HealthyGamerGG - Why Venting Is Always A Bad Idea

Episode Date: April 6, 2024

In today's episode, Dr K explores why we feel the need to vent our problems to others, and how that can affect our habits and our ability to deal with problems, along with how it may affect those around us. Check out Dr. K's Guide To Mental Health: https://bit.ly/3xqZODp Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Want to get started? Head to CarMax.com for details and get pre-qualified today. Want to drive? CarMax. Today we're going to talk about why venting is a bad idea. Now, this sort of came to my attention recently when I've noticed that there's an increasing trend of content creators to like vent about what's going on in their life on Twitter. Like influencers and stuff kind of do this stuff.

They're like, yeah, you know, like life is so hard. Like this, I'm going through this. I'm going through this. And everyone is like, oh my God, like this guy's so brave. Like this girl is so great. Like people are like sharing their feelings and stuff. And then it also does something really cool, right? because we tend to do a lot of what other content creators do.

So if they start buying this thing or playing this video game, then I'm going to start buying that thing or playing that video game. Right, that's how the creator economy runs. And so this is also really great because once like content creators share their mental health struggles, like we're all inspired to share the same, right? Yeah, this is great. Like this is a big part of what we do in this community, right? The problem is that like this doesn't really work out well, kind of scientifically.

And so like, let me tell you all what I'm talking about. This kind of reminds me of a situation where let's say I'm in a room. And I feel really uncomfortable on the inside because I'm full of gas, right? And then what I end up doing is I like, I got to let out the badness. So I got to literally vent the gas. So I end up farting. And then everyone's like, wow, like look at this person. Like farting is so stigmatized.

You know, like we're not allowed to fart, but everybody farts. Then everyone else is like, yeah, like I'm inspired. Let me vent my gas. And I'm in this room where this one person has farted at everyone has started clapping. And everyone else is like, you know what? I'm going to fart too. I need to fart too. And then they all start farting.

And then before you realize that you are in a room where everyone is passing gas. And so each individual person feels a little bit better, but you are in a room that smells literally like shit. And this is what the internet has become. Like, right? Can we all agree that, like, it's become a cesspool of venting with, like, no one doing anything about it? So I'm all for sharing your feelings as a psychiatrist, as a content. creator. We even help content creators with that kind of thing. We've got, you know, programs where we've supported over 500 content creators to vent their feelings and then do something

about it. Because that's really what venting is about. So let's take a quick look at why psychiatrists and therapists are all for venting. So when someone comes into my office, right, and they start venting about something, if I'm, in my opinion, a good psychiatrist, it doesn't end with the venting. The venting is a step, right? So let's understand this. So like when I'm filled with negative emotion, it can be very hard for me to see clearly. So if I go and I talk to a therapist or a psychiatrist, I vent that negative emotion. But then as the psychiatrist or therapist, hopefully what they're doing is they're not looking for you to come back week after week after week just to vent whatever is going on in your particular day. What they're hopefully doing is venting so that you can start to do things about what you're unhappy with.

So as a psychiatrist, when someone comes in and says, oh, my partner is like not loving and, they're abusive and they're this or that or they have a drinking problem or whatever. So I'll like validate them for a while. I'll talk to them about, wow, that sounds genuinely very difficult and it sounds like you really love this person. And at the same time, like, they can really turn into a real monster when they've been drinking. Like, that must be so hard for you. So we as psychiatrists, this is why we do this, right?

