Transcript
Rob Dial (0:00)
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Co-Host (2:06)
Welcome to today's episode of the Mindset Mentor Podcast. I'm your host, Rob Dial. Hope you're having an amazing day. If you have not yet done so, hit that subscribe button so you never miss another podcast episode. I put episodes four times a week every single week for the past almost 10 years. And so if you're ready to learn and grow and improve yourself and you want some short to the point, no BS podcasting to improve yourself, this is it. Hit that subscribe Button. Today we're going to be talking about how what you perceive in your life usually isn't 100% of the story, and how perception is not reality. And how you have these things called cognitive distortions that actually are a mental filter on your brain that actually change reality in front of you so that you see reality a specific way. I want you to understand that there is no such thing as your perception being full, 100% reality. If you look at it, subjective perception is subjective reality, not perception is reality. People say like, oh, perception is reality. No, no, no, no, no. Subjective perception is subjective reality. Your perception is not absolute reality. In fact, your perception usually isn't reality at all. Because like I said, your brain filters and distorts everything that comes in through your five senses. So all of these billions and millions of bits of information come in through your five senses. And then your brain has to make some sort of sense of it. It has to put things into boxes in labels and hopefully try to make as many things as possible fit into these boxes. And so what it does is it filters everything that goes through your senses, through conditionings, through the way you were raised, through millions and millions of experiences that you've had in your life. These little distortions in psychology are actually called cognitive distortions. Cognitive distortions are biased ways of thinking that reinforce thoughts, beliefs and emotions. And they're really common in many mental health conditions, such as depression, such as anxiety. But we all have them. They're not just in anxiety and depression. We all have them, even if you don't have any sort of mental health diagnosis at all. And so understanding your cognitive distortions is one of the most critical steps in improving your mental health and also creating better self awareness and overall a better life. Let's talk a little bit more about them real quick so I can really talk about how to fix them. What are cognitive distortions? Cognitive distortions are irrational, biased thoughts that perpetuate negative thinking patterns that you have. And so if you think, oh, the world's out to get me, you're going to see all of the ways in which the world is out to get you, or that all men are cheaters, you're going to see all of the ways that men are cheaters, or this type of person is bad, you're going to see all the ways where that type of person is bad. They're basically errors in your thinking that distort your perception of reality. And these distortions are basically automatic. They're unconscious most of the time. Usually if you know it's a person who doesn't work on themselves and they're not very self aware. They just don't even notice in the first place because they're so deeply ingrained. They often occur without us even being aware of them. They go unnoticed unless you pay more attention. And that's why I always say this, and this is really what they say in cognitive behavioral therapy, is to question the validity of your thoughts. When you have thoughts that are getting in the way of the life that you want to create, you've got to question to see is this actually valid. And that's where questioning the validity of your thoughts comes from, is because cognitive distortions will come in, change reality in front of you and you think that it's real reality. And then you've got to go, hold on, is this valid or is this just me? And so I'm going to give you a few different types of really, really common cognitive distortions. I think I got like six of them for you. Okay, Number one is one that's called all or nothing thinking. This is also known as black or white thinking. This distortion tends to see things in very absolute terms. For example, if I'm not perfect, I'm a total failure. That's all or nothing thinking. Or I didn't get an A on the test, so I must be stupid. I miss a deadline at work, now I'm never going to get a promotion. And maybe you're working on your fitness and you eat bad one meal, say, I'm never going to hit my fitness goals. And so it's like all or nothing. And if you think that way, it tends to derail you when you're trying to get better. If you think, okay, I eat bad one time, you know, maybe have 17 days of really good fitness and eating really healthy. And then you know, you have a little bit too much ice cream one night and you're like, I'm never going to hit my fitness goals. And you're focusing on this one moment where you ate a lot of ice cream and you're not even paying attention to the other 17 days where you did really well. And so you just give up. I'm never going to hit my fitness goals. You see how that's a distortion? It's distorting reality in front of you. So that's the first one is all or nothing thinking. The second one is overgeneralization. And this involves broad conclusions based off of a single event. It is very similar, not exactly the same thing as all or nothing thinking. For instance, I failed this test. So I'm going to fail all of my tests. Or I felt awkward at this party and I'm always awkward in social situations, or I failed this exam, so, you know, I'm going to fail all of my classes. And so what happens is we take one event and we just put a broad stroke over all of the rest of the events that are going to be happening in the future. That's overgeneralization. The third one is called negative mental filter, which is another way of calling it negativity bias is what it is. The distortion involves focusing solely on the negative aspects of a situation and then just ignoring all of the positive. So for an example, I made a mistake on my presentation, so the whole presentation was a disaster. Or, you know, you get a work review and it says, great job here, great job here, great job here. This needs improvement. Great job here, great job here. And then all of your focus goes to needs the improvement. Like, you don't pay attention to any of the great jobs. The one thing it's focused on is needs the improvement. Like, I remember when I first started putting content out online about nine years ago, I remember I had one video that did really well, and it was on Facebook and I had like a thousand positive comments and there was one negative comment. And like two hours later, I'm walking around my house and I'm ruminating and thinking about that one negative comment. I'm not paying attention to any of the thousand positive ones. I'm focusing on just the one negative one. You know, it's like you can have a. Maybe you go out to a party, you have a great time at a party. And I don't know if you've ever done this. I've done this many times. You say one thing a little bit weird, or you say something that might be just a little bit different. You don't get the reaction that you want to, and you go home and you dwell on that one negative, that one thing so negatively, and you think, oh, my God, everyone must think that I'm so awkward. I hope they didn't think that what I said meant xyz. And so you're focusing on just that one thing. And so that's the negative mental filter. The fourth one, which is very common, is discounting the positive. We do this a lot. People do this a lot. I see it all of the time with people is what you're basically doing is you're dismissing the positive experiences by insisting that they don't count. And the reason why is because they don't. Really line up with your filter of yourself and what you think of yourself. So you want to dismiss them. So an example of this, be like, I only did well on the assignment because it was easy. You know, I'm sure everybody did well on it. You know, you think you're gonna fail something, you get an A. And you're like, well, yeah, I only did that. I only got an A because it was easy, not because I'm smart, not because I did well. I'm sure everybody else did well. Or, you know, maybe you will go back to the presentation to work. You do a presentation at work and everyone's like, oh, great job, great job. And you're like, well, they only said great job because they feel bad for me. And maybe you. This one happens all the time. I see this one more common than any of the other ones. You get a compliment and you're like, oh, they're just being nice. They don't think I actually look good. Like so many people, it's really, really hard for them to take compliments from other people because it doesn't line up with what they actually think of themselves. And so they're like, oh, no, no, they're just being nice. They just. They don't actually think I look good. If you have trouble taking compliments, discounting the positive could be a cognitive distortion that you might have. The fifth one is labeling, and it evolves attaching a negative label to yourself or even to other people as well. So, for example, let's say you, you mess something up and so you're like, I'm such an idiot. Or you fail a math test and you say, I'm terrible at math. Or you screw something up at work and you're like, I'm terrible at my job. Or once again, you say something weird at a party and you're like, oh, I'm just so awkward. Or you lose your temper one day after having a hard day in front of your children, like, I'm a terrible parent. Or you sleep in one morning and you're like, I'm just lazy.