A raw look at two of the biggest limiting beliefs my parents passed on to me and the tools I used to discover they weren't to blame.
As kids we were around our parents almost everyday. We looked to our parents on how to relate to the world around us, and just like a thirsty sponge we soaked up everything they showed us - both the good and the bad.
We watched our parents go through their own struggles and took note (usually sub-consciously) of how they reacted to certain situations, certain people and certain feelings they were experiencing.
But why would our parents show us things which would make our lives harder and healthy connections with others more difficult? Why would our parents treat themselves and others poorly in certain situations? These were the questions I had as I began to dig deeper and deeper into my negative reactions which were causing trouble in my own relationships with others.
Show Highlights and Takeaways
Our parents have given us a lot of helpful positive beliefs and also the negative.
We don’t usually acknowledge the positive gifts as they enhance the quality of our lives and don’t usually get in the way.
The negative beliefs, cause friction within ourselves and in our interactions with other people. So these are what we notice as they can make our lives unpleasant.
Ben: I was in a relationship and noticing I was having very strong negative reactions in certain situations. At the time I was already in the habit of writing down my feelings, so I explored these negative reactions in my writing.
I discovered that I held the beliefs:
That I was inherently unworthy of receiving love, and I needed to prove my worthiness in order to receive it.
And that my default state was inadequate, that I wasn’t good enough just as I was.
These beliefs caused me to search outside myself for a sense of love and acceptance, and undermined all of my creative pursuits, how I socialised, how I expressed myself…
I asked myself why do I feel this way? I found that this was how my mum and dad operated. I saw that I was copying what I’d seen my parents role model to me as a kid. This was how their own relationship was and I was just copying what I saw.
It made sense to me. The two people that were constantly in my life as a kid were my mum and dad - I was relying on them to give me love and acceptance, so whatever they said I accepted. I wasn’t going to question how they were showing me to live.
And all these years later these beliefs were causing me some problems.
The behaviours they’d shown me in their relationship had started to cause me problems in my own relationships.
When I saw I’d picked up these beliefs from them I became incredibly angry. I couldn’t belief they would act that way towards each other and other people.
I felt disappointed, I felt let down and that things should have gone differently. Because if things went differently I would not be having the problems I’m having right now.
Why Would My Parents Show My These Negative Beliefs and Behaviours?
I wanted to know why they why the would act that way? Why did they think that would be a good idea?
I continued exploring by asking myself questions. Writing down what I’d discovered and asking myself: why would that be the case?
Why would my mum only believe that love only comes to you from another person when you’ve proved your worth?
Why would I believe from my dad that things are inherently not good enough?
I discovered they were behaving in that way, not because they wanted to, not because they were even aware of their behaviour, but they were just copying how their parents had done things.
But Why Would Their Parents Act That Way?
Why did their parents believe love only came from outside you and that people are inadequate by default and be better than they are.
I saw that these behaviours had just been passed on.