So we actually like speed up the venting process through validation. So we're like, let's get this shit moving. Okay, I'm going to tell you why your life is so hard. I'm going to validate, validate, validate, validate. And then 100 minutes of vent. venting turns into 30 minutes of venting. And then is the psychiatrist what I do is to say, okay, now what are we going to do about it? Right? So what we do, the reason we encourage venting and the reason we use validation is to speed it up is to decompress that emotion so you can take

appropriate action. The problem with venting is that it's a form of emotion-focused coping. And the problem with emotion-focused coping is that over time it doesn't actually lead to good things. So let's take a quick look at venting and understand what it is and how it works. So venting is a form of something called emotion-focused coping. And here's what we know about emotion-focused coping. So this is from a paper about maladaptive coping mechanisms developing in childhood. So children facing chronic and uncontrollable stress less often cope by actively attempting to solve problems and managing their emotions. Okay. So in fact, active attempts to intervene in uncontrollably stressful situations lead to undesirable social outcomes. So what does this mean?

This means that when you're a child growing up, if you try to fix a problem like your parents are fighting and they're going to get divorced, it doesn't end well. Instead, what children learn how to do is manage stress through acceptance. They don't tend to do a whole lot of cognitive reframing, but they tend to focus on their emotions, right? So I can't fix mom or dad because that's not going to happen. But what I can do is make myself feel better. by playing a particular video game. And so what we tend to find is that this form of coping, emotion-focused coping, where I can't fix the outside rule,

I can just fix my emotions. It works. But the problem is that this pattern of findings, of reliance on an efficacy of avoidance, right? So the problem is that when we focus on avoidance of the problem, which is what emotion-focused coping is, it actually works. The problem is that it doesn't work for very long.

So, however, while adaptive for chronic, stress, reliance on avoidance does not equip children to cope with all the circumstances they will encounter in life and places them at risk for mental health problems. So what does this mean? This means that basically, we know that emotion-focused coping or venting is effective if you can't do anything about the problem. Because when there's nothing you can do, all you can do is vent. Hey, just a quick note. A lot of people will ask us, what do I do next? And that's why we built Dr. K's guide. It's a comprehensive resource that distills over 20 years of my experience, both as a monk and as a psychiatrist. And it's designed in a way that's tailored to fit your needs. So if you're

interested in better understanding your mind and taking control of your life, check out the link below. Here's what we know about the science of emotion-focused coping. As kids learn to be avoidant because they can't fix the problem, it actually leads to more problems later in life. because as you grow up, your ability to do things actually increases. But if all you've ever done is vent or manage your emotions instead of actually fixing problems, it starts to create more problems in life. And so it can be adaptive if you have no control. But as your control increases, it becomes more maladaptive.

And so this is why we got to be careful about venting. Because with a psychiatrist, it can work really well. But when we do it on our own, it creates all kinds of problems. So as we look at venting, we begin to see there's another key problem with it, which is that the purpose of venting is to get rid of our negative emotions, right? And this is the main thing that we need to understand. The most powerful motivators of our behavior are actually negative emotions. When you get incredibly angry, it is easy to act. When you feel very, very ashamed of your appearance, it's very hard for you to leave the house.

And you may say, but hold on a second, doesn't that make my life hard? No, what is the shame actually motivating you to do? It is a very powerful motivator to stay home. And so this is why there's kind of an interesting balance with venting, because what tends to happen with people who vent a lot is that they vent about the problem, but they never actually do anything about it. And you may know people in your life who are like this, who have this almost habitual way of venting.

It may be a mom or dad or sister or whatever who are constantly griping about the same thing. Oh my God, my life is hard this way. way and this way, oh my God, this sucks, this sucks, this sucks, this sucks, this sucks, and then they never end up doing anything about it. Because if you really pay attention, there is a correlation between how much you bitch about something and how little you actually do about it. And the reason for that is very simple, neuroscientific. It is as we vent the negative emotion, we actually disable our motivation to fix the problem,

which is why it works if I'm a child in an abusive household because I can't fix anything anyway, But then it sabotages me later in life when I am able to fix things, but instead I keep on leaking out my emotional energy. Your little one grew three inches overnight. Adorable. Also, expensive. Sell their pint-sized pieces on Deepop and list them in minutes with no selling fees. Because somewhere, a dad refuses to pay full price for the clothes his kids will outgrow tomorrow.

