Contrary to what we usually think, remaining apathetic can provide us with the tool to distance ourselves and learn to respond, instead of reacting, to life’s demands.
Negligence, apathy, indifference… all emotions carry a message
I remember those moments of my childhood when I was sick, when fever and a certain clumsiness invaded me. He then looked at the world in a very particular way. I was both present and distant, as if anesthetized, unable to react to what was happening and with no desire to intervene: apathy dominated me.
Installed on the family sofa, he watched the comings and goings of each other.I heard them talk, I attended all the actions that I was no longer invited to participate in: setting the table, tidying up my things, taking part in conversations…
I was present, but as disconnected; he attended the daily life of a family, but without being part of it, like a ghost. And oddly enough, that wasn’t painful or annoying, it was even interesting!
Today, when I’m sick, I react like an adult: I tend, first, to consider my illness as an obstacle that prevents me from living normally and deprives me of something. I have lost the capacity for acceptance that allowed me to experience those moments of apathy without judging them negatively.
So now when I’m sick or flu or numb I first irritate and I feel a little desolate; then I remember those moments, I smile and I try to relive them. I try to recover the wisdom and peace of my childhood apathies…
What is apathy? Defect or virtue?
apathy is defined as an absence of emotion and reaction to our surroundings, a state of distant presence.
Although it may seem so, apathy is not indifference –we can remain attentive–, nor drowsiness –we are awake–, nor boredom –it is not a rejection of the world–. We tend to think that apathy can only be suffered and that, therefore, it is undesirable and expresses incapacity.
This is indeed the case when it comes to a symptom of depressive illness.: the person suffers from his apathy, he would like to be more active and reactive, but he cannot. Apathy may come after nervous exhaustion; Quite often, it alternates with periods of emotional hyperactivity, alternations that are difficult for those around you to understand.
It may also be that the apathy is only in appearance: a mask behind which the moods are intense, as it happens with the shy, the phobic or the hypersensitive. But apathy can also be chosen.
In our hectic age, which values action, motivation and self-expression at all costs, we tend to see apathy as a lack, a problem.
Apathy: how to get rid of passions
In antiquity, apathy was perceived as an ideal, since the ability to detach from passions and emotions, not to overreact to the events of our lives, was considered a virtue. Stoic philosophers encouraged their disciples to cultivate a form of impassive presence before the vicissitudes of existence and not to let their actions be directed by passions but by reason.
In Buddhism, the appeasement of the spirit -samatha- which leads to the right view -vipassana- is very close to this goal. In that sense, apathy can be a sought-after state or, at least, tolerated. It happens, for example, in mindfulness meditation, in which one trains oneself to witness events without reacting, without judging or controlling them.
Seen from the outside, it can look like passivity.but inside it is evidently something very different:
It is about an active attitude, awareness and distance from what we are living and feeling, moment after moment.
The meditative experience reminds us of the interest that adopting an existential position close to apathy can sometimes have, as it was perceived in Antiquity.
Listening to apathy brings benefits
It is a mental attitude that allows one to better observe the flow of our thoughts and emotions, without embarking on them, that is why it interests psychotherapists.
Apathy helps patients achieve greater emotional balance.
It is a position in which we grant ourselves the right not to act., not to intervene, we give ourselves some time to decide what to do. In meditation, it is said that we strive to “respond” with discernment, rather than “react” automatically.
When we are sad, a certain apathy overcomes us –which becomes paralysis in depression, that chronic sadness–. We want to be alone, calm, withdraw into ourselves.
This apathy should not be rejected immediately in the name of the need to “positivize” at all times, because it is the one that forces us to listen to our sadness instead of ignoring it and moving on to something else.
It encourages us to stop acting and interacting to ask ourselves the underlying questions: What is not working in my life right now? Why am I so sad?
Then yes, we must move away from apathy to put into practice the answers to those questions – if we have found them – or to reincorporate ourselves into life – if those answers are inaccessible at the moment. Because apathy is only useful and fruitful when it is a passing state and not a chronic one.
Thus, it may be interesting to allow ourselves moments of passivitywhich in reality will be moments in which we authorize our spirit to be only in the presence, observation and feeling, and not in intervention or control.
These moments tend to be increasingly rare in our societies, which require us to be constantly and immediately reactive, in all fields: emotional, psychological, behavioral, social.
The current slogan is, then, to be “connected”, to be “reactive”… But you always have to disobey the instructions! Or at least from time to time. Our individual and psychic freedom depends on it.
For this reason, paradoxically, apathy can represent an enrichment in our lives. It is like a pause in the accelerated course of our days.
Instead of rejecting it, if we inhabit it with positive moods –curiosity, patience, tranquility–, it will help us to better understand and savor our existence.