“Goblin mode”, the word of the year that you should know according to Oxford

How are you feeling these last few months? Are you accompanied by a mood that ranges from frustration to exhaustion? Do you sometimes feel an almost uncontrollable urge to scream, run away from everything, or get into some mischief? If it seems like these ideas perfectly describe your current reality, know that you are not the only one.

Every year the Oxford English Dictionary chooses the most popular word. That which, in some way, describes the new trends of today’s society. Now, in 2022, what this institution did is open the popular vote and allow the population to choose that term, that word or idea, with which they were most in tune.

93% of those who voted chose the concept goblin mode (goblin mode). It is possible that more than one person will feel some surprise and even bewilderment. Why this word? What’s special about it? The truth is that it is not new. It first appeared on Twitter in 2009, but it was this year, as we emerged from the pandemic, that it settled, little by little, in the collective unconscious.

We explain what it consists of, because it is very likely that you will identify yourself.

In recent months, we have been feeling a sense of overwhelm related to our social expectations.

Goblin modethe word that describes how you feel

There is an obvious fact and it is that which shows us how the pandemic has changed our lives. It may be that when we look in the mirror we hardly notice in our skin and expression these few years that have passed since we had to lock ourselves up. However, the variations, dents and reformulations are within us, in our psyche and even in our mental health.

Goblin mode describes a complex state of mind that combines satiety with a feeling of anguish, self-indulgence with the desire to escape from everything. It is as if a finicky elf awakened in a part of us that wants to send everything to hell, but at the same time cannot escape the haze of stress, overload and discouragement.

If we take a little look at the TikTok videos tagged with this term, we will discover a very graphic description of this idea. We will see many young people dancing as if no one was watching. There are many people who barely feel like getting out of bed, those who are sitting in strange positions and those who eat junk food as if there were no tomorrow.

This word hides a facet as dark as it is dangerous in the aspect of mental health. That elf is not always kind or fun, and if we let ourselves get carried away with it, it can become a malevolent entity.

The “elf” who wants to reveal himself from social norms

The Oxford English Dictionary defined the term in the media goblin mode as or a type of self-indulgent, lazy, careless behavior, typical of someone who rejects social norms or expectations. This definition describes a reality that many people currently experience as a result of everything that has happened in recent years.

Pandemic, uncertainty, economic and values ​​crises… There is an inherent satiety in part of the population. It is that which arises from the frustration of not being able to achieve one’s own vital objectives. Also, a type of perception associated with the artificiality that comes to us from social networks.

We have been anchored for a long time to those impossible canons of beauty, to ideas about success that border on the deceitful. These years of pandemic have made us reformulate our perception of those conditions that, until not long ago, enslaved us. He globin mode invites us to reveal ourselves to false and unsustainable lifestyles, opting for healthier ones.

This, without a doubt, is as positive as it is necessary.

The less friendly side of this term chosen as the word of the year

Experts warn that the term globin mode It is the reflection of the mental state of a part of the population. There are those who show a form of neglect that has as its background apathy and lack of energy to take control of one’s own life. It is that state in which everything does not matter to us and, little by little, we move more toward some anxiety or depression disorder..

We cannot ignore the fact that, as described in a study in collaboration with the University of Zaragoza and the University of New South Wales, the psychological problems resulting from the pandemic have only gotten worse. This can cause our inner elf to become, without us realizing it, into a somewhat malevolent goblin.

These are usually its manifestations:

The mode goblin convinces us that It is better to stay in bed, avoiding social connection.You go to bed and wake up in the same clothes. Little by little you lose the desire to get ready. You stop taking care of your diet and eat the first thing you find at home. And if it’s junk food, even better. Many of the goals you previously set for yourself are no longer important. Now you limit yourself to letting yourself be carried away by apathy, by that irritable state of mind, for that protesting elf who doesn’t care about everything.

Sometimes people are forced to transform and acquire new habits in stressful situations. The duende mode proposes us to reduce expectations and the idealized self.

Hug your elf in a healthy way and you will have an ally

We live in what many already define as a permacrisis. That is, we are trapped in a stratum in which one crisis adheres to another and then another. Many of us have activated the goblin mode almost as a coping mechanism in such a complex context. However, when it comes to embracing that inner elf, let’s try to do it in the best way possible.

Let us not become captives of laziness, procrastination and apathy that rusts everything and closes the windows to the world. Let’s better acquire that mischievous character of the elf who no longer wants to follow the expectations of others to assume his own. Let’s be naughty and say no to idealization, to the need to always show our best version through the most sophisticated of filters.

Let’s opt for the authenticity of who shows himself as he is, for those who accept reality without the need for sweeteners. We’ve been through enough events to stay in Disney mode. Goblin mode can be more suitable if we use it well.

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