#neuro-semantics

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26 Ways To Get The Hell Over Your Fear Of Making Mistakes

I’m not going to lie to you: making mistakes still freaks me out. There’s something about getting things wrong that causes me to break out into a cold sweat. Even if I’m at home playing music by myself, just the thought “What if I get it wrong?” induces enough panic to throw my concentration out, leading to a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Does Making Mistakes Still Freak You Out Too?

It’s easy enough to see where this paranoia comes from. I grew up with a mother who criticised my father for almost everything that he said and did, and this led to arguments that I found very frightening. Most of those arguments were about who was right and who was wrong in the previous argument, so I learned from a very young age that it was extremely important to be right all the time if you wanted to avoid degrading humiliation and terrifying conflict.

Add to that a religion where you burned in hell for all eternity for being a flawed human being, if you didn’t accept the correct saviour. Even as a young child I knew that there were other religions from the one I was being indoctrinated with, so there were other possibilities to choose from. Being wrong about my choice of religion/saviour/deity had eternal unpleasant consequences.

And then there was an education system where your social status bequeathed by the teachers in the form of grades and your position in the class hierarchy depended on me giving the answers that they liked. Get too many things wrong, and I would find myself condemned to the class full of dead-heads.

This kind of thing can leave a lasting impact. I’m still upset about being marked wrong in 5th grade for answering that π equalled 3.1415926535897, rather than the “correct” answer of 22/7.

When I look at the beliefs that I internalised about making mistakes and getting things wrong, they pretty much boil down to these two:

If I make mistakes, people won’t love me

If I get anything wrong, I will be punished

I’ve long since abandoned much of the perfectionistic family, cultural and religious belief systems that I grew up with, so I no longer consciously believe that making mistakes is a terrible thing to be avoided at all costs. But just try telling that to my hyper-vigilant limbic system.

So lets see what happens when I run these beliefs through the 26 “Mind lines” from L. Michael Hall and Bobby G. Bodenhamer’s book Mind Lines: Lines For Changing Minds to see if I can neutralise them with a little neuro-semantic magic.

The book makes a distinction between External Behaviour and Internal State. In these two beliefs, the external behaviour is “make mistakes” and “get anything wrong”, while the Internal State is “people not loving me” and “being punished”.

Bring on 26 Ways To Get The Hell Over Your Fear Of Making Mistakes:

#1: Specificity: Chunking Down

Which people specifically are we talking about here? Perfectionistic control-freaks? They’re conditional love has strings attached. It’s toxic! You don’t want it anyway. Or strangers you’ll never meet? Who cares whether they love you or not? And what mistakes specifically are we talking about? Starting a sentence with the word “And”? Who gives a fuck. If people want to be that pedantic, let them go fuck themselves. You don’t need their love either. What specifically do you mean by “won’t love me”, anyway? Won’t send you Christmas cards? Won’t invite you to their lame parties? Won’t want to hang out with you? Would you really want to hang out with anyone who doesn’t want to hang out with you, anyway? Talk about awkward.

So what exactly do you mean by “get anything wrong”? Make mathematical errors? As if anyone is going to punish you for a mistake in your algebra now that you’re a grown-up. Get an accountant if you’re that worried about it. And how exactly do you expect to be punished? You don’t get sent to jail just for making mistakes, unless there’s some deliberate nefarious intent involved or extreme recklessness that goes way beyond anything you got in trouble for in primary school.

#2: Detailing the Strategy’s Sequence

You start out by doing your best at something, and nevertheless fuck it up. Then a whole brigade of loved ones, friends, associates, and strangers you’ve never met all race into your head and start screaming “You fucked it up!!!” Next, they all abandon you in search of someone who gets everything right, every time. Nice strategy. No wonder you worry so much about getting things wrong.

Let’s look at the punishment sequence:

Step 1: Make mistake (a.k.a. sin).

Step 2: Burn in hell for all eternity.

Yeah, that’s a belief system I’d like to buy into.

#3: Content Reframing: Reframe the External Behaviour by Redefining It

Perhaps there’s another way of looking at this whole “making mistakes” thing. Are you really ever making a mistake, or are you just learning how to be more successful next time? “Getting something wrong” could just be an exciting part of the adventure of life. Maybe other people react the way they do because they do love you, rather than because they don’t.

