Exercise 6: Unwanted Beliefs
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Unwanted Beliefs
I didn’t have very many unwanted emotions this week and ended up writing down 10 beliefs. What might be more likely is that I just wasn’t tuned into some of the emotions. And that’s okay! That’s why I’m here: to practice! The majority of the emotions were anxiety and judgment (is that even an emotion?). My internship ended this week and I was moving so I often traced the feeling of anxiety back to a belief like, “stability makes for a happy life” or “having lots of stuff makes life harder.” I definitely believe the second one. I also agree with the first belief, but I’m sure there will be a time when I trace a different (or maybe the same) emotion back to a belief like, “too much stability makes life less fun/meaningful.”
Needless to say, it was very interesting and pretty fun to do this exercise. Now that I think about it, there were times when I recognized an emotion but couldn’t stop to write it down. I still thought about it and identified the belief I thought it was coming from. So, I guess I had more than 10 this week. Plus, I usually connected each emotion with more than one belief.
Sometimes, after connecting a belief to an emotion, I realized that the emotion was totally silly. But not in a dismissive way; I could look at the emotion and genuinely laugh it away. Then, I could choose my next action with much more clarity based on the true belief. I found this exercise to be the most liberating and helpful thus far. Paying attention to emotions and tracing them to a belief was practical and effective for improving my mood.
How did this exercise compare with writing my beliefs?
I liked this one more. Though I definitely benefited from starting with writing all the beliefs that came to mind. I think I’m getting better at figuring out what the underlying belief(s) is when I have judgments, make strategies, or feel emotions.
Was I able to separate my beliefs from the emotions they evoked?
I think so. Examining the beliefs made it easier to think objectively about whatever was going on. Rather than feeling an unwanted emotion and trying to out-think it or avoid it, I could dive a little deeper and let it go.Was I able to separate my beliefs from my identity?
Yes. I think writing them down separates them, at least in that moment. And the more moments I can do that, the more separated they will actually become. Intellectually, I know I am not defined by the crazy things going on in my head. I even know that some beliefs that pop-up don’t make sense or align with who I want to be. Yet they persist! I really do think continuing this practice will separate them more and lead to me feeling more free from these beliefs that don’t serve me.How did I feel while thinking about the beliefs and emotions?
It felt good! In a way, it’s embarrassing to write down some of the emotions I have throughout a day. But at the same time, it’s freeing. Once they were written I could see much more clearly why they were coming up. It was easier to have compassion for myself.How did that feeling change over the course of the exercise if it did?
It felt better and more natural. I feel like I improved in my ability to identify beliefs from emotions. By the end of the week I also became more comfortable examining my beliefs at face value, with less judgment. I’m coming to fully appreciate the depth and nuances of my psyche, understanding that thoughts, emotions, and beliefs don’t necessarily have anything to do with my true self.Did awareness of the belief make the emotions stronger? Weaker? Different?
I think the emotions typically got weaker. Maybe because I had something else to occupy my mind (figuring out the belief the emotion stemmed from) or maybe because I realized it was silly in the process. Sometimes the emotion would shift to be more positive because once I identified the belief, I could see that the opposite might actually be true (sadness and “my actions don’t matter” turned into motivation and “ living with integrity makes life valuable”). Only once or twice did the emotions get stronger. In these instances, it was because I felt the emotion and belief were important for me to think about more deeply.Where and how might I apply my experience in the rest of my life?
Maybe I need to think of a better answer to this question. I always say that I’d like to keep practicing it and thus apply it everywhere. If I can be more specific, it’d probably help me to actually keep applying it elsewhere. Though this exercise seems more manageable than some of the others. It seems easier to me to notice when I’m feeling an unwanted emotion than to notice random beliefs throughout the day.Honestly, I don’t know if I’m just in a good mood right now, or I have a skewed memory of the week, but I think this exercise helped me be more positive. I feel like I was able to calmly identify emotions, find their source, and either laugh at it or embrace it with true compassion, which enabled me to move on.
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Hayden,
“Rather than feeling an unwanted emotion and trying to out-think it or avoid it, I could dive a little deeper and let it go.” That is very cool. I love that you had fun with this!
