Humans are geared to be pessimistic and avoid danger. It's good for our survival as a species. However, modern humans now interpret anxiety, with deep internal messages of shame (not being good enough/not worthwhile), as being fearful, and naturally we want to run away from these 'dangers'. In this video, Clinical Psychologist Michael Philp explains some of the processes involved and ways in which you can overcome avoidance to embrace challenge and accept the anxiety that comes with that challenge

In chapter 4, we delve into the "Encouragement Approach" where the philosopher states that there is a need to find the courage to do the tasks that one is avoiding. This approach dovetails neatly with Acceptance Commitment Therapy and here Clinical Psychologist Michael talks about the choice point, which is derived from ACT, and helps us to understand how to make "towards" moves - towards the life we want to live - while making room for the inevitable discomfort. He also offers a technique that can be helpful in managing that discomfort.

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F... by Mark Manson is essentially a book about learning to stop comparing yourself to others and develop meaning in your life. It looks at how we get trapped in searching for happiness, and suggests that happiness is found in developing meaning and purpose in life. While it is a self-help book written by a non-expert, it channels theories related to Acceptance and Commitment Therapy as well as Logotherapy by Viktor Frankl (finding meaning and purpose). Here, Clinical Psychologist Michael has taken an excerpt from Chapter 4 The Value of Suffering. In that chapter, Manson recounts stories from famous people in terms of their experience of comparing themselves to others and the psychological torment that they experienced in the process. Michael discusses how we do this in our lives, the reasons why, and ways to overcome this need to compare to others in order to experience contentment.

The Courage To Be Disliked by Kishimi and Koga is a Japanese book about Western psychology. It is written as a dialogue between a philosopher and a student. The book aims to help people to manage anxiety and depression, by focusing on the moment, identifying what tasks are our own and what are others, and creating horizontal relationships instead of vertical ones. Here, Clinical Psychologist Michael has taken an excerpt from The Third Night, How to Separate Tasks which focuses on not worrying about what others may think of you and how we can apply this in our life in order to have freedom from worrying about fitting in, and as a result, more deep and meaningful connections with others.

Daring Greatly by Brene Brown is ultimately about the courage to be vulnerable in order to live the life we want. Here, Clinical Psychologist Michael has taken an excerpt from Chapter 4, The Vulnerability Armory, around dealing with disconnection to avoid feelings of shame. He offers several solutions instead of avoidance, in order to live a more fulfilling life.

Change and personal growth can be scary. Sometimes, where we are becomes so uncomfortable that we are willing to endure the discomfort of the journey of change because staying still is worse. Often, however, staying still is not as distressing as the journey, so we put off making change, avoiding anxiety and discomfort. In this video, Michael discusses how to make room for the discomfort in order to progress towards personal growth and the life that you want to live

A lot of my clinical time is spent discussing avoidance. We spend a lot of our time trying to avoid discomfort. Avoiding doing tasks that make us feel anxious, or uncomfortable, because it triggers negative beliefs that we are not good enough or that people will judge us or laugh at us. Avoidance works in the short term to minimise anxiety, but it prolongs the problem. It holds us back from living a full and rich life, and doing the things that matter most. It stops us from making progress in our lives. In this video, Clinical Psychologist Michael talks about how to manage the desire to avoid uncomfortable feelings and thoughts, in order to live a rich and full life.

In this video, Clinical Psychologist Michael talks about how taking responsibility for your mistakes, rather than offering excuses, can help you to grow. He also talks about how to manage the unpleasant feelings and unhelpful thoughts we get when we make a mistake, using an Acceptance and Commitment approach to "thank our mind" as a way of getting some distance from theses thoughts and being able to plan a more productive way in which to move forward.