What you think of as “being punished” might just be other people’s way of celebrating your behaviour. If you make the mistake of committing a crime, perhaps the legal system just wants to reward you with 10 years in the company of other people who also enjoy committing crimes.

#4: Content Reframing: Reframe the Internal State by Redefining It

That unpleasant feeling that you get when you think that other people won’t love you might just be a helpful warning sign to get you to pay more attention so you’ll do a better job in future. Or maybe it’s not anxiety, but excitement: you’re excited about what a great job you can do. Perhaps it’s even fun to feel the edgy excitement of putting yourself out there and screwing everything up something royal, seeing as you’re such an adrenaline junkie. I mean, you must be given that you keep getting so anxious about things.

#5: Reflexive Reframing: Reflexively Apply External Behaviour to Self or Listener

Do you love other people when they make mistakes? Sometimes seeing someone make a mistake makes me warm to them because I’m witnessing their humanity. What I really hate about other people is when they refuse to acknowledge or show their vulnerability, weaknesses and mistakes. Mistakes and failures make other people more lovable to me.

Do other people deserve punishment when they do something wrong? Well that depends on how you want to see the world. If you want to see it as a harsh place where any misdeed is dealt with retributively, go right ahead… but excuse me if I choose not to participate in your self-created anti-nirvana. I’d rather live in a world filled with compassion and tolerance personally.

#6: Reflexive Reframing: Reflexively Apply Internal State to Self or Listener

Perhaps it’s possible to love other people more when I make mistakes, because I get to see that they’re just like me. Obviously other people make mistakes; I’ve been on the receiving end of plenty in my life. I make mistakes too. So really, we’re all just the same. I can feel the love already!

Punishing other people for my mistakes is a bit of a dickhead thing to do, but I’ve got to admit that I do it. I create these enemy images in my head of people who I think have “hurt me” by their cruel and callous actions. I think negative thoughts about them, and then try to punish them for the way I’m thinking. That doesn’t make a lot of sense, so I think I’ll quit doing that. If other people want to do it to me, that’s their own problem. I don’t need people like that in my life anyway. Let them try to “punish” me with abandonment; I’ll have the last laugh because they won’t be on my radar any more.

#7: Counter Example Framing

Ever had people love you even though you made a mistake? I think it’s called forgiveness, but don’t ask me because I’m not an expert at it. In fact, ever had people love you more because you made a mistake? I screwed up my routine at a stand-up comedy gig, and people told me afterwards that they loved that part the best. I always like it when other comedians mess up on-stage and I get to see their vulnerability. Mistakes are awesome for generating love and affinity between people!

You don’t always get punished for getting things wrong. Sometimes the universe rewards us for our mistakes. It’s a golden rule of theatrical improvisation that there is no wrong, and the bigger you can fuck it up, the better it generally goes. The rules that applied as a child in primary school generally operate the other way around as an adult in the real world.

#8: Positive Prior Intention Framing

Everybody loves you regardless of what you think of as your “mistakes”. The only reason they ever even bothered to point your flaws and weaknesses out to you in the past, was because they cared enough to let you know ways you could be even more awesome. The people who punished you in the past were just helpful Pavlovian behaviourists who wanted to condition you for even greater excellence in the future.

#9: Positive Prior Cause Framing

The reason some people don’t love you isn’t because you make mistakes sometimes; it’s because they just haven’t gotten to know you yet. They’ve very discriminating and just don’t want their love taken for granted. Other people want to be absolutely sure that when you do experience their love, that it feels real and meaningful to you.

Adults who punished you as a child were just preparing you for an exciting adulthood. They wanted to highlight the contrast between childhood, where you got punished for mistakes, and adulthood, where you get rewarded. They wanted you to feel the absolute joy of discovering for yourself that the more action you take as an adult, the more mistakes you make and the greater the rewards you receive in life.

#10: First Outcome Framing

What results are you likely to get if you hang onto the beliefs that mistakes mean that people won’t love you, and getting things wrong leads to punishment? Well, you won’t take many risks, and will live a small, unfulfilled “life of quiet desperation”. Is that really what you want?

#11: Outcome Of Outcome Framing

If you keep avoiding failure you’ll become totally risk-averse and miss out on all the excitement that life has to offer. All because you were too busy focusing on whether other people would love you or punish you for some arbitrary thing you’ve done that you’re choosing to call “wrong” or “mistaken”. I don’t see this leading to the life of my dreams; more like the life of your nightmares.