And he's ready to buy your son's entire wardrobe right now. Consider your future growth bird budget, secured. Start selling on Deepop where taste recognizes taste. Payment processing fees and boosting fees still apply. See website for details. There is even a more subtle problem at play here, which is something that we're going to learn from the yogic tradition, which is something called a vasana. So as we mentioned earlier, we know that there are these people who will vent about the same

thing over and over and over again. And this is particularly insidious not just because of the motivation, but because of the mental habit it creates. Now, this is what Avasana is. So to illustrate this, I'm going to give you all an example. So I had a patient who came into my office. I was their eighth or ninth therapist. They're about 48 years old, okay? So they've been in therapy since they were 15 or 16. And what they would do is they'd come into my office and they'd vent about their day. I'm sad because of this and this thing went wrong and this thing went wrong. And I was like a second year or third year psychiatry resident. So I was just like, I just finished two years of training. So I'm like, okay,

this is what psychotherapy is. I'm here to listen to people talk about how sad they are. Like, that's me being supportive, right? And then a couple months went by. And then I was like, bro, is this helping? And he's like, what do you mean? Is it helping? And I was like, is this actually helping you?

And he's like, well, like, I don't know. I mean, I'm like, do you feel better than you did six months ago? And he's like, no, I mean, my life hasn't improved at all. But he's like, isn't this what therapy is supposed to be? Like, aren't I supposed to come here and like talk about my feelings? And that's when I started to realize, wait, something is going, something is off here. And that's when I actually like, so usually when I don't understand something in psychiatry, I'll read psychiatry stuff, but then I also read like yogic stuff.

And I stumbled upon this idea of a vasana. So vasana is a mental habit. And the big problem with a mental habit is that once you start venting in a particular way, your neurons kind of get concrete about that sort of thing. You develop literally a mental habit where all it takes is a tiny trigger. for your mind to go through this well-rehearsed form of thinking, which frequently venting is. So if you'll want a good example of this, you can go to like dating forums or in-cell forums, where these are people who, let's take in-cells.

I'm not trying to bash in-cells. Let's just look at what it is, okay? So these are people who, you know, went on a couple of dates many, maybe a few years ago, and yet they go on the internet every single day, and they will type about how alone they are, how alone they are. And you can't argue with them or anything like that, but they spend hours and hours and hours in their own head thinking about how alone they are. And the really weird thing is if we sort of look at life for a second, okay?

So let me give you all kind of a quick example of this. So let's take a look at let's understand vasanas. Okay. So a vasana is a mental habit. Now here's the tricky thing. If we're looking at people like in cells or someone who gets triggered to vent. So what you've got is you've got one kind of exposure. And once you trigger the exposure, once the exposure triggers, this exposure can even be less than five seconds.

So this can be something as simple as I logged on to the internet and I saw a happy couple smiling. And then this triggers a venting response. And this can be like minutes to hours. And if you know people who have Vassanas, you know what I'm talking about. because you can trigger that pattern of thinking, and they will say the same damn thing over and over and over again, right? So I play the game of Dota 2. Maybe I'll play League of Legends.

And sometimes something is overpowered. And the moment that I see that every time I lose to this particular hero, I fucking, I log on the forums and I rant, this hero is so overpowered. And I spend 35 minutes of my life because I played one game of Dota because I saw this particular person. And then now I'm off track. I see someone else playing that person. that particular hero, I start ranting and raving.

