Early Deprivation: Can Early Deprivation Cause Someone To Have A Closed Mind?

Although there are people who are very open-minded, there are others who aren’t. When someone is open-minded, they can not only be open to new ideas and views, but they can also be open to new experiences.

Thanks to this, no matter what they believe or how they see things, they will be willing to change their mind and try things that they haven’t tried before. This will mean that they will be open as opposed to closed to life and it will allow them to have new experiences.

A Similar Position

Due to what they are like, they are likely to be surrounded by people who are also the same. The reason for this is that being around people who are closed-minded and not willing to try new things is not going to appeal to them.

If they do have friends who are like this, they might not spend a great deal of time around them. They could, for example, be old friends, who they see from time to time and primarily talk about the past when they are with them.

One outlook

If they were to come across someone who is very closed-minded, they could struggle to understand why they are like this. What can enter their mind is that being this way is preventing them from being able to not only expand their mind but also from being able to embrace life.

It can be as though they are running software that is years, if not decades old and they live on a very small island. They will be very set in their ways and they won’t be willing to move around the island, let alone visit another island.

A Dead-end

Still, they might believe that if they keep trying to get through to them, this person will change their mind and be more open. Yet, regardless of what they say to them, they are unlikely to make much progress.

If they have given them a number of examples of how some of the things that they believe are not true, what they said might have soon been dismissed. It will have been as if they were trying to get through to someone who simply couldn’t hear them.

The Issue

At this point, they could come to the conclusion that they are wasting their time and need to accept that they are talking to someone who is too set in their ways. Moreover, they could conclude that this person was simply born this way.

Unlike people who are open-minded, they won’t have the ability to let go of old beliefs and ways of seeing the world. Nonetheless, there is a chance that when someone is in this position, it isn’t because they were born this way.

Another Angle

What this can show is that they are carrying a lot of pain and being closed-minded is part of what allows them to keep it at bay. This is not to say that they consciously chose to adapt in this way as this is likely to have taken place automatically and unconsciously.

Without realising it, then, what they believe and how they see the world, along with how they live their life, will allow them to keep it together and function. If they were to let go of what they believe and change how they viewed the world, along with changing how they lived their life, some of the pain that is being repressed would start to enter their conscious awareness.

A Big Impact

The outcome of this is that they wouldn’t be able to keep together and function; they would be overwhelmed by pain. What this shows is that what is taking place outside of their conscious awareness has an impact on their mind.

This part of them can then appear to operate autonomously and not be influenced by what is going on for them at an emotional and instinctual level but this won’t be the truth. In other words, other parts of their brain that are not ‘rational’ will play a part in what their ‘rational’ mind believes and how it sees the world.

A Closer Look

Taking this into account, it can seem strange as to why they would be carrying so much pain. What this can show is that their early years were not very nurturing, with this being a time when they were greatly deprived and deeply wounded.

So, one or both of their parents might that been emotionally unavailable and unable to provide them with the love that they needed. To handle what was going on, their brain would have repressed how they felt and a number of their needs.

No Other Option

This wouldn’t have changed what was going on but it would have allowed them to keep it together and function. As the years passed and their mind became more developed, they would have developed certain beliefs, seen the world in a certain way, and behaved in a certain way to keep this pain at bay.

Therefore, for their mind to open, they will need to face and work through the pain that is outside of their conscious awareness and experience their unmet developmental needs. Once they start to reconnect to their emotional and instinctual self and are no longer weighed down by pain, they will no longer need to be in a defensive position, which will allow them to be more receptive to life.

Awareness

If someone can relate to this and they are ready to change their life, they may need to reach out for external support. This is something that can be provided with the assistance of a therapist or healer.

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Oliver JR Cooper
http://www.oliverjrcooper.co.uk