#12: Eternity Framing

Ultimately, if you persist in avoiding taking action out of fear of getting anything wrong, your whole world will implode into a gravitational black whole of suckiness. You’ll end up in a living hell for your sins.

Happy now?

#13: Model of the World Framing

What kind of fucked up inner world are you living in there anyway? One where people’s love and approval depends on whether we get everything right or not, and where any little mistake, no matter how minor, is met with cruel and unusual punishment. Yikes. The world you’ve created for yourself in your head isn’t one I’d want to live in. Get me out of here.

#14: Criteria and Values Framing

It’s not much fun to think that other people’s love depends on you being perfect, is it? Or that you’ll be punished for getting things wrong; unless we’re talking some kind of kinky business here. Nor is it consistent with the esteemed value of unconditional love. If you want to have fun in life, perhaps it’s time to forget about these limiting beliefs altogether.

#15: Allness or Universality Framing

Is it really true that all people won’t love you if you make any mistakes? I think not. Surely there are people out there who will love you regardless. Maybe even in your family, if you’d lighten up for long enough to give them a chance. And you haven’t always been punished for getting things wrong.

#16: Necessity Framing

Is this whole mistake/wrong/unloved/punishment thing really necessary?

I want to go play music now; it’s more fun.

#17: Identity Framing

Making mistakes and getting things wrong doesn’t really alter who you are. Whether other people love you or not doesn’t alter who you are either. Some people love you because of who you are, and others love you in spite of it. Your lovability isn’t dependent on whether other people choose to invest their emotional energy in you. You are not your behaviours, nor are you the outcome of your actions. You are who you are regardless of any mistakes you make.

#18: Framing All Other Abstractions

Reality does not dictate that mistakes make you unlovable; that’s just an idea you cooked up in your little brain… and this crazy idea is the big mistake. Other people’s response to you isn’t about you. They may withhold love, and they may punish sometimes. That’s about them, not you. I can’t emphasise enough just how silly it is to continue acting as-if you’ll be punished as an adult for getting things wrong. It’s an idea from the past that has no relevant in the present. It’s not real.

#19: Ecology Framing

Does believing that mistakes cause people not to love you, serve you well? Does thinking that you will be punished if you make mistakes make life a party? Do these irrational beliefs from your past create the best of all possible worlds for you to live in now? Are all these rhetorical questions starting to grate on you yet?

#20: Metaphoring Framing Or Storying Framing

Once upon a time, there was a little boy who got into trouble a lot for doing what he enjoyed. The people around him weren’t much fun and didn’t share his sense of humour. They wanted a nice, safe, quiet, boring life. For a long time, he did what they wanted because otherwise they withdrew their love or punished him severely. So he pretended to be the nice little boy he thought they wanted. Then he got very unhappy. In his desperation, he decided not to bother worrying what other people think any more, and to trust his creative instincts. This morning, he wrote this article so you can live in heaven instead of hell too.

#21: Both/And Framing

Sound the alarms! Turn on the sirens. I detect black-and-white thinking. Even if other people’s love did depend on whether you made mistakes or not, surely there’s a lot you could get away with before they’d withdraw their love completely. Getting little things wrong probably doesn’t attract any punishment at all; it’s not like we’re talking about killing someone here, or raping and pillaging.

There’s plenty of scope to live and have fun within the adult law, even when you get things wrong, without attracting any kind of punishment from the legal system. Push the boundaries and you’ll find that even there, the severity of the crime determines the severity of the punishment. Not that I’m suggesting becoming a career criminal; I’m just saying that there are degrees of “getting things wrong” and the punishment associated.

#22: Pseudo-Word Framing

Who came up with this idea of a “mistake” anyway? Maybe from time to time you behave in ways that don’t get you a result that you’d like, or that wind up giving you an experience you don’t enjoy so much. But is it really a “mistake”? It’s a made-up concept. There are no mistakes in life really, just learning opportunities. I might find this difficult to swallow when I’m in a lot of emotional pain over something turning out in a way that I didn’t like, such as a girl ditching me for another guy. But perhaps the only real “mistake” in life is to believe that there’s such a thing as a “mistake”.

And as for “getting something wrong”, that’s only a valid concept in the context of mathematics or formal logic. It doesn’t apply to the real world, where there are only actions and consequences; and the consequences often depend on many things outside our control. So you can hardly say you “got something wrong” just because you didn’t get the result that you would have liked.