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Thank you! 🙂
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I love your practice of embracing your beliefs with true compassion and moving on. Very powerful 🙂
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Leadership Step-by-Step
Unwanted Beliefs1. How did this compare with writing your beliefs
I have to first acknowledge again that I did not find a way to make it work to write things down as I was feeling them. I usually felt something in the middle of doing other things, in transit somewhere, in a group, etc, and stopping to write down what I was feeling didn’t feel like an option. I wrote them down later.
I didn’t feel much difference in this exercise and the last about recording feelings. I watched my feelings of judgement and of others and myself arise frequently as I had unwanted feelings. I think that being a therapist trained me to watch my own negative feelings scrupulously in relationship to others and it is a lifetime habit. I tried to recognize anything different that might arise in this particular exercise but I honestly can’t say that I saw my feelings differently.2. Were you able to separate your beliefs from the emotions they evoked.
The hotter the emotion, the more time it took me to get out of the emotion and articulate the belief underlying the emotion.
3. Were you able to separate your beliefs from your identity.
This is a lifetime process! One of my beliefs about what this life is about is continuously learning that I am not my ideas, my thoughts or my beliefs. I see it as the helix. I keep seeing/learning this in ever evolving levels of understanding.
4. How did you feel while thinking about the beliefs and emotions.
I sometimes felt like what Josh described feeling when he meditates; “I’m probably doing this wrong”. I thought of Josh’s example of believing that not locking your knees was the “right” way to stand as a child, but then thinking “that has a should in it”. So what is the belief behind that should? That standing with your knees locked will hurt you? So much of my processing time was trying to figure out if I was missing something. If the way I first expressed my belief had an implied should, I tried to examine what I thought the outcome would be if that should wasn’t met. I felt a little twisted around in a way that didn’t feel particularly enlightening.
5. How did that feeling change over the course of the exercise, if it did.
It really didn’t change.
6. Did awareness of the belief make the feelings stronger? Weaker? Different?
Yes. Examining the belief behind/underneath the feeling changed the feeling, sometimes to a different feeling and sometimes it diminished in intensity. I don’t think I had an experience of the emotion increasing in intensity.
7. Where and how might you apply your experience to the rest of your life.
The story that Josh shared in the chapter about his experience with his professor can also be described as “reframing” the experience he had with the professor or “changing the narrative” he used to explain the experience to himself. I think this is what this exercise helps us do. When we have negative emotions, creating other ways of looking at the disturbing events by looking at our beliefs can completely change how we experience what was originally experienced as distressful.
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I’m still struggling with removing the “shoulds” too
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Hi mom,
I had the same thought about the standing with your knees locked story LOL. Let’s ask Josh about it in class. -SEW
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Evelyn’s Beliefs that Led to Undesirable Emotions
-How did this exercise compare with writing your beliefs?
This one took me longer to get at any meaningful answers. Also, this one tended to reveal beliefs that revolved around the same topic whereas my answers for the first exercise were more diverse. Finally, the beliefs I worked through in this exercise tended to start with beliefs about myself, whereas beliefs about myself were infrequently identified in the first exercise.-Were you able to separate your beliefs from the emotions they provoked?
Yes. No problem. I’ll note, though, that I rarely identified a name for the undesirable emotion; there was a neuroceptive sense of “yuck,” and that’s what I went with.-Were you able to separate your beliefs from your identity?
Yes. I know who I am/ who I really am. I know how to recognize the beliefs that align with this truth and those that don’t. However, the belief cluster that I found most dense was definitely tied in with my ego’s most pressing insecurities.-How did you feel while thinking about the beliefs and emotions?
I felt: resistance, resignation, self-criticism, self-forgiveness, clarity, and empowerment.-How did that feeling change over the course of the exercise, if it did?
See: sequence of emotions listed above.-Did awareness of the belief make the emotions stronger? Weaker? Different?
Awareness of the cluster of ‘apex’ beliefs (for the sake of this exercise) made their power over my life weaker. Bring a thing into the light from the shadows and it’s much easier to recognize its true shape; once you recognize its true shape, you usually see that it’s much smaller and more feeble than it was when it was hiding in obscurity, which in turn makes it less powerful. I’ve been through this process before, but never by this route. It was neat-o.-Where and how might you apply your experience in the rest of your life?
