How to Challenge Limiting Beliefs Holding You Back
We all hold a set of beliefs about ourselves and the world around us. Some of these beliefs may have been instilled in us during childhood, while others we create ourselves. Some of these beliefs may be limiting, and they hold us back from reaching our full potential. These beliefs make growth, relationships, and emotional well-being challenging.
What Are Limiting Beliefs?
Limiting beliefs are any beliefs that people hold about themselves or the world that are no longer serving them. These beliefs are limited because they are not always factual and can keep people from growing in their lives. Limiting beliefs are usually created during childhood because of trauma or internalizing negative experiences. These beliefs are so hard to change because people treat them as if they are facts, when they’re not always true.
How Limiting Beliefs Affect Us
Limiting beliefs have a sneaky way of holding us back in life without us realizing it. These beliefs form our identity and often control our behaviors. Limiting beliefs filter our mindset and how we see the world. These beliefs may not be fully true (or true at all), and yet we are using them as the compass for all our choices. Limiting beliefs also make our relationships more challenging. This is because we may hold beliefs about trusting others or how others perceive us. These beliefs can hinder people’s ability to support one another and can lead to disconnection. As we mentioned previously, limiting beliefs can drastically affect our ability to engage in self-improvement and growth. Limiting beliefs can be so difficult to change because they are often deeply ingrained. Sometimes logic isn’t enough to change the beliefs because the person believes them so strongly.
How to Identify Your Limiting Beliefs
Identifying our limiting beliefs can be challenging, but it’s always worth the effort. The first step in identifying your specific limiting beliefs is to become aware of them. Everyone will find different things helpful in the identification process. One way to work through identifying limiting beliefs is self-reflection. This can be done through psychotherapy, journaling, or keeping a thoughts journal. Through each of these practices, there are questions that we can ask ourselves to help identify our own limiting beliefs. For example, we can try asking ourselves what we believe about ourselves, our future, and our abilities. We could try asking ourselves about what fears are the most troubling to us. We could also try thinking about our automatic reactions and what triggers them. This might help to identify whatever core beliefs we may have about ourselves and the world around us. If you have a close friend or family member, you could also try asking them what they see from their perspective. They might be able to help you identify things that you might not notice.
Ways to Challenge Limiting Beliefs
Challenging limiting beliefs is such a difficult task because, in most cases, these beliefs have been with us our whole lives. One way to challenge these beliefs is to ask yourself questions. This can be done through journaling or through talk therapy. Another way to challenge these beliefs is to notice patterns that might be recurring in our thoughts. Core beliefs can sometimes be created through repetitive negative thinking. We can also challenge our limiting beliefs by keeping a thought diary. Thought diaries can be used to recognize patterns in our thinking that might typically go unnoticed. Thought diaries can also help us notice cognitive distortions in our thinking. Notifying these distortions within our beliefs can help us on the road to reframing them. Another way to challenge limiting beliefs is to consider your values. All of us have things that are more important to us than others. However, sometimes we’re not aligned with our values for one reason or another. When we are not aligned with our values, we often feel unfulfilled or lost. Exploring our values can be a helpful way to challenge limiting beliefs. We can identify our values and then compare our core beliefs to see if they match up. If they do not, we can use our values as guiding information to make changes in our lives and thinking. Once we can identify these beliefs, we can try gathering evidence for them. If we are unable to find evidence for the belief, this may be a sign that the belief is negative or limiting. The next step is developing a new belief that is balanced and more accurate. Adopting beliefs that are more accurate and self-compassionate will help emotional well-being. All these ways we mentioned to challenge limiting beliefs can also be done with a therapist if they are having trouble making progress. Some core beliefs are too deep or ingrained for us to do this work on our own. It’s completely valid for core beliefs to be challenging to change because they have been with us most of our lives.
How Therapy Can Help Challenge Limiting Beliefs
Therapy and therapists can help patients identify and challenge their limiting beliefs by providing a safe space for patients to explore. They can also serve as an accountability partner for patients to lean on when reframing their beliefs. Having a trusted person to discuss these vulnerable beliefs can help the process be more effective. If therapy does not fit into people’s schedules, there are many licensed teletherapists in every state. Teletherapy helps people who wouldn’t normally be able to attend therapy be able to. This is an incredible advancement for the accessibility of therapy to all.
We are not to blame for our limiting beliefs; however, we do have control over whether we choose to change them. These beliefs can hold us back from achieving things that are important to us in our lives. Limiting beliefs can be challenging to identify and reframe, but they can help improve emotional well-being and success in life. We can reflect on our thoughts, values, and core beliefs to try to guide us in the process of challenging limiting beliefs. If it’s too challenging to work through these beliefs on your own, this is completely valid. Needing extra support during the reframe process is normal and sometimes necessary. There is never anything wrong with needing extra support. We encourage you to try exploring your own limiting beliefs in some of the ways we suggested. Changing the things we believe about ourselves and the world can have immense power on happiness and personal-growth. We promise you that you are worth the work it takes to reframe these limiting beliefs. Living with a negative, limiting voice in our heads is no way to live at all.
If you (or someone you love) could benefit from working on challenging their core beliefs in therapy, we are here to help! Reach out to us today if you are ready to work with us.
References
https://positivepsychology.com/false-beliefs/
https://asana.com/resources/limiting-beliefs
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10888081/
https://prosper.liverpool.ac.uk/postdoc-resources/reflect/overcoming-limiting-beliefs/
Keywords: limiting beliefs, personal-growth, self-improvement, emotional well-being, teletherapist