Are you seeing straight?
July 2010: As children, many of us develop very damaging and distorted schemas. Schemas are the core beliefs we hold about ourselves and our world. They are constructed from the ideas given to us by parents, older siblings and authority figures such as teachers. I see many people of all ages, some even in their 70s, who are still plagued by the negative idea of themselves they acquired in childhood. It's as if they have spent their whole lives seeing everything through wrongly prescribed glasses. For example, poor parenting may have led them to see themselves as ‘unlovable’ and so have very little sense of self-worth and they continue to hold this view even as adults. Underneath these schemas, they can be also be holding onto a very great deal of sadness and even unexpressed anger.Schemas colour and distort our view of ourselves and the world and we respond to other people and events based on that distorting schema. The result is that we tend to have life experiences which re-confirm our distorted core beliefs – in other words, we keep repeating the same mistakes.
As children we can't always defend ourselves against the negative ideas others impose on us, but as adults, we can think and reason objectively – we can challenge and reject the maladaptive core beliefs we have acquired about ourselves. We can do this by using a range of techniques which enable us to examine our schemas in depth to see how powerful and distorted they are; we can explore the underlying feelings we have been repressing; and then we can build realistic and enabling new schemas so that we can avoid repeating past mistakes. The sooner we take off those distorting glasses the better.
Repetition is the keyJune 2010: Repetition is a key ingredient in hypnotherapy so every client who comes to me gets a free of charge CD at the second session. This enables them to continue taking on board positive suggestions, specially tailored for them, between sessions and, if they listen to it regularly, helps to speed the process of recovery. I know from clients' feedback that they really value these CDs and continue to use them as a top up long after treatment has ended. Listening to the CD is a great way of training yourself to use self-hypnosis so that you can put yourself into a relaxed state and give yourself positive suggestions whenever you need to -- a skill that comes in useful all through our lives.
Get Rid of Those ANTsMay 2010: We all know that the way we talk to others influences their attitude and behaviour towards us. Our internal dialogue works upon our own mind in the same way, only its influence is more pervasive, more insidious and more continuous. When we're anxious or depressed we tend to have an almost constant barrage of ANTs (automatic negative thoughts) streaming through our minds, thoughts such as "I'll never be any good", "Nobody likes me", "It's hopeless", "I'm a loser", "I'm not attractive enough", etc. etc. You only have to imagine saying those things to someone else, a child perhaps, and you see just how hostile and destructive this kind of self-talk is. Sometimes these thoughts are phrased as questions to ourselves such as "Why do I always goof up". By asking such questions we are implying answers like: "Because I am a bad person and deserve to be punished!" That's the kind of suggestion we're giving ourselves. The great thing is that these ANTs can be both challenged and stopped using cognitive-behavioural techniques. Just becoming mindful of our self-talk is the first important step to developing a healthy mindset and one of the first things I ask clients suffering from anxiety and low self-esteem to do is to keep a record of their ANTs. (You can do this yourself just by putting a tick in a notebook every time you catch yourself saying something negative to yourself and making a note of your most frequent ANTs.) Most clients are genuinely shocked at the frequency and hostility of their ANTs and it's not unusual for a client to say: "I can't believe I'm doing this to myself all the time." After they've learned a simple thought-stopping exercise, clients learn how to recognise any thinking errors they may be making. Then they're ready to begin challenging any persistent ANTs and to replace them with more positive and helpful thoughts. Together with ego-strengthening hypnosis in each session, these skills allow clients to develop a more positive mindset within a few weeks.
Unproductive Worrying
April 2010: A common symptom of anxiety is worrying obsessively about things outside our control or things which may never happen. This is known as 'unproductive' worrying and serves no useful purpose -- all it does is heighten our anxiety. How do you tell the difference between 'Productive' and 'Unproductive' worrying? Simple - if you can make a 'to do' list in response to the problem you're worrying about, then that's productive. If there's no 'to do' list you can make, then your worrying is unproductive so you might as well put the problem out of your mind. We all have to live with uncertainty in our daily lives. A simple example might be how we prepare for a long car journey: we can make a check list of things to do: check the tyres and the oil, fill the tank, make sure we have a map of the route to your destination, etc, etc. That's productive. What we can't do anything about is the unforeseen -- there's no point in worrying obsessively about, say, the fact that a lorry might jackknife in front of us -- there's no action we can take to prevent such an eventuality, it's outside our control, and so such worrying is unproductive. If you find you are engaging in lots of unproductive worrying, CBH can give you techniques to conquer this habit.
Are You Thinking Straight?
Jan 2010: When we're anxious or depressed, we're often not thinking straight and this distorts our view of ourselves and others. Once we recognise the kind of thinking errors we're engaging in we can begin to correct them. Check out the list below and see how many sound familiar.