I’m already changing the behaviors that revolve around the cluster beliefs I spent most time reflecting on this week. In other words, I can use this experience for self-improvement. I can also use the framework to help bring shadowy beliefs into the light: next time I’m feeling an unwanted emotion, one question I can ask myself is “what is the belief that led me here?”-
Very cool
Resistance, resignation, and self-criticism –> self-forgiveness, clarity, and empowerment
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Leadership Step by Step Exercise 6:
Beliefs:
Curiosity about my perspectives indicates that someone cares about me.
Being asked questions and follow up questions to observations I make and opinions I have means that others care enough about me to be curious about my perspectives.
Missing my commitments to myself feels bad. Being self-employed gives me more time freedom and requires more discipline.
I feel confident. Preparing for client meetings is a respect to both of our time.
Making a mistake on client paperwork discredits me.
Owning up to a mistake gives me credibility with my client.
Beating myself up does not help me move forward.
Home projects take me a long time.
Asking for help is hard.
Receiving help is also challenging.
I need help with my home projects.
Information is abundant, not always relevant nor useful.
Experience can help filter information.
My mom is afraid of being a burden.
My mom is clinging to her identity of being the helpful one in the family and constantly trying to give to me and others.
Fingerprinting for licensing is easier than I perceived it to be.
Procrastination sucks up bandwidth.
Crossing off long-standing to-dos feels so good.
Conquering procrastination is conquering oneself.
Helping clients to understand their finances who are not in a position to take action is valuable to promoting financial literacy.
Unpaid work is not the most efficient use of my time but is worthwhile.
Connecting with traditional advisors gives me a basis to compare and contrast our offerings to clients but is not the best use of my times since we are in direct competition for clients.
Platonic relationships between men and women are possible.
Developing friendships and connections across life stages and backgrounds is possible and requires respect for boundaries and curiosity.
Clear boundaries between men and women make relationships easy to navigate.Reflection:
How did this exercise compare with writing your beliefs? – I found them to be very similar. There were a mix of beliefs – tied to how I experienced an unwanted emotion as well as tied to how I desire to navigate the world. Consistent with my beliefs.Were you able to separate your beliefs from the emotions they evoked? Sometimes.
How did you feel while thinking about the beliefs and emotions? Very conflicted. For every belief I could see myself having the counter-belief. Thinking about the unwanted emotions, I found myself very keen on finding ways to find beliefs that could help me to not experience the undesired emotions.
How did that feeling change over the course of the exercise, if it did? – I feel neutral towards my feelings now that my beliefs are on paper and have some structure to my reflections.
Did awareness of the belief make the emotions stronger? Weaker? Different? – I think awareness of the belief helped to address and weaken my undesired emotions. A sort of reckoning, and a transition to observation from judgement.
Where and how might you apply your experience in the rest of your life? – I think self-awareness and curiosity are both components that are applicable in every other area of life. It’s meditative to document beliefs and revisit them. It gives more clarity on the internal narrative and allows one to evaluate if it’s consistent with who they want to be. Feels like someone gains more agency and empowerment through this process.
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Hi Olivia,
I relate to you on the point about counter-beliefs. Definitely feel the transition to observation and greater agency/empowerment, too!
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6- Beliefs that contribute to unwanted emotions
Preamble: I kept losing the thread of what I was supposed to do. Write beliefs that contribute to emotions you don’t like. It also implies in the subtitle of the chapter section that these beliefs will be unwanted but does that always hold true? Some of my beliefs I’m fine with but the unwanted emotion comes from me knowing that there isn’t alignment between what I say my belief is and my actions. Maybe it depends on how I write the belief? Quite a quandary.
1. I feel resentful and discouraged at work when there is insufficient airtime in meetings for me to present innovative ideas to problems that are being discussed.
Counter measure. Senior leaders don’t have much time to listen to ideas and blurting out a number of them to anyone dilutes the total impact. It is too much to focus on and maybe in these situations I’m taking up too much air that limits contributions from others. Instilled a practice of recording my ideas as I have them, hold them, a Watch for this and acknowledge the effort of those spoken of and speak to the teams effort as well. Make surnd limit myself to contributing only one idea that I think is the best towards the end of the conversation or meeting. That will make that one idea stand out more strongly. The other ideas can be held for later discussion.
