The Only Way To Change Your Reality Is To Understand How You Create It

Our thoughts largely condition our state of mental health. The practice of certain habits of thought and resistance to change originate our reality. There is a reality outside of us, and we do not actually interact with it. The only reality we really live with is a simulation created by our brain through our thoughts, which can be more or less close to external reality.

In theory, the less biased our thoughts are, the closer we will be to certainty. The problem comes when we have been educated in generalizations, prejudices and dichotomies that make us distance ourselves from the real. Thinking is like breathing, we do it without realizing it , but  we cannot believe everything we think. It is estimated that only about 20% of our thoughts come true.

Human beings have thoughts that do not correspond to the reality of the moment or the situation ; These thoughts are called deformed or irrational thoughts. They are ideas that come to mind and that prevent us from seeing the ultimate reality of things; They tend to lead us to error and that has a  great and direct influence on our emotional state.

Interpretations about reality are what lead us to be emotionally stable or unstable people, rather than reality itself. What we think of ourselves and our experience is what really creates the anxiety and / or depression problems , so prevalent in the first world, and not the situation itself. Two people in the same situation can experience and understand it differently, showing that reality is ultimately created by our thoughts.

If you want to change, change your thoughts

Psychology bases part of its therapies on the substitution of irrational thoughts for others that better fit the real events. Learning how to transform irrational thoughts into rational thoughts is the main axis of thinking adjusted to reality. People who are able to modify these thoughts can have great control over their emotions and be able to make better decisions.

One of the most used clinical techniques to change misaligned thoughts is debate,  where the patient is taught to modify his beliefs through questions formulated by rational parameters, until he is able to generate a much more adaptive alternative thinking . The objective is that in the end the patient is able to substitute or file his thoughts in an autonomous way.

Although the circumstances are complex, such as those that can occur around a dismissal or a couple breakup,  these situations are not going to improve no matter how much we think about them. In many difficult situations, our margin of action passes more to intervene on our thoughts than on our own reality.

How to think in a healthy and rational way?

The events do not cause the  emotional and behavioral problems, but rather they are caused by the beliefs that underlie the interpretations of these problems. One of the basic aspects to highlight is the distinction between rational beliefs and irrational beliefs.

To think rationally, is to think relativizing,  expressing oneself in terms of desires and tastes (I would like, I would prefer, I would like…). When people think in a healthy way, even when they do not get what they want, the negative feelings that these situations generate do not prevent the achievement of new objectives or purposes.

On the contrary, thinking in a dogmatic and absolutist way makes us express ourselves in terms of obligation, need or demand (I have to, I must of, I am obliged). Its non-achievement causes inappropriate negative emotions (depression, guilt, anger, anxiety, fear)  that interfere with the achievement of the objectives and generates behavioral alterations such as isolation, avoidance or escape behavior and the abuse of toxic substances.