“Sometimes you’re your own worst enemy.”
Our minds can convince us of things that have no basis in reality. Through studying neuroscience, I’ve learned that our brains are hardwired for negativity. Should we find ourselves in life-or-death situations, this can be very helpful. But this negativity does not serve us in our relationships.
How can you stop this hardwired reflex? Well, you can’t. Your first response in a tense situation will always be to lean toward the negative response, but with practice, you can develop a secondary process of positivity, acceptance and gratitude—all things that serve us well in our romantic relationships. When we are in relationships and things aren’t going the way we’d like, the typical go-to response is negative. We either focus on the problem our partner is causing or we focus on our own shortcomings and how we are just not good enough to have a successful relationship. Both responses are examples of how our mind can hold us hostage with its negative leanings.
Add to that propensity the rules and expectations we have about relationships that we don’t always let our partner in on, and we have a disaster waiting to happen.
The first step to freeing your mind is to recognize when negativity presents itself. We get this clue from either our painful emotions of anxiety, sadness or anger, or it can also come from physical pain that doesn’t have a medical cause. These signals are early warning signs and if we attend to them productively early on, then we can free our minds. Ignoring those signs or using the emotions or pain to try to change our partner or the relationship will almost certainly keep our minds imprisoned.
The next step is to challenge the story in your head. You must first realize it’s just a story you’re telling yourself that may or may not be true. Realize you’re making it up with an instinctual bias toward negativity, so it’s likely the narrative is a painful one.
Once you experience that pain, ask yourself if you have any evidence for the veracity of the story. Chances are, you don’t, but in the rare event evidence exists, then investigate further. A simple example might be that you find your partner in the arms of another. This is evidence that your partner is in an embrace with another person. The story you tell yourself is probably that your partner is cheating, doesn’t love you any more or you are not good enough. The facts are that you saw your partner in an embrace with another person; the rest of the story you manufactured.
You can tell yourself a negative story or you can free your mind by telling yourself a better story. You are making it up anyway; why not create a narrative that serves you and helps you feel better? You have that power. Over time, you may discover evidence to support your original painful thought, or you will realize there was a neutral or even positive explanation for what you saw. Either way, the worst thing that happens is you spend some time in a more positive frame of mind.
When confronted with a painful reality you can’t change, to free your mind, you need to accept it. You can’t change it, so why waste time in the mental headspace of, “It’s not fair. I know they don’t mean it. This is wrong. It’s not supposed to be like this.” Accept it, decide how you will respond and move on.
The final mind-freeing technique is to develop a daily practice of gratitude. Your mind will offer you all the things that are wrong with your life, things you can no longer do and all the things you don’t have that you want. Consciously shift your thinking to all that is right in your life, the things you can do and the things you have. Before you know it, your mind will be free enough to begin with gratitude without you directing it to.
Free your mind of the negativity bias and see how not only your relationships, but also your life, will transform.
Kim Olver, LCPC, NCC, BCC is the author of the award-winning Choosing Me Now, Secrets of Happy Couples and the forthcoming title, Mental Freedom, which expands on the Free Your Mind concepts. She is a board certified relationship coach, helping people learn the skills to nurture and strengthen their relationships. She is the founder and president of Olver International (www.OlverInternational.com), formerly Coaching for Excellence and has a monthly Writers Group to help others write, publish and market their books.
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8 comments:
Kim, thanks for being our guest this weekend at Romancing The Genres. Great tips on turning the corner on negativity. The saying "Have an Attitude of Gratitude" has a core truth in it. I also believe that there is a "gift" in every life experience. We may not see it or find it hard to believe it in the moment of the challenge but we can see it afterwards if we look for it.
Do let people know about your books on relationship here in Comments. And to everyone else, do check out Kim's website www.OlverInternational.com to learn more about the programs she offers.
Thanks so much, Judith, for the opportunity. You wanted me to post about my books on relationships. I wrote Secrets of Happy Couples to help people in any stage of relationship--alone, getting together, compatibility, maintenance or the alone stage again with grief and loss. There is something for everyone interested in improving their relationship. Then I wrote Choosing Me Now to help people develop a better relationship with themselves. Both are nonfiction.
Kim:
Thanks for this. It helps a lot. Sometimes we need to take a break from our own mind. Joan Ramirez
Judith: Thanks for posting this.Joan
Interesting post, Kim. It's a good reminder that we develop a negative bias from a very early age as we learn how to survive in our world. We learn not to touch a hot stove because it burns, or not to run away from our parents because we can't find our way home. Perhaps because a negative, scary, hurtful experience is intense, our brains catalog that and build more connections to that so we don't forget.
It is a difficult task to learn how to put those experiences in perspective of a life of experiences. I think that today it may be even more difficult than it was in the past because of the ease of connecting with virtual strangers who weigh in on our abilities or lack thereof.
As a small example of negative expectation fulfillment, an author receives 30 great reviews of her book at the four and five star level, but the one she worries about is the one that was negative and two stars. The one that says her characters were boring, there were a lot of grammar errors, or she didn't describe the location well. That one negative review, in her mind, becomes the measurement of her effort and the other 30 good reviews are discarded as not meaningful. Even though she had a good editor, did a lot of research to get the details right, and had 30 other people love the book she takes this one review as "proof" of her writing not being up to snuff.
For some this is a motivator to do better. For others this is proof that they are posers or incapable of writing a good book. That can stop them from writing again. Unraveling that negative bias is complex enough. Unraveling negative bias in a relationship with others also experiencing difficulty with their own self-esteem is doubly so. But then that is what makes life interesting both in stories and real life. It is hard work.
I admire that you have written books on this. They are certainly needed today even more than ever before. We have far too many opportunities to get negativity reinforced through media and the opinions of millions of "friends" online. I see you are part of the The Glasser Institute, I assume that means that your books aren't just descriptions of ideation and process but actually provide step-by-step strategies and worksheets for retraining the mind toward positivity and gratitude instead of negativity and failure.
Hi Joan, you are absolutely correct! A break from our imprisoned, negative mind is an excellent thing to do.
Hi Maggie, thank you so much for your thoughtful response. Your example of the negative review is something most authors or speakers can relate to. Yes, as a counselor and member of the Glasser Institute, I like to think my books are filled with meaty material that will help people in real time, first build a loving relationship with self and then, learn to navigate the complexities of being in relationship with others.
Thank you for Guesting at Romancing the Genres, Kim. You explained negativity bias and some techniques for counteracting it clearly in this short post! I'm impressed. Can't wait to read your books!
Thank you so much, Sarah. I hope you like them.
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