This blog is about the readers. I want to hear less of myself and more of you! So, I would like to pose a question for all of you to discuss.
What would you say is your most prominent irrational belief, and how does thinking that way affect you?
For those who aren’t sure, there are four types of irrational beliefs:
Demandingness – rigidly thinking that you, another person, or the world should be or behave a certain way (e.g., “My wife should understand my point of view!”)
Low Frustration Tolerance – thinking that you cannot tolerate or handle something (e.g., “I can’t stand this pain!”)
Awfulizing – making something worse than it is, such as saying that it is awful, or the worst thing in the world (e.g., “My life couldn’t be any worse!”)
Globalizing – rating an entire person, whether yourself or someone else, on a behavior or event (e.g., “My ex-husband is a no-good, completely rotten person!”)
To start the discussion, I most frequently catch myself saying that I won’t be able to handle some future event. Even after years of training and knowing that logically I will be able to stand it, my automatic thought is often that I won’t be able to. Consequently, I feel much more anxious about the future than necessary, and I end up thinking I am much more fragile than I really am.
Thankfully, I have practiced thinking rationally enough that I can challenge my irrational beliefs as soon as I become aware of them and feel less anxious fairly quickly. I have also noticed that the more I challenge my irrational thinking, the easier it becomes!
So, readers, what is the irrational belief that you tend to have, and how does it affect you?
And if nobody comments, I will be able to stand it.
Next Up: Candice Siu, Ph.D. on Rational Beliefs for Hockey Players
I guess it is
“Life/things should not be so hard”
I believe the most prominent belief is “People Rating”. Rating ourselves or others as “completely no good” because of something we/they did or didn’t do. People rating is often at the core of depression, hate and bigotry.
I’d say my most irrational belief is a combination of my demand//must for guarantee’s & certainty and my i-can’t-stand-itis if I don’t get that guarantee//certainty.
In my case, my anxiety is about a deadly illness killing me, despite the lack of evidence that I am at any realistic risk. But lack of realistic risk doesn’t mean NO risk. And since I’ve not uprooted my irrational beliefs, my irrational demands remain unmoved by notions like “no realist chance” and “no realistic risk”. And, as a result of my irrational beliefs and demands, I have disturbed emotions and which compel behavior I dislike.
On the upside, I’ve noticed quite rapid progress since I’ve completed three of Ellis’ books. I’ve got to continue reinforcing the points: (1) Just because I haven’t felt better in the past doesn’t mean I won’t feel better in the future! and (2) I’d prefer if my anxiety were greatly diminished now but it’s not true that I can’t stand it if my anxiety isn’t greatly diminished now. I can stand it! (3) I’d prefer a world where I have a guarantee of not dying from an illness but it’s not true that I can’t stand living in a world where I don’t have a guarantee of not dying from an illness. I can stand it! And damn it, I can not only stand it but enjoy myself!
Hi there,
I’ve used REBT for a few years now and I feel like I’m highly likely to be able to comfortably ward off depression and anxiety – or at least REBT has proven to be the best mechanism up until now. Choosing the most prominant type of irrational belief is tricky because before I was a truly rational thinker, demandingness, LFT, awefulising and globalising all came hand in hand – yes, I was a total screwball like many people are! These days, I guess the one I’d choose is my LFT (Low Frustration Tolerance) – all of the others are thoroughly engrained within, but LFT really requires effort to PMA (Push My Ass!) As an example, I recently got into guided mindfulness meditation that I would listen to through headphones (although not in a spiritual way), and as a result of this, I became a little ‘short-range hedonistic’ about it (a kind of meditation junkie!) So because I enjoy the level of relaxation it helps me to attain, I started to look forward to doing it and would get frustrated if ‘less significant’ things got in the way (a kind of meditation paradox!). However, these ‘less significant’ things turned out to be quite significant (such as helping to get my daughter ready for bed or preparing the tea), but I viewed them that way because I’d usually been at work all day and therefore unknowingly (at the time) demanded to myself that my relaxation time was far more important than household chores – not so! So after eventually realizing the extra stress that my selfish actions were causing my partner and that I/we would most likely get more out of this practise if I did it at a different time of day, I changed my schedule. I then reverted to using HFT (High Frustration Tolerance) to get through the daily (and fairly painless!) grind of chores knowing that I could have my guided meditation time at a more suitable part of the day. This worked and to top it all, I no longer require the guided audio and can meditate pretty much whenever I feel like it these days to varying degrees. I’d also like to point out that I use meditation as an addition to REBT, not as a way of avoiding potentially destructive thoughts – I find that it compliments REBT rather well.
In contrast to this, if I was basing the most prominent irrational belief on my observations of other people’s screwballish tendancies I would say that demandingness would top the list with ‘people must treat me well’ being the most destructive which then leads to the awefulizing ‘if I don’t get their approval then life would be unbearable.’
As Forest Gump famously said after rambling for ages: “That’s all I have to say about that!”
Regards
Jon
Demandingness. I have an irrational belief that I *must* make people (or people who I care about) laugh, in order to be liked by them. Obviously, this makes me anxious around people that I’d like approval from. I understand that questioning the belief helps, but what else can I tell myself in order to squash this irrational belief?
Hi there,
I used to struggle with this and for me it’s largely about letting go of what Ellis calls ‘The dire need for approval’. Like you say, you prefer to be liked (who doesn’t?), but when the negatives (anxiety) outweigh the positives (approval as the funny guy), it’s possibly time to let it go. Is humour really your only likeable characteristic? Perhaps you could dispute your ‘less important’ personality traits – try having conversations with people that you would prefer approval from, but make your main aim relaxation (but with a genuine interest in what they are saying) – instead of worrying about how you’re going to make someone laugh, the genuine interest you have in them will likely give you ‘cognitive distraction’ away from anxious thoughts.
You can also learn conversation techniques to become an expert facilitator – a good one is to start with open questions e.g. What do you do to relax these days? ……oh yeah, tell me more about that.
You might find that you are occasionally funny without having to try so much.
Regards,
Jon
LFT when it comes to dealing with anxiety-provoking matters, perhaps coupled with demandingness that the world must be fairer/easier to cope with.
It manifests through avoidance and procrastination when dealing with these matters.