Chapter 3
Develop Fruity Thinking
I love quotes. Perhaps my favourite is one I made up (humility always was my strong point). It goes as follows:
‘The most important person
you will ever talk to is yourself.’
In the previous chapter we explored how we can hinder our lives by talking to ourselves and others in victim language. Talking to yourself (at least silently) is generally referred to as thinking (other phrases you may have heard are self-talk, inner-dialogue or your mindset, but ultimately whatever the language we use, we’re exploring the conversations that go on inside our heads). In this next SUMO principle we are going to explore how we think. Thinking is a little like breathing – most of the time we are not aware we are doing it. People do not wake up in the morning and say, ‘I think I will breathe today’, and likewise, neither do they pay much attention to how they think.
So why is it so important? What is the connection between my thinking and the results I am experiencing in my life? The answer lies in the fact that the way we think, i.e. talk to ourselves in our heads, significantly impacts upon what we do in our actions, and it is our actions that determine the results we achieve in life.
The TEAR model
Imagine you have been asked by a work colleague to make a presentation to their department about the work you do. Your immediate thought is, ‘I hate making presentations, I always go to pieces’. You feel intimidated by the prospect and decline the request by stating you have too many other commitments at present. The result? You still fear presentations and you miss out on the opportunity of helping a colleague. You just went through the TEAR process:
Thinking → Emotions (or feelings) → Actions (or behaviour) → Results (or outcomes)
Another way to illustrate this is as follows:
Life can become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
William James, one of the pioneers of modern psychology, said, ‘You can change your life by changing your attitude’. Quite simply, when you think differently, you feel differently, behave differently and ultimately achieve different results. Suppose when you were asked to do the presentation, you thought, ‘I’ll give it a try… they wouldn’t have asked me if they didn’t feel I could do it’. You might not feel confident, but neither are you gripped by fear. You take action by preparing and then delivering your presentation. You get a different result and outcome because you changed how you thought about the situation.
How were you feeling at the time – anxious, fearful, confident, excited, daunted, motivated?
What actions did you take? Did you avoid taking certain actions?
What were your results? What was the outcome?
In what ways would your outcome have been different if you had changed your thinking?
How might the formula E + R = O have helped in this situation?
What influences your thinking?
How you view your life, yourself and other people is influenced by many factors. Let us examine four of them.
1 Your background influences your thinking
A leading British entrepreneur records in his biography how, as a youngster, his mother would often tell him the following: ‘Dare to be different’; ‘Be prepared to rock the boat’; ‘It’s OK to make mistakes as long as you learn from them’; ‘Life is not a rehearsal’; ‘Never forget – no one is any better or worse than you’. Brought up in that environment, it is not surprising that this person became a risk taker, a visionary leader and a person who, despite setbacks, always bounced back. Contrast that with a delegate on my course who told me recently that his father’s advice on how to succeed in life was, ‘Always wear navy and keep a low profile’.
Now that would be funny if it wasn’t so sad. You see, the main message that person received was this: ‘Blend in. Play small. Don’t take risks.’
The most important message you receive as you grow up is the one that influences how you see yourself. Messages that affirm you for who you are, as opposed to for what you do, will help you develop a healthy sense of personal identity. Equally, a bombardment of messages that remind you of your inadequacies and failings will help sow the seeds of low self-esteem.
2 Your previous experiences influence your thinking
Have you ever had to give a talk in public? Imagine (if you need to) that you have, and your input was such that most of the audience were cured of their insomnia. It would be understandable if you did not rush to do another one.
Or maybe when you took a risk or tried something different, you did not get the outcome you were expecting. It is likely that you will be more cautious in the future. Perhaps the last time you went to a restaurant you received excellent service and you are eager to return. Whatever your previous experiences have been, they influence your attitude and your expectations. This also relates to when we meet people, and is why aiming to create a positive first impression is so important. Our brief encounters with people can create attitudes that last a lifetime.
3 The company you keep influences your thinking
The 1970s British comedy series Dad’s Army starred a Scottish character called Frazer. When not in the Home Guard, he worked in a funeral parlour. It suited his personality. Whenever there was a set of circumstances or a situation that could be described as challenging, Frazer would cry, ‘We’re doooooomed!’ Watching Frazer was amusing, but working with a ‘Frazer-type character’ is not. Someone who exaggerates problems and can always pinpoint the negative in a situation does not help cultivate a positive way of thinking in those around them.
4 The media influence your thinking
What have you read in the last week? A newspaper? A magazine? Which television programmes have you watched, or radio shows have you listened to? Although we may watch a programme or read a magazine purely for entertainment, or in order to ‘chill out’, continual exposure to the media subtly influences our outlook on life.
