As I’ve mentioned before, I often write the article I most need to hear on a particular day.
I’m writing this one today in response to having used this technique on myself really effectively this afternoon and then stopping and thinking “wait, what did I actually just do then?!”
This is how some of the tricks and tips I’ve learned (and come up with) over the years now work for me. They’re so simple, and have become so ingrained into my life that I often do them without really consciously being aware that that’s what I’m doing.
I read Byron Katie’s book, Loving What Is in 2020, during the pandemic. I picked it up because I knew that my last romantic relationship was becoming more and more of a problem for me.
Why? My ex’s story is not mine to tell but it’s enough say that he’d been struggling with his mental health since 2016 and he’d eventually been diagnosed with ADHD as an adult.
This meant a change in our relationship as he came to terms with his diagnosis and what that meant for his life, going forwards. And it also meant that I wanted to understand his neurodiversity and what his behaviour did (and didn’t) mean.
Suffice it to say, things had really changed between us and I was struggling. So I was drawn to this book as part of my efforts to educate myself on his neurodiversity and to establish if there was anything I could do to help to get things to work out.
This is the basic premise of the book:
Inquiry: The Four Questions and Turnaround
1. Is it true?
2. Can you absolutely know that it’s true?
3. How do you react when you think that thought?
4. Who would you be without the thought? and Turn it around.
The best self help techniques are the ones which seem simplest. You might be rolling your eyes and wondering how in the heck just asking yourself “is it true?” can help you when you’re struggling with something in your life, whether that’s a relationship with another person or your relationship with yourself.
So, this lunchtime I sat down to do my usual hour of just sitting and thinking. It’d been a busy day with plenty of meetings, as well as weaving in my washing and cleaning my little house.
It was really the first time I’d had (or had allowed myself) to acknowledge just how I was feeling.
Frazzled. Rushed. Like I had too much to do and not enough time to do it.
I took a couple of deep breaths and asked myself “is that true?”
Sure, I had my usual list of tasks all planned out. But I’d already achieved a heck of a lot with the time I’d had at my disposal since I’d woken up.
And while I had a lot of meetings booked in, I still had enough wiggle room to be able to delay things and/or to weave them in to the cracks in my day.
Also, would there be any massive issues if I didn’t do absolutely all of the things in my list? Nah. No one was even relying on me for most of the things I had left to do, and so no one would be inconvenienced if it did them later than I’d planned or even if I did them tomorrow.
There’s a balance, you see, which all of us need to find, between shying away from doing things and procrastinating, and putting stuff off because what you’ve managed to do to day is enough!
Anyway. All of that told me that the thought/emotion “I’ve got too much to do and not enough time to do it in” absolutely was not true - and remember that emotions only last 90 seconds on average, anyway!
This technique is similar to CBT principles, where you very much have it in your mind that emotions and thoughts are not reality. Often they’re coming from messaging you received in your childhood (in my case my need to achieve things and my ambition to succeed is to do with having been brought up by a narcissist who could only give me conditional love) or things you’ve repeatedly told yourself, much of which has come from with society says you should or shouldn’t do, should be or shouldn’t be, based on your assigned gender, place in society or job.
In CBT you ask “is this thought or emotion real?” And often it’s not. Just as Byron Katie’s question exposes the fact that a thought is often not correct and that it’s been tarnished with those veneers I just mentioned.
So. The next time an emotional thought crosses your mind, ask yourself “is it true?”
And then work through that thought and ask yourself the other questions if you feel like you still need to get to the root of the matter.
Will this always work? Heck no. Nothing works for everything and for everyone — and any person in the self help arena who tries to tell you different isn’t being truthful with you (or they’re misguided!)
But this is such an easy thing to try — and if you find you don’t remember to ask yourself the question(s) when you struggle, it might help to write them on Post-It notes and pepper them around your house.
So, what do you think? Is this a technique you were already aware of? Have you read the book?
Is it something you’ve tried? I’d love to hear what you think.