Music. Music. Welcome back to Mr. Vista's Therapy Podcast. We're so glad that you're here with us today. We're continuing a series that we started regarding negative cognitions and beliefs. And today we're going to cover the second grouping, which is under responsibility, it's I did something wrong. And there are three beliefs that we're going to cover today.
So if you've been following along, you know that negative beliefs and negative cognitions are important because those are really the things that once an experience or a memory or a trauma happens, we begin to have these negative beliefs that then continue throughout our life. And any experience that we have after that really tags onto that and digs those negative beliefs deeper and deeper. And that's where EMDR comes in to help uproot those negative beliefs early on.
So let's jump in as we talk about these three negative beliefs. What are some trauma examples or experiences that they could come from, as well as how do they impact our current life. So the first one is I should have done something. Now, examples where this can come up from is if you witness some type of traumatic event where somebody was hurt, like a car accident or some type of violent crime, and you may have chosen not to intervene or you may have been unable to intervene.
Or another option is growing up in a house where there's domestic violence and the child can feel powerless but then still have a desire to try to stop the violence or or to protect the parent who's being attacked. And I think a lot of people who are struggling with the negative belief of I should have done something is they feel a heightened sense of responsibility over the outcome to everything.
So if you have this negative belief, what you find is this overinflated sense of responsibility over everything. And then a lot of times you're going to be interjecting yourself into situations where it's not actually good for you to be interjecting you into or you shouldn't be interjecting yourself into it. And again, it comes from this negative feeling of responsibility of if I would have done something, it could have been different.
And so then you're always looking out for what can I do to prevent another bad thing from happening. I got to make sure I'm always on alert. I'm always paying attention. But then there are definitely situations where it is better not to intervene, where it's better not to jump into that. And you actually inserting yourself into that situation can actually cause more harm than good.
I think one of the important things to remember is with a lot of these negative beliefs, they can make logical sense in your mind. Like you can convince yourself why logically that makes sense, but it's not rational. So when you look at the example of the domestic abuse, it makes logical sense why that child would feel like, oh, I should have done something. But when you think about it rationally, they're just a child.
They really don't have the physical ability to stop their siblings or their parent from being abused. But they still have this negative belief deep in them feeling like just having that guilt and inadequacy that continues to haunt them over time. And it is hard because hindsight is 20-20. There's a lot of things that we would have done differently. If only I could do it again, I would do it different. But you have to give yourself grace because we're doing the best that we can.
Really, this belief of I should have done something is a difficult one to swallow because you can't change the past. You can't go back and redo things. But you can use the information that you have and make different decisions for the future.
And this belief reminds me a lot, if you you look at the stages of grief, it reminds me a lot of the bargaining stage, where it's the if only I did this, or what if this was different, or I should have done this, where we're really going through a lot of the different what ifs and if onlys in situations, and we're grieving that. So the next belief is I did something wrong. And all three of the beliefs that we'll talk about out today are very similar at its core.
So this belief of I did something wrong could come from being blamed for negative outcomes despite having no control over the situation or very little control over the situation. An example of this is a child whose parents got divorced and they believe that they are somehow responsible for the family's breakdown. Or another example is survivors of sexual assault who are wrongly led to believe that their actions contributed to the abuse.
And there's some victim shaming that goes on. And so how this belief can impact your current life is it often manifests as low self-worth, persistent self-blame, which really does kind of pervade all aspects of their life. They can struggle with decision-making, feeling like their actions are always going to lead to these negative outcomes. And they have this all or nothing thinking.
And their relationships can be particularly affected because the person might continue to apologize and exhibit this like self-serving behavior. Thinking that they're always in the wrong. Now, I think looking at these two different beliefs, so I should have done something and I did something wrong. Now, I would say the biggest difference between these is one is you chose inaction, I should have done something, and you feel bad about this.
Now, I did something wrong is you chose action, but then the action didn't come out as you had hoped it would. Now, I think the interesting thing about human beings is we want to be able to kind of predict how things would come out.
And so if you chose an action, and then you got a bad outcome, you think, well if I would have chose action then I would have got something good or if you chose action and then you got something bad you're like man if I would have just not done something then it would have come out good but a lot of times that's not really the case there's a lot of different things that can happen but it's not always a if I would have done this instead I would
have got a better outcome you actually could have gotten a worse outcome hey I didn't do anything and I got a bad outcome but if I would have done something I could have got a worse outcome or hey I did this thing and I got a bad outcome but if you didn't do something you could have gotten an even worse outcome. And so it's really hard when your brain's trying to justify it. It's trying to find some sense of control over the environment by thinking that there is a good option out.
