rebecca palacios
Logroño, (EFE)
This professor of the degree in General Health Psychology at the International University of La Rioja (UNIR) has reflected on the limits of order and cleanliness and the possibility of developing a mental pathology.
The Japanese consultant Marie Kondo, known worldwide for her KonMari method of organization, has recently acknowledged that, after her third child, she feels unable to keep her house in perfect condition, according to the advice in her best-selling book “The Magic of Order”.
The guru of order has assumed that having a tidy house “is no longer her priority” and in a new book she details her “kurashi” method to teach another way to pass the time. “She does not invent anything, but she sells it very well,” Berzosa has indicated.
obsessive disorder
The confinement of the spring of 2020 due to the covid-19 pandemic forced the population to stay locked up in their homes with a lot of free time, which is why many people chose to put their homes in order.
However, he has detailed, only those with previous traits of a more “insecure” personality became obsessed with order and developed obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).
“Some people only find their security by having their things very neat and clean. They need to see their great space, because maybe their childhood was not great. When order is no longer healthy, and creates unhappiness and disturbance, there is a problem,” he explained.
This line between normal and obsessive can be “very fine” in people with “a lot of insecurity or anxiety,” he pointed out, or who have had to live with “excessively strict patterns” during their childhood.
This psychologist, with a face-to-face consultation in Jerez de la Frontera (Cádiz) and also telematic attention, has stressed that OCD due to cleanliness and order is one of the pathologies that “generates greater suffering” in those who suffer from it.
“When a person feels more vulnerable at a certain moment, because they are lost, they do not have hobbies and they do not know what to do with their life, it is easier to fall into an obsessive disorder like this”, but, he pointed out, “there must be a certain predisposition ».
Thus, people who have lived alone for many years, with a tendency to be very orderly and strict, in the sense of not tolerating objects being moved around, are more likely to develop OCD.
External order to improve the brain
«Being tidy has more good things than being messy. Order is one of the habits that must be instilled from childhood so that the brain works better, both on a pragmatic and emotional level”, she stressed.
When you have a well-established external order, like children picking up their toys and tidying up their room, he explained, the brain is acquiring skills to manage internal order, which is “essential” to organize time, establish priorities and make decisions. .
A person is orderly or disorderly depending on the way in which these habits have been instilled in them and on their own characteristics, such as the culture in which they have grown up, this psychologist has qualified.
In the case of people who are “a little fussy” about cleanliness and order, there may be “triggers” that cause them to “cross that line” between normal and obsessive.
Among these circumstances, he has cited a duel for a death, a personal crisis, a sentimental separation or a situation that greatly affects the person and forces him to find something to “hold on to”.
“However, this change does not happen overnight. It is the same situation, in the opposite sphere, of the person who suffers from Diogenes syndrome and accumulates many belongings: his mind forges a pathology until it gets out of hand, “this expert has verified.
Berzosa has concluded that it is “essential” to be an orderly person, but one must be “aware” if this habit “takes away happiness when things are not arranged as one wants.” EFE