Jan
22
Remove Habits of Psychological Pessimism
January 22, 2000 | Leave a Comment
Posted by: Kathleen Daniel
One thing that holds people back from achieving their full potential is a low, sometimes crippling, sense of self-worth. While the causes of low self-esteem are various and open to speculation, understanding its origin is sometimes less useful in overcoming it than is becoming aware of the specific habits of speech and thought that re-enforce it. One of these habits is an attitude of psychological pessimism.
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Based on an interesting series of studies conducted several years ago, psychological pessimists were identified by three attributions they would make whenever a “bad event” happened to them: internal, global and stable. For example, suppose you are a student who just failed an algebra exam. If you’re a psychological pessimist, you might say “its all my fault” (internal). I’m a bad student. I mess up everything I do (global). And I’m always going to be like this (stable).” It’s not just that you had a particularly heavy courseload, or that teacher wasn’t good, or that were coming down with the flu the day of the exam, it’s because you are a hopeless good for nothing who is never going to change. There is a pervasive sense that whatever you do, whoever you are, it’s not enough.
There is a difference between assigning blame to all sorts of things outside yourself and refusing to shoulder responsibility for every disappointing outcome. There is a story that the Dalai Lama was asked this question: what he would say to people who believed that when they got ill, it must have been caused by their being psychologically or spiritually wrong? He apparently had a great laugh, and then said he would tell them not to be so simple-minded. He said that you have to look at many factors. It’s always good to see how you might have contributed to the illness, but that doesn’t mean you should blame yourself, because in some cases there will be a contribution and in others there won’t.
Low self-esteem has a nasty way of throwing a wrench into otherwise rational thinking. Consciously becoming aware of, and identifying your thinking and speaking patterns, is the first step in shifting your self-perception, giving you a point of leverage to reformat your immediate and habitual responses.
fly the online ACTION: When you find yourself globalizing, take a moment to look at the occurrence as a single incident, and recall a time that you can be proud of. Instead of assigning blame, look at circumstances that may have impacted the outcome and ask yourself what you can do to have them operate in your favor in the future. And most of all, love yourself anyway. Imagine you as a child: what’s going to work best to improve your future outcome: berating your mistakes or assuring yourself that well, these things happen, there’s a learning curve to everything in life, and I’m doing just fine
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