#23: Negation Framing

I think you may have got the whole thing around backwards. People hate perfectionist robots. Making mistakes shows humanness and vulnerability. Showing vulnerability is the way to get people to love you. Getting things wrong shows humanness, that other people warm to and feel more safe around. Even my 5th cousin once removed Alan Turing’s “imitation game” required a computer to get things wrong sometimes in order to be considered having human intelligence. People will only truly love you if you make mistakes and get things wrong sometimes.

#24: Possibility and “As If” Framing

What would your life be like if you acted as-if these beliefs weren’t really true, and held no power over you any more? What would be possible if you not only thought that it was OK, but even advantageous to make mistakes, and that this would increase the amount of love in your life? How would you act if you believed that the only way to be rewarded in life was to take massive action and get as many things wrong as possible?

#25: Systemic and Probability Framing

Looking at the big picture, what’s the likelihood that you would lose all sense of love from other people even if you made mistakes constantly? Even if the belief was true, there is no chance that you could ever lose everyone’s love. Even the worst criminals have friends, and nobody can take away the love that you have for yourself; it’s always there, even if you can’t feel it.

Tackling the religious punishment-for-sins idea: Any God who condemned a person to eternal suffering for finite sins conducted in a limited lifetime would be unjust; and the bible says that God is loving and just. The notion of a loving God isn’t consistent with the idea of eternal punishment in hell; they couldn’t possibly exist in the same system. You don’t get eternal punishment for getting things wrong in this universe.

#26: Decision Framing

You get to decide what you believe and how you act. Who do you want to be? Someone who holds back from taking action because you’re worried that you might make mistakes (which you certainly will) and lacks love (which you certainly won’t). It’s your choice whether you judge yourself harshly and use labels like “getting something wrong”.

New Post has been published on https://grahamstoney.com/relationships/26-ways-chill-the-fuck-out-about-what-other-people-think

26 Ways To Chill The Fuck Out About What Other People Think

I used to get tremendously anxious about what other people thought of me. Hang on a second; used to? Who am I kidding? I’m still as neurotic as the next person. But I have been making some inroads into this particular phobia lately.

Do You Worry Too Much What Other People Think? Chill The Fuck Out!

It helps is knowing where it comes from, and it’s partly an evolutionary thing: we evolved in tribes where individuals specialised in what they were good at, because that gave the tribe an evolutionary advantage over individuals living every-Neanderthal-for-themselves. Our ancestors were interdependent, and that meant they needed to get along with each other. Since the cook couldn’t hunt and the hunter couldn’t cook, rejection by the tribe meant certain death; so we learned to worry about what other people think of us.

Or I could just blame my mother. She used to say “Who cares what other people think?” But the way she hid her feelings, and her intolerance to criticism left me thinking that unconsciously she worried about what other people thought of her a great deal. I probably learned this habit by osmosis.

Regardless of where it comes from, while consideration for others is a good think, worrying too much what they think is something I’ve overdone in the past. If I were to describe my fear of what other people think in terms of a limiting belief, it would be something like:

Other people’s thoughts can hurt me.

Sounds pretty crazy on the face of it, but try telling that to my hyper-vigilant nervous system.

With that in mind, I decided to run this irrational belief through the 26 thought reframing patterns from L. Michael Hall and Bobby G. Bodenhamer’s book Mind Lines: Lines For Changing Minds to see if I could neutralise it with a little neuro-semantic magic.

This gives me 26 Ways To Chill The Fuck Out About What Other People Think:

#1: Specificity: Chunking Down

Which other people are we talking about here? Some random dude in the street? A family member? My mother? They’re all individuals you know. That whole collective consciousness thing could just be made up. When did I buy into that new age bullshit about other people’s negative energies affecting me?

And which thoughts, in particular? They’re probably thinking more about what to have for lunch or how they’re going to get away with their last sexual indiscretion than they are about me, anyway.

#2: Detailing the Strategy’s Sequence

When I feel the impulse to do something that I want, I suddenly think “What will they think!” Then I freeze and get all anxious and panicky.

Well that’s a kick-arse strategy, isn’t it. How about I try just skipping a couple of links in the causal chain and quit pretending that just because I’ve played this game in the past, I’ve got to keep it up ad-infinitum.

