Stories

Stories

Words happen when alphabets come together, and sentences happen when we place those words together to convey a message. Yet, how we place those words together can alter the interpretation of how each sentence feeds a narrative as you go.

We are all storytellers consciously and unconsciously — we tell our stories to other people to evoke their respect or pity. We also tell stories to ourselves about our lives, where we think it is going and how our reality matches our ideal.

Even if you do not have a cordial relationship with words, you still use them to tell stories.

While we all hear words but see them mainly in pictures, this can be significantly more intense for the visual learner as the person imagines in HD. This makes it onerous to overcome themselves when that picture narrative is negative.

How your stories sabotage you

I will define a story as a narrative you have heard, seen or felt and are likely alluding to in your thoughts, actions and behaviour.

If you have seen blissful marriages, you will believe good partners are available even if you are still heartbroken from your last relationship.

You are not necessarily an optimistic person; your stories are just positive. The same pattern applies when people are negative. So, the next time you feel like motivating yourself to ‘look on the bright side,’ ask yourself what the story is.

How your stories are formed

Experiences: while experience is not the best teacher, it leaves an indelible mark — memory. If you know anything about your neural networks, they work hard to keep those memories reusable as much as possible. That is upsetting when your memories are negative experiences because you now have a new responsibility to teach your mind to work differently.

Neuroplasticity means you can learn anything at any time, but it still is a lot of work, internal conflict and potential relapses before your new pattern becomes your norm.

Education: this is an aggregate of everything you have learned in school and life. Contrary to popular opinion, you do not learn because you are instructed. You do because you can see someone to mirror, are getting rewarded and are curious.

This is why role modelling impacts your mind from childhood — your mirror neurons are for replicating what they see.

It is also why you should pay attention to what rewards you receive from people — if you are applauded for stealing, you are likely to do it again because significance in a social environment is a psychological need. This explains why ostracizing, neglect, and abandonment affect a person’s mind severely.

Curiosity comes from a sheer wonder at how something works. When curiosity births questions that receive answers (especially when those answers can be demonstrated and experienced), learning takes place.

Interpretation: the same experiences and education will be interpreted differently by groups of people based on their environments, personality, self-esteem and other social or psychological factors that cannot be pointed out.

Interpretation happens based on the lens with which you view something. If you interpret based on the frame theory, you will generalize, distort or delete information.

Interpreting your stories

Generalization happens when a single event or couple of events are used as a blanket for all related events. If you learn to drive a Toyota, you never have to learn to drive a Ford from scratch because you can generalize that knowledge from the Toyota experience.

Generalization is why we do not waste our lives learning things again, but it can become a nuisance when we attempt to judge life based on a few samples.

This means your ex-lover can not be the measure of a specific gender, race, tribe, country or skin tone — that is an unfair generalization. Generalization works best with practical, measurable skills.

Distortion happens when your mind edits new information to fit into the box of old information. This is during conflict — you say a different thing, but they hear a different thing.

Distortion is a good thing — it keeps you grounded such that your thoughts and ideology are not easily swayed by little influences but by irrefutable facts. However, if not balanced, a person can live in delusion.

Deletion happens when you delete a new piece of information because it is useless. This is how we cope with high-octane traumatic experiences — deleting them from our conscious mind. However, it can still show up in our unconscious, playing out as nightmares or an inability to make ourselves act or not act in specific ways.

Deletion is the reason every billboard seen does not become the subject of your thoughts — they are inconsequential.

Six Window Hut Model

The different windows of the window hut model are ways you also look at life and interpret your stories. They are: 
1. Life is pretty difficult and at least frustrating for all people at least some of the time. 
2. Life is much less difficult provided you pick and choose sensibly, realistically and non-magically. 
3. Life is both difficult and non-difficult. 
4. Your life could always be a whole lot worse than it is right now. 
5. There are certain things you can control and certain things you cannot control
6. If life was a school, what valuable, positive lesson can you learn from your present problems and adversity?

However you look at it, your interpretation of what is going on in your life is the ultimate pacesetter for your response.

The Sabotage

It is easy to control what we say during conversations and affirmations. The real problem is in controlling what we say to ourselves internally. I have never been able to overlook Dove’s #ChooseBeautiful Social Experiments.

This will help you see your internal dialogue and sabotage even if you are not a woman.

It is not other people who judge you harshly but you judging yourself. It is not even the trauma that is holding you back as much as it is your interpretation of the trauma.

When in therapy with a trauma victim, one of the things I make them do is tell the trauma story devoid of their interpretation of what happened. Do not tell me why you think you were worthy of abandonment or rape. Do not interpret it — tell me the unexplained story.

When you begin to review the story for what it is without colouring it to elicit pity (from others and yourself), you are more prone to upward mobility.

What stories are you telling yourself about your success, sex life and future? How are you acquiring and interpreting those stories? Are you even conscious of the stories you are telling?

Your perception of the problem is the real problem.