Beliefs and why they matter.

Beliefs and why they matter.

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What is a belief? Go on, see if you can formulate a definition in your mind about what a belief is (it’s harder than you think).

When a person suffers with symptoms of anxiety or depression, they often blame those symptoms on external factors such as other people, things that have happened to them, the past for the way that they feel.

However, the reality is that none of those things is responsible directly for the way that they are feeling at a particular moment.

Beliefs

One of the first things that I teach my clients is about the importance of beliefs.

Our beliefs are responsible for much more than we would ever give them credit for in terms of mental health, but in reality, they play a huge part!

So what is a belief? Did you manage to think of a definition? It’s tricky, isn’t it?

Well in the most simple of terms… a belief is something that has to be created and it has to be maintained. It is not fact.

Think about it. If you have a belief that dogs are scary for example, you were not born with that belief. Dogs being scary isn’t a fact, otherwise, everyone would be scared of dogs. That belief has to have come from somewhere and then it has to have been maintained to continue believing it.

Imagine it to be a bit like a bonfire. The bonfire has to be created and then you have to keep adding logs to keep it going. Beliefs are exactly the same.

If you stopped throwing logs on the fire, it would eventually fizzle out. If you stopped adding thoughts and evidence to beliefs, they would fizzle out too.

What have beliefs got to do with mental health?

Everything.

Your beliefs determine how you see the world around you. How you interpret events and situations. How you respond to people and life.

Your beliefs keep you locked into fears, worries, unhelpful behaviours.

There is a quote in psychology that says ‘There is no such thing as reality, only perception’. In other words, each and every one of us perceives one thing in many different ways.

Where one person may see a dog a feel terror, fear, sharp teeth, injury, danger. Another may see cuteness, fun, loyalty, cuddles and love. And others may see many other things in between.

What this tells us then is that the dog itself has nothing to do with how we are feeling. But it is our beliefs about dogs that make us interpret the dog in a certain way that then creates an emotional response.

The impact of beliefs

We have hundreds if not thousands of beliefs and they determine how we see the world, the people and things in it and ourselves.

Some of your beliefs will be helpful. Some of them not so much.

Your beliefs create a behaviour/response cycle. This means that it all starts with beliefs. You have to have a belief to create a thought. The thought then creates an emotion. The more emotion you feel, the more thoughts you have. The more thoughts you have, the bigger the belief becomes.

If you have a helpful, positive and empowering belief, this is a great cycle!

If you have an unhelpful belief, it will leave you feeling out of control, powerless and often, anxious.

Unhelpful beliefs become a problem when you start to look outside of yourself to explain how you feeling on the inside. When you blame outside factors for your feelings such as other people, the past, spiritual or paranormal forces etc.

The more of these external factors you believe impact you, the less control you have yourself.

Can beliefs be changed?

Of course!

You will have had many beliefs as a child that you do not have now. Santa? The Tooth fairy? The Easter Bunny?

These were not difficult beliefs to change. None are really if you are prepared to challenge them and accept that you might be wrong.

Our brains are amazing things, but they are also a bit lazy. They have so many things to do that they find ways to think quickly and make snap decisions so as not to use up too much energy. One of the ways that it does this is by never really questioning itself. It makes presumptions based on similar situations and other bits of data that it has stored.

The problem with that is that our brain assumes that it is right. It uses beliefs to process events and takes belief and perception as fact. It’s not.

We can change our beliefs by challenging our thoughts and questioning our beliefs. Thinking about something from someone else’s point of view that is different to yours. Questioning your thoughts when they are not helpful and asking if you have a helpful perception on something, or are you just jumping to conclusions?

Is that dog really scary? Or it is just sitting minding its own business or playing in the park? If it is coming near you, does that really mean danger? Or is it just after the ball or playing with its owner?

Perspective is everything

Checking that your perspective is helpful and in line with reality is one of the best skills you can learn when it comes to overcoming anxiety. It is not a skill that you can develop overnight, after all, you are probably really good at seeing the negatives, but it is a habit that can be learned with some persistence.

If you or someone you know needs to change unhelpful beliefs and want to overcome anxiety for good, please get in touch to find out how I can help.

info@anxietyspecialist.org

www.anxietyspecialist.org

07730 465855