The Vassana triggers, the mental habit triggers. And the real problem with triggering Vassanas is a five-second exposure can cost you 30 minutes. And now let's look at what our life looks like if we have a bunch of Vassanas. So five-second trigger, 30 minutes. Another five-second trigger, 30 minutes. Another five-second trigger, 30 minutes. Another five-second trigger, 30 minutes. And you'll notice this if you go on these places that are,

are kind of like safe spaces on the internet. It's a bunch of people constantly venting. And so even though my exposure in life has only been 20 seconds, two negative things, I have created two hours of negativity in my mind. This is what a vasana is. It is a mental habit. And the more that we vent, the more our mind gets into the habit of venting. And the more that we get into the habit of venting, the easier it is for our mind.

to go to that particular place. And then all we need is a single trigger to knock us off on this kind of rant, which I don't know if y'all had this, but like, you know, my mom is like this where she has like particular rants that she likes to go on. I have family members that have particular rants that they like to go on. Even I like to go on particular rants. These are all vasanas. And the real problem with venting is not only does it decompress our negative emotional

energy, but it trains our mind to think continuously negative. thoughts. That's what venting is. If we never go about fixing the problem, because then what happens? The circumstance is here, triggers the venting, and then no emotional energy, and then I don't actually change anything. So then the circumstance triggers again and again and again and again. And then my mind gets better and better and better at venting, venting, venting, venting, venting, until all I'm doing is farting all day and never actually fixing the problem. So, I encourage you all to be very careful about venting. And here's the right way to do it.

The first is if you work with a professional, hopefully you find one that is helping you vent for the sake of actually doing something. And even if you're not working with a professional, you can do that yourself. So here's the main question I've got for you all. When you vent, what do you do to fix the problem after you vent? If the answer is absolutely nothing, now you know why you're fucking. constantly venting because you're never actually doing anything to fix it. So, the next time you vent, do something about it. Do something, even if it's minuscule,

if it's insignificant, spend five minutes actually addressing minimum of five minutes addressing the problem that you're venting. And you may say, but there's nothing I can do about it. Stop and think for a second. Oh, my boss doesn't like me. I'm venting about my boss, venting about my boss, venting about my boss. Why doesn't your boss like you? Because they give me, they're criticized me. Well, shit, maybe you could do slightly better at your job. Do you think that could make a difference? No, I've tried that. It doesn't work. That is a Vassana. You see how quickly it jumps up? No, I've tried it. It doesn't work. I've tried it. It doesn't work. I've tried it. It doesn't work. Oh, I see. You tried it. How many times? I've tried it a million times.

It never works. Chances are you've tried it a couple of times. And it doesn't work. and then you've started a form of Vassana of when I try things, they don't work. And then you get stuck in this particular way. So now we get to the Vassana. This is the third thing that you can do. Observe the mental habit of your mind. Observe that when you are in a particular situation, all it takes is a trigger. And then watch how your mind, as soon as you hit the play button, it's like an unskippable ad.

Where now that we've fucking strapped ourselves in and we've started this video, we're going to have to sit through this 15 minutes of BS. And just notice, wow, look at my mind. This is all you need to do to melt avasana is observe the automaticity of it. So wow, now my mind is off on that track. Now my mind is off on the track. Now my mind is off on the track. Holy crap, let it go.

Like, let it literally like let it run its course and watch it and don't stress about it. Now, if you guys want some of these techniques of how to observe and things like that, I definitely recommend you check out our meditation guide. will teach you about a lot of this mental training. But all you need to do is observe the vasana. So at the end of the day, you'll need to be a little bit careful about venting. Venting can be absolutely healthy if it precedes action. If it helps stabilize you because too much negative emotion is overwhelming,

we want to modulate that negative emotion down to where we still have enough emotional energy to motivate to act. This is what a therapist does. But if you don't do this, if instead you just vent for the sake of venting and then you vent again and vent again, vent again, you're forming a mental habit. And then the real problem with that mental habit is that mental habit will make it harder for you to do something because now your body has a habituated response. When this problem happens, how do I deal with it? I bitch about it. So now it becomes harder and harder and harder. It's kind of like, you know, once you train yourself

to be right-handed, it's hard to start writing with your left hand. So once your mind trains with a particular Vassana of this is how I'm going to deal with this problem, I'm just going to bitch about it, it becomes harder and harder and harder and harder to work with your left hand to actually do something about your problem. So be careful about venting and observe your vasanas.