Tag: Beliefs

What is shaping our Journey in Life?

When you think about it, the life journey could be considered to be derived from decisions made, by yourself and by others. Working from the premise that in life there are no ‘good or bad’ decisions, just consequences, it is those consequences that helped to create the person you are today. This BLOG then is written to help you make better informed decisions, through the use of various models and insights.
It took me a long time to arrive at the perspective above. I think I was in my early / mid forties.

Holding this belief has really helped me see that I would not be the person I am today if I had not had ‘my’ experiences and ‘my’ learnings. As I said earlier we each map the world according to our beliefs and the decisions we make are tied into what we believe.
The beliefs come from our experience and conditioning in life and we begin forming them at a very early age. Transactional Analysis (TA) tells us that, between birth (and maybe before)  and three months old, (before we have developed language), we are sensing the world around us and building ‘scripts’ to deal with it, (for example, whether we feel safe or not). These ‘scripts’ are laid down within each of us and basically we spend the rest of our lives living them out, (see my previous entry around The Drowning Man). However, they are in fact, thought patterns and can be changed by choosing to do so, (not easy but possible).

We also get conditioned (learn beliefs) through all sorts of other  influences, (parents, siblings, friends, peers, school, teachers, books, television, newspapers, what we learn works or does not work, what is good, what is bad, what gets attention etc).

We create beliefs about ourselves and others, what we can and cannot do, if you like, our self-esteem is built within our belief system
Our belief map / system is a fundamental part of us and since we are pattern making beings, as I said earlier, our beliefs are laid down as patterns of thought within our brain.

What I have learned is, if they are patterns of thought held in the brain then I can change them. Not all of them of course, because a lot of them are useful and help me run my life. Some of them though limit me and when I catch myself with a belief that is holding me back, I ask “Where did I learn this? Who taught me I cannot do this? What experience have I had that says this is impossible for me? How do I know I cannot do this? If I really want to do this, what new belief do I need to hold about myself (or the world, or others, or something else?) If I were to hold that belief, how would that sit within my belief system? Do I need to modify it in some way? I will cover this in more detail.

Remember also, fundamental is the belief we all hold of, I am right! So whether you believe you can or you cannot, you are right!

  • What beliefs do you hold presently about yourself, in terms of what you can and cannot do?
  • When did you learn them? (At what age?)
  • Who from?
  • Write down the unhelpful ones and look at them written / out there
    • Choose one to focus on
    • What triggers it?
    • Think about what you might believe instead?
      • Begin learning to perceive through this ‘new’ belief (lens), what do you notice?

And now you can be right about this new belief 🙂

Beliefs we may learn early in Life

In the journey to becoming you, a major influence is the beliefs we form early in life.

For example, a belief held by many people that holds them back in life is “I’m not good enough”. Think about beliefs you learned as a child. See the information below

When did you learn these  / beliefs / lenses?

How old were you?

The following is a synopsis from Transactional Analysis (TA) on childhood scripts known as injunctions and drivers

Figure 1 The Drowning Man

See detail http://www.activatetherapy.co.uk/single-post/2017/05/01/On-being-a-lifeguard

TA identifies twelve key injunctions which people commonly build into their scripts. These are injunctions in the sense of being powerful “I can’t/mustn’t …” messages that embed into a child’s belief and life-script:
• Don’t be (don’t exist)
• Don’t be who you are (Don’t Be You)
• Don’t be a child
• Don’t grow up
• Don’t make it in your life (Don’t Succeed)
• Don’t do anything!
• Don’t be important
• Don’t belong
• Don’t be close
• Don’t be well (don’t be sane!)
• Don’t think
• Don’t feel.

In addition, there is the so-called episcript:
“You should (or deserve to) have this happen in your life, so it doesn’t have to happen to me.” (Magical thinking on the part of the parent(s).)

Against these, a child is often told other things he or she must do. There is debate as to whether there are five or six of these ‘drivers‘:
• Please me/others!
• Be perfect!
• Be Strong!
• Try Hard!
• Hurry Up!
• Be Careful! (is in dispute)
Thus in creating his script, a child will often attempt to juggle these, example: “It’s okay for me to go on living (ignore don’t exist) so long as I try hard”.
This explains why some change is inordinately difficult. To continue the above example: When a person stops trying hard and relaxes to be with his family, the injunction You don’t have the right to exist which was being suppressed by their script now becomes exposed and a vivid threat. Such an individual may feel a massive psychological pressure which he himself doesn’t understand, to return to trying hard, in order to feel safe and justified (in a childlike way) in existing.
Driver behaviour is also detectable at a very small scale, for instance in instinctive responses to certain situations where driver behaviour is played out over five to twenty seconds.
Broadly speaking, scripts can fall into Tragic, Heroic or Banal (or Non-Winner) varieties, depending on their rules.

Now think about this:-

What might you have ‘Learned’ as a child, that maybe holding you back today?

What if you could change the belief? Create a new lens to look at reality, what would that belief be?

What do you now have to learn?

Remember when you hold a belief about something, you are right! And you have evidence to back it up.

The beliefs talked about above are not easy to change, just begin by noticing when they ‘Kick in’.

Perhaps practice  changing a less deeply seated belief and notice what thinking comes up when you do

E.g. I can’t walk into a room of  ‘friendly’ strangers and talk to someone

Change the belief and you will be right about the new way! and build evidence to back that up.

#feelthefearanddoitanyway.  I will come back to this Hashtag

 

Beliefs & Evidence

An interesting thought, once you form a belief about something, you will always find evidence to back it up, otherwise it would be stupid to be holding the belief. (A caveat here is  the world of science, where discipline and conditioning says, that you start with the evidence and then work from that to build support for a hypothesis).

For most of us though, we develop ways of looking at evidence so that our belief is preserved, we filter out what does not fit and filter in, if you like, more of what supports the belief (it is not seeing is believing, it is believing is seeing!) Remember my definition of a belief, as a lens through which we perceive reality 🙂

This insight is in my view, fundamental to becoming the real you. Beliefs that we currently hold  about ourselves, will need to change, on the journey to becoming the real you. 🙂

Let me give an example that may strike a chord. In school, in front of the class, the teacher says “you’re hopeless at maths, you’ll never be able to get this, will you?” Your reaction may be a polar response of, I’ll show her and you set your intent to become brilliant at maths actually, or you say to yourself, “she’s right I am useless” and then you begin gathering the evidence to prove it. Each time you get a wrong answer or low mark in an exam it’s just proving to you that you are right in your belief that you are rubbish at maths. You never really ‘see’ the fact that some of what you are doing is good!

Whether you believe you can or you can’t do something, you are right! Because, as I have said in a previous post, the biggest belief we all have is I am right! 🙂

What is the belief about yourself, that holds you back the most?

When did you ‘learn’ it?

How old were you?

What if you learned a belief now that really helped you ?

What would that be?