1. All or Nothing Thinking: You see things in black and white categories. If your performance falls short of perfect you see yourself as a total failure.
2. Over-generalization: You see a single negative event as a never-ending pattern of defeat.
3. Mental Filter: You pick out a single negative detail and dwell on it exclusively so that your vision of reality becomes darkened, like a drop of ink that colours an entire glass of water.
4. Disqualifying the Positive: You reject positive experiences by insisting that ‘they don’t count’ for some reason or other. In this way you maintain a negative belief that is contradicted by your everyday experience.
5. Jumping to Conclusions: You make a negative interpretation even though there are no definite facts that convincingly support your conclusion.
a. Mind reading. You arbitrarily conclude that someone is reacting negatively to you, and you don’t bother to check this out.
b. The Fortune Teller error. You anticipate that things will turn out badly and you feel convinced that your prediction is an established fact.
6. Magnification (Catastrophising) or Minimization: You exaggerate the importance of things (such as your goof-up or someone else’s achievement), or you inappropriately shrink things until they appear tiny (your own desirable qualities or the other person’s imperfections). Also, you are assuming that the worst will happen without evidence.
7. Emotional Reasoning: You assume that your negative emotions necessarily reflect the way things really are: “I feel it, therefore it must be true.”
8. Should Statements: You try to motivate yourself with ‘shoulds’ and ‘shouldn’ts’. ‘Musts’ and ‘oughts’ are also offenders. The emotional consequence is guilt. When you direct should statements toward others, you feel anger, frustration and resentment.
9. Labelling and Mislabelling: Instead of describing your error, you attach a negative label to yourself. “I’m a loser”. When someone else’s behaviour rubs you the wrong way, you attach a negative label to them. “She’s a blankety blank.” You use language that is highly coloured and emotionally loaded and apply a ‘global’ label which fails to recognise the totality of the individual.
10. Personalization: Taking personal responsibility for things outside your control. Also falsely assuming that things which happen, or which are said or done by others, refer to you personally.
11. Blaming: Falsely assuming excessive or absolute responsibility or attributing excessive responsibility to others.
December 2009 TIPS FOR RELEASING STRESS
Paying attention to our breathing is a good way to relax and focus our thoughts.
The two simple exercises below should ease some of the immediate effects of stress - tense muscles, irregular breathing and poor concentration. Try them every day for a couple of weeks and any time you feel stressed and see if you notice a difference.
Relaxation Exercise 1: 7/11 Breathing
Sitting comfortable, begin to breathe gently, slowly and evenly and then begin the exercise:
1. Rest your hand on your belly button. Breathe in as you count to 7.
2. Breathe out slowly, relaxing your shoulders, face and body as you count to 11.
3. Breathe in slowly, let your hand move outwards with your stomach as you count to 7.
4. Breathe out slowly and let your hand and stomach move inwards as you count to 11.
5. Breathe like this for 5 more breaths, focusing on your hand and stomach as they rise and fell, relaxing more with each breath.
Notice the stretching sensation in your stomach as you breathe in. As you breathe out, notice the relaxation that follows. With practice you may find you can breathe more slowly. Practice this exercise regularly so it's easy to use any time you feel anxious. You can also use it in bed to help you sleep.
Relaxation Exercise 2 - Tension Release
When stressed, we carry tension in our muscles without noticing it. This exercise makes you aware of that tension so you can let it go.
Sit or lie down and make yourself comfortable. As you do this exercise, use the stomach breathing from Exercise 1.
1. As you breathe in, clench your right hand, notice the tension in your hand and arm. As you breathe out, release the tension, notice the difference.
2. As you breathe in, clench your left hand, notice the tension. As you breathe out, release the tension, notice the difference.
Notice how comfortably heavy your hands and arms feel when you let them relax.
3. As you breathe in, clench your thighs and buttocks, notice the tension. As you breathe out, release the tension, notice the difference.
4. As you breathe in, bend your feet up, notice the tension in your legs and feet. As you breathe out, release the tension, notice the difference.
5. As you breathe in, point your toes, notice the tension in your legs and feet. As you breathe out, release the tension, notice the difference.
Allow the relaxation to deepen. Notice the pleasurable sensation of heaviness in the legs.
6. As you breathe in, 'shrug' your shoulders to your ears, notice the tension in your shoulders and neck. As you breathe out, relax, notice the difference.
7. As you breathe in, lift your eyebrows, wrinkling your forehead, notice the tension. As you breathe out, relax, notice the difference.
8. As you breathe in, squeeze your eyes closed, notice the tension around your eyes. As you breathe out, relax, notice the difference.
9. As you breathe in, tense your jaw, notice the tension in your mouth and jaw. As you breathe out, notice how comfortable your whole face feels as you allow it to relax.
10. Continue to relax, breathing calmly, using comfortable stomach breathing.
