal satisfaction.

As a mental health professional, what habits of emotion management do you think people tend to underestimate?

Emotional management has to do with that concept so fashionable these days of emotional intelligence, understood as the psychological abilities and skills that involve feeling, understanding, controlling and modifying our own and other people's emotions, and about this concept and from my opinion we should point out a few things.

First, I wonder sometimes if we are really emotionally intelligent, daily we see in our own lives as well as in the lives of the people around us, the continuous realization of harmful behaviors towards us, that even knowing that they are, we are not able to let do.

On the other hand, it is not clear to me that emotional intelligence consists in identifying the emotions of others, it would be more about connecting with our own emotions, recognizing them and accepting them through an integration between those emotions that we do not like or are difficult to recognize and those others that we like, in this way we will favor self-knowledge, which will also make us more empathetic.

And finally, alluding to emotional control and training, I do not believe that a person changes his structure because he has to smile when he is feeling something else, or should be positive when what is happening to him is not positive at all. Emotional intelligence is something that exists within each one of us and we have to develop and integrate it and it requires us to know ourselves better.

That would be the key, self-knowledge, acceptance and working with what I am, with what I am, with what I feel, and not with what I don't, with those I should, I should feel this way, I should do that, which cause so much frustration, that is, not to seek or pursue a way of thinking and feeling under an ideal and a perfection that does not exist.

I would summarize it in; connect with our emotions, promote self-knowledge and accept and integrate them, the ones we like and the ones we don't like.