How do you challenge inaccurate beliefs about yourself?
I think we can agree that Childhood is all about learning. So it is natural that the things we learn when we are young, tend to stick with us into adulthood. It makes sense that we inherit a lot of our beliefs from our parents. We spend so much time with them and they are such an important part of our lives, it's natural that we learn and adopt many of their beliefs.
But I've learnt that part of becoming an adult is re-examining those beliefs and deciding for yourself what you believe to be true. Sometimes those beliefs are so deep seated, we really have to challenge them. Particularly if they are harmful to us.
Do you have any harmful beliefs from your childhood that you had to challenge later in life? How did you do that?
The other day I realised that I believe that I am an inconvenience to others. This impacts my day to day living because I try to minimise the amount of inconvenience I cause others. I can see that the actions of only one person in my childhood led to that belief. One against all the others. That is a lot of bias. I am subconsciously attaching a lot of weight and importance to what that one person said and did. And it's beginning to look like that isn't wise. I'm putting a lot of time and energy trying to avoid something that might not be even true.
This is quite hard to realise. I feel quite a fool to discover how much this has lived in my brain. How much it does still live in my brain. I'm quite angry at the person who put it there, whether it was unintentional by them or not.
I think it is time for this belief to take a hike. But how do I go about doing that? What have you found works?
I shall start with one I've learnt about: say a positive affirmative to counter it.
In this case, maybe, I am a good person. I'm kind, caring and considerate of others.
@Clio9876 Hi there! 👋
As random as it may sound, I relocated to Thailand for around 4 and half years, but now back in the UK. While I was living & working out there, I did a little sightseeing of the Buddha temples. One which always stays with me, was in Buriram. A monk spoke English and was asking me questions. He asked me if I’d like to light an incense stick which apparently was to help clear your mind of any negativity thoughts, or negativity in general (since then I’ve lit one every Monday, to hopefully start each week as fresh).
Afterwards, the monk said to me “most of our life we live in our own head. So make it a nice place”.
This is probably not the answer you were looking for, but the moral of the story is:
Don’t worry. Be happy 🙂
@Dayley
I love your story. And I love your idea! Lighting an incense stick as a little, simple reminder each week to banish the negative and seek the positive, is a great idea. I'm not a big fan of incense, but I will definitely think about what small thing I could do weekly to create a moment to remember and start the way I want to go on.
I wish you happiness too.