#3: Content Reframing: Reframe the External Behaviour by Redefining It

How can I seriously give a fuck what other people are thinking inside their heads? If it’s anything like what’s going on in mine, the bullshit is flying thick and fast. I don’t even know what they’re thinking most of the time, and they generally don’t even bother to tell me. It’s just not that important. The people who do offer me an unsolicited free character assessment are just expressing their ill-informed point of view anyway. Who gives a fuck?

#4: Content Reframing: Reframe the Internal State by Redefining It

So I feel a little anxious when other people are around. I get socially anxious sometimes. Public speaking freaks me out. Big deal. It’s just a feeling. Maybe it’s even a good thing. Get over it. Move on man!

#5: Reflexive Reframing: Reflexively Apply External Behaviour to Self or Listener

Other people should be more worried about what I think of them. But it’s not as if my thoughts can actually hurt them, so why should their thoughts be able to hurt me?

#6: Reflexive Reframing: Reflexively Apply Internal State to Self or Listener

Hang on a second. I’m the alpha-dude here. I set the frame, and the person who sets the frame has the power in the interaction. If somebody’s going to get hurt here, it’s not going to be me.

#7: Counter Example Framing

I’ve met plenty of people who thought highly of me. What do you think I am, an idiot? Every day I meet other people who find me interesting enough to stop and give me the time of day. Remember the people at the presentation I gave yesterday? They loved what I said so much, they all wanted to hang out and talk afterwards. They told me they thought I was awesome. They’re right.

#8: Positive Prior Intention Framing

There’s always a positive intention behind other people’s thoughts about me, since we’re all searching for happiness. The way other people think just provides another perspective on how to get there. It just takes a little work to uncover sometimes when they don’t communicate clearly.

That woman at the beach who told me she thought I should be more careful with they way I spoke was just trying to help, really.

The bullies at school just wanted to help me identify my weaknesses so I could work on them more quickly, by pointing them out to me in front of everyone else, every single day of my school life.

#9: Positive Prior Cause Framing

Other people’s thoughts often contain a refreshing perspective on reality. Some people follow religions that have been invented in very recent history, even though they are obviously made up. Others believe in gods that almost certainly don’t exist. Some people reading this will think I’m having a go at them. Many of them will be right.

Some people think I’m awesome. Others think I suck. Some people think I’m awesome at one point in time, and then later decide that I suck; like ex-girlfriends. The degree of flexibility and diversity demonstrated by the range of different thoughts that other people have about me is an exciting testament to the richness of human imagination.

#10: First Outcome Framing

If I go around imagining that other people’s thoughts can hurt me, I’ll feel more inhibited and less free than I otherwise would. Which is sad because I never really know for sure what’s going on in someone else’s head. I could end up making myself miserable for no good reason at all!

#11: Outcome Of Outcome Framing

If I carry on acting as if other people think poorly of me, and that their thoughts can hurt me, and I go out every day with that kind of crap going on inside my head, I’ll probably end up acting all weird, causing people to think poorly of me.

#12: Eternity Framing

All right already! Say I walked around forever imagining that other people think negative, hurtful thoughts about me. I’d just end up a completely paranoid mental case. But that’s what you were thinking already, wasn’t it? Wasn’t it!?!

#13: Model of the World Framing

What kind of world would I be living in if everyone around me just thought negative hurtful thoughts about me? Even strangers who have never even met me! Beam me up Scotty, this planet sucks.

#14: Criteria and Values Framing

My core value is fun. Worrying about what other people think isn’t much fun. I’d rather be playing with them instead.

#15: Allness or Universality Framing

It’s not as if everyone thinks negative thoughts about me all the time. Only my inner critic does that, and I don’t always have to listen to it either. Even when people do think negative thoughts about me, they don’t necessarily have the desire or opportunity to hurt me.

What other people think of me never makes any fucking difference to my life whatsoever.

#16: Necessity Framing

Is it even necessary to think that other people’s thoughts can hurt me? I can survive just fine without continuing to think this way. It doesn’t add anything useful to my life.

#17: Identity Framing

What difference do other people’s thoughts about me make to who I am anyway? Nothing! They can think whatever the fuck they want, and I’ll still be the same me. In fact, if I were to ditch this belief, I’d probably be an even better, freer version of me. The fear that other people’s thoughts can hurt me is the only thing that restricts me, and even that doesn’t change who I am. It’s just a piece of useless thought-baggage I used to carry. I am who I am regardless of what other people think.

