LIMITING BELIEFS

You may have found in the previous topic on core story and beliefs and the corresponding exercises that, as well as uncovering positive core beliefs, you also discovered some negative ones. We call these negative core beliefs our limiting beliefs.

Limiting beliefs represent a skewed perception of the world, impacting your emotions and actions in a way that limits you. Like our other core beliefs, these limiting beliefs are like a lens through which we see life—they colour everything we see and can colour our opinions of things.

These distorted thought patterns tend to emerge, particularly in moments of psychological distress. During such instances, your attention can become selective, focusing solely on information that reinforces your limiting belief, a phenomenon known as confirmation bias. In essence, these limiting beliefs not only shape your worldview but also have a profound influence on your responses and choices, narrowing your perspective and potentially hindering your personal growth.

The first step in challenging these negative core beliefs is to identify which ones you hold, as you did in the last topic in the exercise on core beliefs. Once you have identified the limiting belief, you then have to challenge it.

Use the worksheet to challenge a limiting belief that you hold.

The trick to dealing with a limiting belief is to catch it when you are experiencing it. This can be difficult at first and comes with practice, being present, and reflecting on situations.

Automatic Thoughts

In specific situations, these limiting beliefs can influence your perception or understanding of that situation. They can drive automatic thoughts, also known as cognitive distortions, which can then affect your emotions and how you behave and often lead to a physiological response. These automatic thoughts, or cognitive distortions, are things like:

Do any of these automatic thoughts resonate with you? How do they affect you?

As with limiting beliefs, the first step is to identify the automatic thought. Once you have done this, you can start to identify alternative thoughts.

Use the worksheet to identify and challenge your automatic thoughts.

Limiting beliefs and automatic thoughts can undoubtedly have an impact on various aspects of your life, including your relationships. And your relationship can also trigger your limiting beliefs. It’s important, from both perspectives, to acknowledge these limiting beliefs and grasp their impact. Recognising the role of these beliefs is essential not only for personal growth but also for fostering healthier relationships that are not distorted by the influence of self-limiting thoughts.