This solution includes listening more deeply to the conversation and me talking less, to identify the real problem, not just the symptoms. My underlying belief is a good leader is one who values contribution, gives space for people to contribute their ideas and speaks last. So I shouldn’t get fussed if others speak first. Wait for my moment later on and be brilliant with the one thought or idea that is most insightful.2. I feel resentful and depleted that myself and the team aren’t recognized for the effort we’ve made to resolve tough issues or troublesome situations in the past , especially when the credit goes elsewhere.
Counter Measure: I follow up with the team to tell them that I understand and appreciate their effort and take action to recognize them to others. If it is a team situation, make sure I’m putting more focus on them rather than me. If it is myself and I’m feeling unappreciated, think about what I’ve accomplished and why I may be feeling that way. Was I holding true to my values?
3. I believed little to no action would be taken to address the negative work environment and leadership problem within a merged department we were in. This generated considerable frustration, anguish, cynicism, demotivation for me.
Counter Measure: I was stuck and feeling helpless and at my limits and the best way out to overcome my emotions was to start changing myself and began what has become a multi year reinvention of me through learning, discovery, coaching and practice. This journey has been quite uncomfortable at times but the drive to create a new identity has been stronger.
4. I believed in the past that giving leaders the same level of details about a problem and it’s solution as I would want was needed to get a decision and at time have been discouraged by the mediocre response to my work. Leaders have even less time than me and more issues coming at them. It was disrespectful of their time to think they should hear me out and did not acknowledge they were probably 10 steps ahead in their thinking.
Counter Measure: I was providing information at a tactical level and needed to shift to a strategic level about the bigger picture.
5. Sometimes I keep myself busy just to avoid facing what is really important to me and that creates internal conflict on what to cut out and the reality that life is short and I can’t do it all.
6. Often I feel like I’m tilting at windmills when I take action to create positive change and it doesn’t appear valued by the organization.
7. I’ve believed hard work alone is enough to get ahead and have been frustrated when I don’t and others do. This is an emerging realization that self-promotion is also needed, not something I’m accomplished at.
8. I’ve believed in perfection for most of my life but have realized it comes at the cost of progression. Grappling with that discord.
9. I believe I don’t spend enough time with family to justify my belief that it is important which is probably part of my feeling unsettled and unhappy at times.
10. Taking the time to plan a project for success is important and I get angry at myself when I don’t have one and impatient with others when they don’t.
11. The company reorganization and cost cutting initiative we are in will go bad for a lot of people in the short term but good in the long term for those who are open to new opportunities.
12. I believe I’m an effective leader of people who listens, responds and has the backs of employees at heart. But how good am I really? Every time I learn something new about leadership, I think there is less I know. It is very frustrating.
REFLECTION
1. How did this exercise compare with listing my beliefs?
Much tougher to think through. I keep getting tripped up on defining my belief that is causing the trouble.2. Was I able to separate my beliefs from the emotions created?
Yes I believe so in some cases but I’ve probably not gotten to the bottom of all of them. More work needed.3. Was I able to separate my beliefs from my identity?
Some beliefs I would say I want to be a part of my identity but I don’t think I am living up to them so I have two identities, the real one and the desired one.4. How did I feel while considering beliefs and emotions?
I’ve been challenging my mental models as part of my reinvention. It is empowering to connect what I’m feeling with why I’m feeling it. I can see how my mental models restrict my sight, hold me back from the bigger picture.5. How did the feeling change over through the exercise?
A lot of confusion6. Did awareness make the emotions stronger, weaker, different?
DIFFERENT: Facing the unwanted emotions and understanding where they come from feels good. Now I can do something about it.7. Where and how will I apply what I’ve learned in my life?
Challenging my own mental models makes me a better person in a multitude of ways, less judgement, more possibilities and opportunities fewer blind spots, increases my potential to make a difference.-
Hi Jim,
Thank you for your thoroughness in writing about this exercise (and all of them). I really liked reading your “counter measures.” Especially your first point about holding back from blurting out every idea, and instead writing them down and contributing one, “homerun” (as I interpreted it) idea. Not only to show your value but to allow others to show theirs first.
