Repeating the same unhelpful patterns

Have you ever asked yourself why you always seem to end up in the same situations, problems in relationships, picking the wrong partners, the same dead end jobs, the same worries and concerns?

It's a common thing we hear from our patients in therapy "I know I shouldn't pick partners who are distant and unavailable, but I always seem to....I don't like it and I keep pinching myself when I'm attracted to the wrong people".

Or "I'm always the one that gets dumped on by my boss at work. I see everyone else laughing and joking and I'm there working harder than everyone else. I just can't seem to say no and stand up for myself; it makes me furious!!".

Do these sound familiar? How does life seem to pan out in exactly the way we're trying so hard for it not to. We get the opposite of what we're trying to achieve.

It's down to schemas, or core beliefs, and then development of patterns of behaviour.

If you grew up in your family being told that you're not as bright as your sibling then that leads to what we call a "failure" schema - what this means is that deep down you don't feel like a success at things, at life, in your work etc. you feel like a failure. And here's the thing, we behave in ways that reinforce the schema.

It's quite a tragedy but it's out of a person's awareness and without therapy there's very little that can be done. Let me explain...

Person A feels like a failure so she avoids situations that might make her feel like one. She doesn't put herself forward for extra training at work. She doesn't speak up for herself when she actually has done something well even though her colleagues shout about theirs. She dismisses anything that's good and instead exaggerates any negatives. All these patterns of behaviour mean that she never provides herself with opportunities to refute her "failure" schema. Everyone else gets the credit, everyone else improves their quality of work and she continues to look at herself and say "I'm just not as good or as clever or as hard working as my workmates" despite the evidence suggesting otherwise.

Person B feels like a failure deep down, but goes out of his way to prove that he's not (we call it over-compensation). He has incredibly high expectations of himself, pushing himself to be perfect in everything that he does. Perfect employee, perfect boyfriend, perfect friend, perfect at sports, hobbies, etc. you get the picture. He won't settle for 99% needing to be 100% (at least) at everything. Even though he has loads and loads of evidence to prove that he's not a failure he can't accept it. If he doesn't achieve perfection he views himself as a failure. even if he can manage 100% he tells himself that the task must have been easy or that he had loads of help and it wasn't down to him. The only way he sees that he can deal with any level of perceived failure is to try even harder! He then gets burnt out, starts making mistakes, finds he can't be 100% in every area of his life and eventually starts to fail. This of course reinforces the view he's had of himself all along...that he's a failure! He can't get out of this pattern as he doesn't see it in himself, he has no idea what he's doing. The worst thing is that when he realises this (through therapy) he starts to beat himself up that he couldn't see it in the first place. An over-compensator will find it difficult to take their foot of the gas, but therapy is the only way to deal with this.

It may take some time, but eventually both our avoider and our over-compensator will start to realise that they were never a failure in the first place, that it was the messages they received in childhood that made them think this. They'll develop a more accurate nuanced view of themselves and start to challenge the internal critic that tells them they're no good. They'll start to pay attention to evidence in their life that they're not a failure and most importantly recognise how they go about refuting that evidence that ends up with them repeating the same coping strategies and ultimately leading to the same outcome. Lastly they'll be able to "feel" different, not just "know" that the failure schema isn't correct. This will lead to happiness and a sense of achievement that's long-lasting in their employment, with their friends, relationships and ultimately with their lives.