#18: Framing All Other Abstractions

The idea that other people’s thoughts can hurt me doesn’t reflect reality. It depicts a false dichotomy between myself and other people. It has a misplaced emphasis. It belongs to a different time zone in my life. I realise that it’s not real. Insert broadly generalised catch-all statement covering all the other reasons why other people’s thoughts can’t hurt me here.

#19: Ecology Framing

Does thinking that other people’s thoughts can hurt me make life a party? Not one that I’d want to go to! Fuck that. I’m heading next door where everyone’s dancing naked without a care in the world.

#20: Metaphoring Framing Or Storying Framing

Once upon a time, there was a little boy who worried too much about what other people thought.

Yeah well, that was a long time ago. I’m all grown up now, and it’s time to get over it.

#21: Both/And Framing

Maybe it’s not that other people’s thoughts either can or can’t hurt me. Perhaps there’s a grey area in the middle where I don’t know either way, but it JUST DOESN’T FUCKING MATTER. Ah… I always feel better after a good scream.

#22: Pseudo-Word Framing

What are thoughts anyway? Just electrical impulses surging through tiny synapses in a person’s brain. They aren’t even real, regardless of how often we tend to get sucked into believing them. You can’t pick up a thought and kick it down the road. If it’s not even really a thing, then how the heck could it possibly hurt me?

#23: Negation Framing

Maybe I’ve been wrong all my life, and had the whole idea around backwards: what if other people’s thoughts can only ever help me? They can never hurt me, because all they can ever do is teach me something… like what an asshole the mean thinker is.

#24: Possibility and “As If” Framing

What would it be like if other people’s thoughts just didn’t even factor into how I felt, what I did, or what happened to me?

#25: Systemic and Probability Framing

If I think of all the other people in the system called “the world”, they’re diverse individuals, all going about their own business. What’s the probability that they’re thinking anything about me at all, let alone anything negative that could possibly hurt me? The probability of them even giving a shit has to be a billion to one. If they want to think negative thoughts about me, they can jolly well go and get fucked. I don’t need them in my life. There are enough people in the world for me not to worry about the ones who enjoy thinking negative thoughts about me.

#26: Decision Framing

New Post has been published on https://grahamstoney.com/relationships/26-ways-to-chill-the-fuck-out-about-whether-other-people-like-you

26 Ways To Chill The Fuck Out About Whether Other People Like You

I grew up in an environment where everybody kept their feelings to themselves. I was a sensitive kid with very strong emotions that I didn’t know how to express constructively. The people around me didn’t seem to have emotions, because they never talked about them. Over time I developed a deep sense of shame about my feelings, and learned to suppress, suppress, suppress.

Are You Still Worrying About Whether Other People Like You?

At the same time, strong feelings of emotional abandonment as a child led me to become terrified of rejection. I didn’t know at the time that feelings are what build empathy and connection between people, and that the emotion-less communication strategies I had learned from the adult role models around me made the very thing I was most afraid of, rejection, more likely to happen to me.

As a young adult, I had panic attacks when strangers I met declined to talk with me. I developed a tremendous anxiety about what other people thought about me, and tried very hard to be perfect so that other people would like me. I thought that if I tried real hard to get people to like me, they’d be more likely to want to hang out with me.

All that did was make me even more self-conscious.

It turns out that none of these strategies work in the real world. Over time, with enough painful interactions with other people under my belt, I developed a paranoid default belief deep down in my unconscious mind:

Other people don’t like me.

Given that relationships have the most significant impact on our life satisfaction, this painful limiting belief is a real joy-killer. And it got buried not just consciously, but subconsciously, unconsciously, neurologically, limbically, and in every nerve cell of my body where it lurked waiting to rear its ugly head by getting triggered any time I encountered a potential rejection.

How do you overturn a painful belief that goes so deep?

I recently read the book Mind Lines: Lines For Changing Minds by L. Michael Hall and Bobby G. Bodenhamer, which offers 26 ways of neutralising painful limiting beliefs like this one via a neuro-semantic process known as “reframing”. Many of the patterns work by defusing the formula by which we create our distorted inner reality from our painful external experiences:

External Behaviour →/= Internal State

Whatever the fuck that means. I wish they’d explain themselves more clearly when they create some new pseudo-mathematical notation. I think it’s supposed to mean that external events don’t necessarily have to adversely affect our feelings. Somebody else behaving in a way that I used to interpret to mean that they didn’t like me, doesn’t necessarily have to make me feel bad.