Thanks for always inspiring me to continue pursuing improvement in leadership.
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Exercise 6: Unwanted Beliefs
This week, the Leadership Step By Step exercise was to attempt to identify unwanted beliefs everytime you feel an emotion you don’t like.
This exercise felt distinctly different from the past two. Whereas when I was just trying to identify as many beliefs of mine or others felt like it was something I had to constantly remind myself to do, this challenge had a very specific trigger: feeling an emotion I don’t like. With a trigger, I found myself trying to identify not just beliefs when I feel disliked emotions, but I’d start thinking about other people’s beliefs and my own beliefs unrelated to the disliked emotion as well. I found myself going back and starting second pages for my “Write Your Beliefs” and “Write Others’ Beliefs” sections of my notebook. It could have just been that I’m improving at identifying beliefs, but having the trigger seemed to open the floodgates and I was able to find a lot more beliefs.
There were some new questions that arose from this challenge as well. Does a disliked emotion (sadness, anger, frustration, embarrassment, disappointment, etc.) always mean there’s an unwanted belief? Sometimes it felt like my anger/frustration/sadness was coming from a perfectly reasonable belief. For example, I may have felt frustrated and disappointed when someone was late to a meeting because I have a belief that being punctual is virtuous and respectful. This is a belief that I rather like and don’t feel is unwanted at all. Other times, it was very clear that my emotion was coming from a belief that I clearly would want to change, like when I felt frustrated that someone else wasn’t doing something the way I would do it, and I recognized that my way is not necessarily the “best” way.
Some of the beliefs I wrote also still felt a lot to me like judgments. Sometimes it felt uncomfortable to write beliefs, and I would feel a need to write a second sentence to try to justify it (“I know this isn’t true!!!” or “I reflected on this and recognized I was wrong later!!!”) as if I was afraid of my own judgment of my past self. I never wrote those second sentences, but sometimes there was a very strong urge to.
I was also surprised at how often the beliefs I was starting to discover felt like they were uncovering bits of who I am as a person. In general, I think we all think of ourselves as a kind of amorphous being that can’t really be defined by concrete, quantifiable measurements, but in some ways, this exercise started to feel like it was getting as close as you can to doing so. Writing many beliefs felt like they were very “core” to who I am as a person – fundamental, basic tenants that I live by to define my everyday self. Very often the beliefs were ones that I’ve never really thought deeply about or put down on paper, and were often beliefs that I take for granted or feel like are obvious and common to everyone. This made the exercise feel very much like an exercise in self-discovery and self-exploration.
Another interesting result of the exercise was that identifying beliefs made me a much “cooler” thinker when problems or conflicts arose. Having this trigger to identify the beliefs of myself and the person I was associating with gave me a way of taking a step back in the moment and thinking, rather than reacting emotionally. It gave me a brief moment to forget the emotion and analyze. This ended up making the emotion itself feel weaker and have less of a hold over me, and allowed me to handle the conflict with a much cooler head. This was one of my favorite results of the exercise. Depending on the situation, identifying the possible beliefs associated with a negative emotion might’ve helped me navigate the issue and come to a better solution than I would have ordinarily.
I can clearly see how this exercise is going to help in the future for leading myself and leading others. Trying to control your emotions is hard. But if you can identify their source, it becomes a much easier thing to do. If you can successfully identify your own beliefs and the beliefs of those around you with a high rate of accuracy, you’re far less likely to overreact, far more likely to think clearly, and will be far more likely to start with a problem, and turn it into a solution that is not just a solution, but also a better connection to and deeper understanding of a person in your life.
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Eugene,
I think I benefited similarly from the trigger. Really cool to see how this exercise impacted you. I got a lot from it, too. I used the “cool” thinking today while walking my dog — he kept trying to go in different directions and I started getting angry. Then I took a second to search for the root of this anger and realized it was a belief I didn’t like: “I deserve to always be in control” (or something like that). Almost immediately my anger dissipated and we enjoyed the rest of our walk in the woods 🙂
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