As a Gestalt therapist encounter in working with various client and their feelings and States. Often a lot of time on identification of feelings, sometimes it even fails. I understand that the experience happened, it is not necessary to call, but awakens in me the spirit of research. Recently, I started thinking about the fact that there is a category of mental States, not there is polarity. But nevertheless their opposites too often mistaken for reality . I refer to such "feelings" - a sense of trust/mistrust, acceptance/rejection and narrow-minded understanding of happiness/unhappiness.

Now I will try to justify the unreality of the one part in each given pair of States. Principle is important. I would be grateful for comments and additions! Of course my interest in this subject practical and in the end I will try in any way to conceptualize these phenomena in order to make it easier to use the insights.

so, the trust/distrust. Recall a situation when You were in a state of disbelief. I will not mention the distrust of "sense", because it just hurt the experience. I remember that I was scared, I was tense, collected and alert. Please note that I described your experience not including other people. That is, the "feeling" of mistrust is fear projected onto other people. Projected fear is experienced fundamentally differently, it is immediately added attempt to control the other, and with the consequent feeling of helplessness, experiencing their own fear becomes impossible and the person's actions become inappropriate for the situation. The efforts of the psychologist in this place are focused on return to experience fear and tension.

But if you try to imagine the experience of trust. I get only relief from the lack of danger. Obviously this experience occurs only when I first afraid, check the reality of the danger and relax from the announcement of the release of a General mobilization. However, in this reality again as there is another person who can not be controlled. Therefore dynamic person inevitably moves from mistrust to trust and back. This is always a lot of tension. Yield, as always, is inside. And again, it is important to apply to their own experiences and resources. So, as you work with the therapist, the client gradually discovers more and more of their own resources and the need to control another is reduced. Further - reduced stress, life becomes easier. So, I conclude that an isolated "feeling" of trust does not exist is a dynamic kind of mistrust, fear is associated with actions of a significant person. After all, if a sense of fear in this situation is not, in principle, the trust we don't remember ever, it will be irrelevant.

Now let's consider a few acceptance/rejection. Here I am not going to repeat the above, as I see it the same logic that in the consideration of trust/distrust. However, it is important to emphasize the contrast of trust/distrust. Failure, actually as the taking is the active actions of the internal plan in the form of thoughts, feelings, or even external in the form of words, physical actions. From experience I can say that the failure of myself and others saw a lot and often. It is expressed in verbal or physical aggression towards themselves or others. Adoption I've only seen in the form of suppression of these aggressive manifestations or declared, for example, the adoption of strangers living on another continent. From this we conclude that the adoption and the failure of the dynamically unified and in fact it is one experience. True acceptance, which in fact, people seek is to shift attention from the imperfections of yourself and others on more interesting topics.

About happiness/unhappiness reminded of a quote from Schopenhauer ironically placed above the gates of concentration camps (can't remember what): "Happiness is the absence of suffering." Let me clarify that I'm talking now about the common understanding of happiness as a feeling of fullness of satisfaction of all desires. Of course, it's impossible. A practical solution to this dichotomy lies in the acceptance of the impossibility of homeostasis.

what do You think about this?