So let’s see if this stuff works by applying the patterns from the book to the belief: “other people don’t like me”. This gives me 26 Ways To Chill The Fuck Out About Whether Other People Like Me:

#1: Specificity: Chunking Down

How specifically do people show that they don’t like me? Which people specifically don’t like me? At what specific times or places don’t they like me? How specifically do they show that they don’t like me? Could there ever be a case where it’s better for someone not to like me, such as if they are a psychopathic stalker who wants to unite us forever in the afterlife? So many questions!

#2: Detailing the Strategy’s Sequence

When somebody didn’t talk to me, I used to think “They don’t like me” and “They won’t want to spend time with me”. Because I value connection so highly, I then felt strong feelings of abandonment pain. My head gets tense and my heart started racing.

But there are several links in the sequence, and they don’t all have to follow automatically. How do I know that they don’t want to talk to me? How do I know for sure that there isn’t something else going on for them that just makes it impossible right now? Even if they didn’t like me, how can I be sure that they wouldn’t want to spend time with me? What about the times when I want some time to myself? Even if the physical signs happen unconsciously, I’m still creating them. Can’t I learn to reprogram my unconscious and change the sequence? If they don’t like me, would I want them to spend time with me anyway?

#3: Content Reframing: Reframe the External Behaviour by Redefining It

What other meaning could I give to someone not talking to me? Perhaps there are other reasons why someone might not talk to me or spend time with me than that they don’t like me. Maybe their schedule is already filled up with less important commitments that they are nonetheless bound to. Perhaps they really want to talk to me, but have messed up priorities. Or they are so intimidated by my attractiveness that they feel uncomfortable in my presence. Yes, I think that might be it.

#4: Content Reframing: Reframe the Internal State by Redefining It

What if the painful feelings, tension headache and racing heart was my intuition telling me that I wouldn’t enjoy spending time with them? I could dodge a bullet by listening to what my body is telling me and moving on quickly to someone who appreciates what I have to offer.

#5: Reflexive Reframing: Reflexively Apply External Behaviour to Self or Listener

Given that there have been circumstances where I didn’t talk to people who I liked for fear of rejection, perhaps many other people in the past haven’t talked to me because they were afraid I might not like them, even though they really liked me. What if other people hold the same limiting view of “rejection” that I used to have?

#6: Reflexive Reframing: Reflexively Apply Internal State to Self or Listener

Perhaps some people haven’t talked to me in the past because they were experiencing abandonment pain themselves, or they had a tension headache and a racing heart. That would make it hard for them to talk with me, even though they really liked me.

Alternatively, if we had spoken, maybe I would have found that I didn’t like them. In that case, not speaking to me has saved me time and the hassle of breaking off the interaction.

#7: Counter Example Framing

What about annoying people who I don’t enjoy talking to? If they don’t like me, I’ve just saved myself the unpleasant experience, inconvenience and potential guilt of dealing with them.

#8: Positive Prior Intention Framing

What if people who didn’t want to talk to me were simply trying to help me build greater resilience? Perhaps they wanted to challenge me to lift my game, or to be more authentic before they would lower their own defences. Maybe they knew I wouldn’t enjoy connecting with them because they were in a bad mood, and wanted to preserve my time and effort for someone else.

#9: Positive Prior Cause Framing

Perhaps something happened to the other person just before we met, that made it better for me if they didn’t talk to me. Maybe they had the flu and I wouldn’t have wanted to risk catching it anyway, or they were a terrorist suicide bomber recruiter with incredible powers of influence that they knew I would be unable to resist.

#10: First Outcome Framing

What result do I get when I think the thought “other people don’t like me”? Does it lead me to have the kind of relationships with other people that I desire? Do I really want to keep thinking that way?

#11: Outcome Of Outcome Framing

What will happen in the long term if I continue to hold onto the belief that other people don’t like me? Won’t it just continue to impair my ability to connect and have the relationships I desire?

#12: Eternity Framing

If I hold on forever to my victim-based belief that other people don’t like me, I’ll end up all alone. At the end of the day, is it really worth being so self-righteous about this?

