“ A man is but the product of his thoughts. What he thinks, he becomes”. — Mahatma Gandhi
A morning conversation intrigued me to do some reading about ‘Schemas’ — A mental structures that support deep negative beliefs. A schema is a cognitive framework or concept that helps organise and interpret information. Schemas can be useful because they allow us to take shortcuts in interpreting the vast amount of information that is available in our environment.
However, these mental frameworks also cause us to exclude pertinent information to focus instead only on things that confirm our pre-existing beliefs and ideas. Schemas can contribute to stereotypes and making it difficult to retain new information that does not conform to our established ideas about the world.
For example, a young child may first develop a schema for a horse. She knows that a horse is large, has hair, four legs and a tail. When the little girl encounter a cow for the first time, she might initially call it a horse. After all, it fits in with her schema for the characteristics of a horse; it is a large animal that has hair, four legs and a tail. Once she is told that this is a different animal called a cow, she will modify her existing schema for a horse and create a new schema for a cow. Through her new experiences, her existing schemas are modified and new information is learned. In childhood development, schemas are something that all people possess and continue to form and change throughout life.
Let’s look at some types of schemas that people often possess:
Object schemas — are focused on what an inanimate object is and how it works. For example a car. Our overall schema for a car might include subcategories for different types of automobiles such as MPV, sedan or sports cars.
Person schemas — are focused on specific individuals. For example, our schema for our friend might include information about her appearance, her behaviours, her personality and her preferences.
Social schemas — are focused on general knowledge about how people behave in certain social situations.
Self-schemas — are focused on our knowledge about ourselves. This can include both what you know about your current self as well as ideas about your idealised or future self.
Event schemas — are focused on patterns of behaviour that should be followed for certain events. This acts much like a script informing us of what we should do, how we should act, and hat we should say in particular situation.
The processes through which schemas are adjusted or changed are known as:
Assimilation — new information is incorporated into pre-existing schemas.
Accommodation — existing schemas might be altered or new schemas might be formed as a person learns new information and has new experiences.
Schemas tend to be easier to change during childhood and it can become increasingly rigid and difficult to modify as people grow older. Schemas will often persist even when people are presented with evidence that contradicts their beliefs. In many cases, some people will only begin to slowly change their schemas when inundated with a continual barrage of evidence pointing to the need to modify it.
Now again, schemas are like lines of code that run in your brain, giving you instructions for how to interpret things, feel about different events, and react. They influence your attention and absorption of knowledge. They also represent your core beliefs and values. They create feelings, thoughts and lead you to certain decisions and actions. That’s why schemas are extremely powerful structures.
Schemas are valid representations of early childhood experiences, and later serve as templates for processing and defining reactions to different situations.
When schemas are triggered in interaction with the environment, they generate automatic thoughts, intense feelings, strong effects and behavioural tendencies. When schemas are toxic or when they lead us in a negative direction, they are called maladaptive schemas.
Most people have difficulty in at least one or more schema areas, even if they don’t have psychological issues.
Maladaptive schemas cause us all quite a lot of problems. They negatively distort reality, lead to negative thinking, devastating feelings and ill acting, and they are also the foundation of stereotypes, prejudices and cognitive biases. If one has strong negative beliefs in oneself, others and life, constant relationship troubles, and durable self-defeating patters — understanding the maladaptive schemas and how they function can help a person a lot in developing a healthier approach to life.
Once a schema is formed, it is hard to change, because schemas are stored as experiences in the emotional part of the brain called amygdala.
The Modes — temporary states where schemas and coping mechanisms are triggered. This is where a set of schemas and coping mechanism become active. When we are in “a mode”, we act out of several schemas and coping mechanisms. It’s about a temporary mindset we act out of. A certain mode is always connected to a specific problem we encounter that serves as a trigger.
The most common triggers of modes are disturbing situations that bring back memories or stereotypes planted from early childhood. Sometimes these modes are also called emotional flashbacks.
A schema can be healed through hard work. That is usually through therapy. If a schema is not healed, it runs its course and dictates our automatic negative thoughts, feelings and behaviours, which is called schema perpetuation.
Logically, schema perpetuation is not the goal, however, schema healing is. You want to free yourself from toxic thinking, feeling and behaviour, with which maladaptive schemas imprison you. That can be achieved only by weakening the maladaptive schemas and coping styles, and building up the healthy part of a personality.
Schema Therapy (ST) was developed out of Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy (CBT) which terms this as ANTs (Automatic Negative Thoughts), which is said one of the most popular psychological therapies.
Now working with schemas is at a deeper level, where it has to be guided by therapist, however, are we able to work at it at a ‘outer’ level? Guess what? Yes you can. You can learn to get rid of negative thoughts.
80 percents of everyone’s thoughts contain some sort of negative content. So it’s normal to have negative thoughts. It’s part of our evolutionary heritage. The difficulty isn’t that we have negative thoughts. The problem comes when we believe our thoughts are true.
Now let’s us see this example, consider an article written in a tabloid magazine about the latest celebrity scandal. We read the article and we know it’s likely biased. It’s exaggerated, or taken out of context. We typically don’t believe every word in the article, or think we need to take some action as a result.
Now back to negative thoughts — The thoughts in our mind collectively make up these stories, and they often sound familiar to the tabloid articles. The problem is that we become “fused” with these stories — fused as in joined together as a whole. We don’t step back to get a better perspective. We don’t ask ourselves necessary questions about our thoughts such as :
Is this thought true?
is this thought important?
Is this thought helpful?
How do we defuse these thoughts?
Label your thoughts — Instead of saying “I’m a loser”, say “I’m having the thought that I’m a loser”. Instead of saying, “I’m going to blow this test”, say “I’m having the thought that I’m going to blow this test”. The difference maybe seem subtle, however, it can help you gain the perspective that you are not your thoughts.
Thank your mind — If you’re having anxious thoughts such as, “I hope this plane doesn’t crash..I hope the pilot knows what he’s doing..” say, “Thank you, mind. Thank you for trying to keep me safe. However, there is nothing that you really need to do right now. I’ve got it covered”. This is like a note to our mind, an appreciation of its efforts, however, also let it know it can take a break.
Let them float away — This one involves imagery. You put each negative thought on a leaf and imagine it floating down a steam. When you have another thought, as you will, you put it on another leaf and watch it float away.
Sing your thoughts — Try singing your thoughts to perhaps a Row, Row, Row Your Boat or ‘Frozen’ famous song, Let IT Go… :))
Say them in a funny voice. Trying saying your thoughts in a funny voice. Maybe do an imitation of a cartoon character. Now MASK Jim Carrey came into my mind :))
It takes a little practice to get the hang of “defusion” techniques, so don’t give up. Keep practising it daily. You will be able to feel the difference in your life.
“Watch your thoughts; they become words. Watch your words; they become actions. Watch your actions; they become habit. Watch your habits; they become character. Watch your character; it becomes your destiny”. — Lao Tzu
Peace and Love to all 💞
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