Noticing the Stars

Sometimes it feels like everything is going wrong and we can’t do anything right. We might find ourselves focusing on shortcomings within ourselves or others, thinking about the things we or others should or shouldn’t have done and feeling like things will never change. It can feel really difficult to see anything beyond this never ending spiral.

We all carry with us beliefs about ourselves (who we are as people, what we can and can’t do etc), beliefs about others (what we can expect from others, how other people will treat us etc) and the future (what we believe the future will hold for us). Sometimes these beliefs are helpful to us and improve our wellbeing, sometimes they are less helpful. If the less helpful beliefs are very strong, rigid or inflexible we can find ourselves stuck in vicious cycles of unhelpful thinking.

We naturally notice information that fits with our beliefs. For example, if you believe “all trees are beautiful” you will mostly notice trees that do look beautiful and will be less likely to notice trees that may have issues like disease or decay.

There is other information out there though. Imagine this information is large letter shaped. This information is more helpful to you, it reminds you about the great feedback you got on that work project, or when that waitress complimented how well your child behaved or you really helped a friend. But this information doesn’t fit in the post box, to make it fit you have to fold and scrunch it up. To make it fit you tell yourself that you only got good feedback because you got lucky with this project, or they caught your children on a good day or you just did what anyone would do to help your friend. Now it is small letter shaped – it confirms you are no good, you are a failure and you can’t do anything right – it fits in the post box.

Then there are ginormous star shaped parcels containing information like consistently performing well at work, your children being happy, healthy and thriving, and having great friendships, however you ignore these completely as there is absolutely no way these ginormous star shaped parcels will fit in the postbox.

When we don’t ‘notice the stars’ and scrunch up the information in the large letters by discounting it, minimising it or telling ourselves it is an ‘exception to the rule’, we are feeding our unhelpful beliefs.

So what to do?

1. Name it when you notice this pattern of focusing on the unhelpful information or discounting information that challenges unhelpful beliefs.
2. Start to deliberately try to search for and find information that does not fit easily into the postbox – try to find the positives, alternative or ‘stars’.
3. You could try writing a list of positives about yourself or others, or keeping a diary of positive things you do or notice everyday.
4. Practice looking at the whole picture by taking notice of ALL the information available to you about any situation.

This may sound ‘easier said than done’, but with practice and patience it can really help us to get more used to picking up on the things we don’t normally pay attention to: information that can challenge unhelpful beliefs and lead to improved wellbeing.

If this is something you would like to explore further please contact us at Lantern Psychotherapy to find out how we can help.