Core Beliefs
I want to introduce you to a concept called Core Beliefs. This is such a critical part of your growth and healing process. You will understand more as we go along here.
We all have thoughts that we think about every day. These thoughts can be positive and uplifting, or negative and self-critical. I wish we all would only have those good thoughts, right? You know - those thoughts that make you feel good about yourself, excited about life, or loving and warm thoughts and people and things we love. I sure like those kinds of thoughts. But the truth is, many people who experience depression or anxiety have a real problem with negative, distorted, and critical thoughts. It can be so bad that these thoughts come to us automatically. These thoughts can be so awful, self-deprecating, so mean and hateful towards ourselves, that we identify with them as part of our personality. Negative and distorted thoughts can be the first thoughts that come into our mind in the morning, and the last thoughts that come into our mind at night before bed.
What makes these thoughts so powerful is that they are never vocalized. It's called an "inner dialogue." They live inside our heads, always reminding us how awful we are. Eventually, they help to form our "core beliefs" about ourselves, others, and the world around us.
Core beliefs are so strong, they try to define us: "I am stupid, I am a failure, I am not good enough, I am an idiot, I can never be successful." They are usually not true. But we sure believe they are true. And so we begin to see everything in our lives through this lens of our belief system. It's hard to talk us out of it.
Where do our core beliefs come from? There are many factors that contribute to these core and foundational ways in which we see ourselves:
Our Caregivers - This usually means that our parents contribute to these beliefs. While this is true, caregivers can also include extended family members, coaches, teachers, adn any other adult who has some responsibility or influence in your life in your growing up years.
Our Experiences - The experiences in life often help in creating our negative self-statements. One example could be interactions at work. Work colleagues, clients, customers - these groups of people sometimes provide very negative interactions with us. Think about the ways in which you were spoken to and managed by past employers and managers. Consider the past interactions with others - an angry or dificult customer or colleague, and others you might have encountered. Another example is our own efforts to do something important, complete a task, earn a degree, solve a problem, find a job, keeping a relationship going. These experiences, if they were negative, would have a direct impact on your beliefs about yourself.
The issue about how these beliefs are formed, is that people, interactions and experiences send a message to us - sometimes intentional, but many times simply be default. If your mom or dad worked all the time to pay the bills and put food ont eh table, he or she was likely doing this out of love for you. After all, what greater responsibility would a parent have than to make sure you have the proverbial “roof over your head and food to eat”? While that is true, the message you might perceive from their constant absence in your life is, “I am not important; I am not lovable; I am not worth people’s time.”
That message is incredibly powerful, and creates negative core beliefs.
So how can we deal with such negative thoughts about ourselves? There are three steps I use in cognitive therapy that will help you with this:
Identify your negative thoughts about yourself. This is the first step. Through counseling, i will help you to thoroughly examine past experiences and caregiver interactions. I will help you process past situations hich have been painful for you. It’s important to understand that most parents didi the best they could given their own background. The goal is notto demonize your parents, but to simply identify any negative thoughts you have been thinking as a result of being in their home.
Challenge these negative thoughts. I will help you through the process of gathering evidence that will support the notion that your are not what these negative messages communicated to you growing up. We will together talk through these positive situations and evidence about who you are. I will help you to see the great disparity between what you heard growing up, and who you truly are.
Restructure these negative thoughts into positive and accurate self-statements. Together we will form a positive self-talk narrative that truly describes your unique personhood.
You need to know that core beliefs can change! They can be challenged. Through this process, I want to help you identify those lies, those false beliefs about yourself that you've been telling yourself forever. I want to help you identify the false evidence that allegedly supports your negative and distorted belief system. Then once this is completed, I can help you replace distorted thinking with true and accurate thoughts.
I will provide some reading for you to help along the way if you like. Let me know what you think about this…