And don't get me wrong, a lot of times there are good options and there are ways out from the difficult scenario that we are in. But also sometimes there is no good solution. There is only bad outcomes and worse outcomes in some scenarios that you might end up finding yourself in. And the last one we're going to talk about is I should have known better.
So this oftentimes comes about from people who who have experience getting scammed or betrayed by other people, especially by somebody that they trust, like a caregiver, a close friend, or in a romantic relationship. Also, this can occur in professional contexts where someone falls victim to a fraudulent scheme or bad business practice, or even a boss who doesn't keep their promise.
And I think a lot of times this can develop because you have this thought in the back of your mind sometimes where it's like, ooh, I don't know, or you have a little sense of doubt, but then you kind of squash that down, especially in the idea of scams, where people play on your need or desire for something. And you get excited about the possibility of what could happen if what they're telling you is true.
But then it ends up not being true. And then now you're in a worse position than you were in the beginning. And like I said, a lot of times you have this feeling like, oh, I don't know, but then you get caught up in that possibility. And then you make the decision anyways. And so then that can make you extra upset where it's like, man, I feel like I knew better, or I should have known better.
Or a lot of times I'll see this, I'll be working with a client and they've been telling me about this person that they're interacting with. And through those interactions, I've been able to see the character of this other person is not good character. So then my client will tell me that they're doing something and it's a good thing. And I'll tell them like, hey, listen, you should expect to get a negative response from this person.
Or you should expect that you're going to get a negative behavior out of this person when you do this thing, even though it's a good thing.
And then they come back to me the next week and then they're shocked and surprised that this person actually did do this bad thing and they get frustrated annoyed they're like i should have known better and a part of it is again these are emotional belief systems and so this person wanted to believe better of this other person even in the face of facts that show that they shouldn't have believed this and so a lot of times we can hurt ourself
in this situation where it's we really do know better but then we don't allow ourselves to believe what the reality is and so then we get hurt by that. Yeah, I can see this a lot in relationships where there is cheating or an affair and there were red flags along the way, but they wanted so badly for this relationship to work out. So they kind of tucked away those red flags or overlooked them because they were hoping that it wasn't true.
Now, I do think sometimes people get blindsided also where they have zero idea that somebody has bad character and then it can cause them to feel like I should have known better. But sometimes you just don't have any red flags. You don't have any clues. And then somebody does something bad or you end up in a difficult situation. And that can also be a tough and nebulous place to get stuck in because it's not necessarily that you should have known better because there was no real indication.
Oh, for sure. And I think that's why a lot of these negative beliefs, even though they aren't true, if you begin to adopt them and and you begin to believe them, they will impact your life as if it is true, because it is true to you. And so even though people around you can say, no, there is no sign, or you talk to that little kid and you say, no, you shouldn't have known better.
You were a kid, you were trusting your parents that they would take care of you and trusting what they said, but still in your mind, you believe, oh, I should have known better. And that just kind of eats at you. And then this negative belief and this negative cognition can have that lasting impact on you, whether or not the statement is true. And some of the ways this negative belief I should have known better can impact your life and cause you to have a lot of self-doubt or paranoia.
And so if you're running around, I should have known better, you're going to think I shouldn't ever get got by something because I'm paying attention and I should know better and I'm going to watch out for it. But that paranoia and always looking out for those things, what's going to happen is you're going to end up reading into the intent of other people.
You're going to look at people's actions and you're going to interpret ill intent into things just so that you can try to protect yourself from getting hurt if they do end up doing something bad. And so a lot of times what it can do is it can prevent you from creating good connected relationships with people because you're very anxious and paranoid about what their intent is. It also can make you very uncomfortable or fearful about making decisions.
If I make a decision, it might go bad, and then I don't want it to go bad. I can't trust myself to make a good decision because the pain of making that mistake really triggers off that negative belief of, I should have known better. And then on top of a situation not going the way you hoped it would, then you have the extra feeling or sensation of guilt that's heaped on you by that negative belief system.
All right, you guys, that's all we have for today's episode, but join us next time as we go into the next category, which is safety and vulnerability. And that's where we'll start to talk about beliefs like I can't be trusted, I can't trust anyone, I can't protect myself or I'm in danger. And so that's all under safety and vulnerability. All right, you guys have a great day. And remember, your mind is a powerful thing. Music.