The stories you tell yourself matter.
Humans like stories. We have been using stories to share experience, feelings, traditions, histories, and lessons for millennia. The gift of a brain with such a large portion dedicated to language allows us to create, share, and understand stories. Stories help us communicate, connect with, and understand one another. They also entertain us. We tell ourselves a lot of stories as well. We all have stories about ourselves, others, and the world around us. These stories greatly influence how we move and interact in the world. This is partially due to humans’ propensity for confirmation bias. What is confirmation bias you might ask? It’s a psychological idea that humans will favor and seek information that confirms what they believe to be true. This is one of the reasons we design scientific studies to test the null hypothesis (the opposite of what you think will happen), so researchers don’t set out to confirm what they think, because they will. Human’s are biased.
How does this relate to the stories we tell ourselves? Well, we will behave in ways that confirm the stories we have rather than giving the opportunity for a different experience. This can both serve us and cause challenges in our lives. For example, if you believe you can’t do something, you won’t try or you might try in a half hearted way leaving you to say to yourself, “see, I knew I couldn’t do it.” If you believe the world is full of kind generous people, you are more likely to engage in ways with others that encourage this kind of behavior or connect with those kinds of people, therefore confirming people are kind and generous. However, if you believe people will hurt you, you may subconsciously choose to be around people that hurt you or avoid healthy connections, confirming what you believe. In essence, we will naturally be drawn to behaving in ways that confirm the stories we tell ourselves. In our twisted human way, we want to be right, even if that means ultimately losing out on positive life experience. As we know, change is HARD and often time consuming. When you are trying to write a new story, it’s imperative you give yourself evidence to confirm the new story. It’s going to take a lot to convince you because you’re working against your confirmation bias, so just keep practicing. Write the new story down, share it with other people. Always remember, you are the author of your story.
Questions to ponder.
What’s one story you tell yourself that interferes with the life you want to live? How has your behavior confirmed this story?
What is the new story you want to tell yourself?
What can you do to create evidence to support this new story?