Alternatively, what would be the ultimate outcome if I was to let go altogether of the belief that other people don’t like me?

#13: Model of the World Framing

I didn’t come up with the idea that other people didn’t like me all by myself. I had help from other people who have a similar paranoid model of the world. I grew up in a Christian church, and the early Christians were persecuted for their beliefs. They thought the world was against them and that people were evil and needed saving; and that attitude doesn’t tend to be a great rapport builder. No wonder other people didn’t like them! But I don’t need to hold onto this model of the world now that my beliefs about life are very different to when I was a child. It’s just not relevant or useful any more.

#14: Criteria and Values Framing

I value connection with other people tremendously. Yet I make it more difficult for them to connect with me when I start with the idea that they don’t, can’t, or won’t like me. This old approach isn’t aligned to my current values. It’s more important to me that I be able to connect with other people, than it is to be right about my old belief that other people don’t like me.

#15: Allness or Universality Framing

Is it really true that all other people don’t like me? There are obviously some people who like me. I meet more every day. Is it realistic or even desirable for all people to like me all the time under all circumstances? If everyone liked me and wanted to spend time with me all the time, how would I ever get time-out, the opportunity to create comedy, or to hang with the friends I like? It would be a disaster.

#16: Necessity Framing

What if someone could like me without necessarily talking to me? What if I could be happy regardless of whether people wanted to spend time with me or not? If I was truly comfortable in my own skin, would it even still be necessary for other people to like me?

#17: Identity Framing

How other people respond to me can’t possibly change who I am. Just because some people don’t like me, don’t talk to me, or don’t want to spend time with me doesn’t make me unlikeable or unlovable. How can someone else’s behaviour possibly make any difference to who I am?

#18: Framing All Other Abstractions

When I look at the bigger picture of what causes people to behave the way they do, there are so many other influences on them that could override whether they like me or not. The more I look at the big picture, the less sense it makes to conclude that other people don’t like me or that it really makes any difference to me whether they like me or not.

#19: Ecology Framing

Does it enhance my relationships to think the thought “other people don’t like me”? Does it make life a party? Well no, obviously.

#20: Metaphoring Framing Or Storying Framing

I met this really pretty girl at a party on Saturday night who clearly enjoyed talking with me. When I was walking back from the buffet looking for somewhere to sit, she gave me the nod to point out that there was a seat next to her. We spent much of the night together, laughing and having fun. She clearly liked me.

The Chinese girl I met at the beach last week keeps messaging me on Instagram. She was really cool and great fun to play guitar with. She obviously liked me.

I met a girl on Tinder recently who I found difficult to connect with. She spent much of our time together complaining about how hard it was to connect with guys, and how she was ready to give up. When she got up and walked off I thought “Well, I just dodged a bullet there”. I was relieved that she didn’t like me enough to want to see me again.

#21: Both/And Framing

Is it really true that people either like me or they don’t? I find that my feelings towards other people are rich and colourful, and they change over time and circumstance. It seems ridiculous to think that other people either do or don’t like me, as if they were the only two options available in the rich palette of human emotions.

#22: Pseudo-Word Framing

Is “not liking me” even really a thing? Surely it’s more accurate to say that other people have feelings towards me, and that those feelings are naturally going to vary at different points in time. Some people may feel more pleasant feelings towards me than others, and that may alter the way they behave towards me. The concept of someone “not liking me” is really just a pseudo-word label for something transient that isn’t even real.

#23: Negation Framing

The more I think about it, the less the concept of “not liking me” means anything at all. It’s a completely made up concept. I could just as easily negate or flip it to be wonderful. Now I love the idea of “other people not liking me”!

#24: Possibility and “As If” Framing

I’m starting to think that it’s possible to actually feel good about the idea of other people not liking me. It means I can play mischievous pranks and tell stories and jokes that are fun for everyone concerned, especially when some of the people involved don’t like me. It makes the joke better if the person doesn’t like me, because the emotional stakes are higher and that makes the comedy funnier for everyone else; including me.

#25: Systemic and Probability Framing

I’ve been assuming that “other people” somehow form a cohesive, co-operative set. But that’s clearly not true. It just doesn’t make sense for me to label the beliefs of other people collectively, because we aren’t all part of the same system. There are people who like me, and people who don’t; but they don’t form cohesive groups. It’s extremely unlikely that everyone in the world would ever decide to not like me.

#26: Decision Framing

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