Without the media, where would fashion be? Where would celebrities be? Where would politics be? There is nothing inherently wrong with the media, but we need to be aware of how it shapes our thinking, particularly in relation to how we see ourselves. The obsession in some parts of the media with the appearance of supermodels and celebrities can cause young people in particular to feel dissatisfied with their own appearance and can affect what they think of themselves.
It can also give us a distorted view of life. Fear is a great marketing tool. A scare story gets our attention. Good news rarely does. So what makes the news? The rare, the vivid, the catastrophic. And you wonder why, when in the developed world our chances of living a longer, healthier, safer life are greater than any time in human history, anxiety and stress amongst people are increasing at an alarming rate.
So our thoughts, beliefs and attitudes are influenced by several factors. They shape our lives whether we are aware of them or not. The key to all this is self-awareness. However, whilst it is important to recognize the influence of various external factors, be careful you don’t start to slip on the Victim T-shirt, i.e. ‘I think negatively because of how my parents brought me up’, or ‘My wife insists we watch medical dramas where there’s never a happy ending’. We still need to take personal responsibility for our thinking despite those external influences. Remember E + R = O.
We highlighted earlier, through the TEAR model (Thinking, Emotions, Actions, Results) the importance of our thinking. Let’s examine in more detail how certain types of thinking patterns can hinder our ability to be successful. I refer to these thinking patterns as ‘faulty thinking’.
Four types of faulty thinking
The first type of faulty thinking… the Inner Critic
This is the voice inside your head that highlights your weaknesses and undermines your confidence. It is not the voice of encouragement to do better, it is the voice of condemnation. You make a mistake on Tuesday and ten days (or ten years) later you are still beating yourself up about it. The need to Shut Up criticizing yourself is great, but people fail to Move On. In extreme cases, you are beating yourself up about events and actions that happened years ago. Driven perhaps by the mistaken belief that ‘I must be perfect’, or ‘It is wrong to make mistakes’, the Inner Critic can help demolish your fragile walls of confidence.
The Inner Critic takes root in our lives from early childhood, and is fed and watered by the four factors we have just explored:
- Your personal background
- Your previous experiences
- The company you keep
- The media.
The language of the Inner Critic includes:
‘I ought…’
‘I must…’
‘I should…’
‘I’m always getting it wrong.’
‘How could I have been so stupid?’
Sometimes the voice of the Inner Critic speaks as an internal third party. These are phrases I have regularly heard inside my own head:
‘Why didn’t you… ?’
‘That’s typical of you.’
‘You always get that wrong.’
‘Don’t get ideas above your station.’
‘Do you honestly think people will want to hear that?’
The emotional intensity behind what you say to yourself determines whether the impact of the Inner Critic is that of a common cold (annoying but not life-threatening) or pneumonia (much more serious with potentially damaging consequences).
However, this next point is crucial.
Silencing the Inner Critic is not an abdication of your desire to improve or an abandonment of responsibility regarding a mistake made. Your ultimate goal is to become a coach to yourself and not allow past mistakes to make a prisoner of your potential.
We still need to have conversations with ourselves, but the voice we need to listen to is that of the Inner Coach. This voice has your best interests at heart. It is for you. The Inner Critic condemns you. The Inner Coach encourages you and inspires you to improve, and in a few pages’ time you will learn how to tune in to this voice.
The second type of faulty thinking… the Broken Record
When we get stuck in a groove of thinking, we continually replay the same messages within our heads. You could be in ‘Broken Record Inner Critic’ mode whereby you continually analyse and criticize your behaviour. Alternatively, you might simply keep on talking to anyone and everyone about your unhappiness and dissatisfaction with your job, a person or a situation. Stuck in this way of thinking, you churn over your thoughts but take no action to resolve your problem.
Some people fall into an irrational way of thinking whereby they believe that by moaning about a situation it will somehow improve things.
It won’t.
But it will make you feel more miserable.
The third type of faulty thinking… the Martyr Syndrome
I know martyrs can be viewed as heroic and their actions taken as a sacrifice for a worthy cause. But when I use the term in this context I mean the sort of thinking that says the following:
‘I am unworthy.’
‘I must sacrifice my needs to serve others.’
‘I don’t deserve to be happy.’
‘My views are less important than other people’s.’
The reasons for suffering this type of thinking have been covered in the previous chapter, ‘Change Your T-shirt’. However, one cause we have yet to mention is why martyrs wear ‘Victim T-shirts’.
When you try and help a martyr who has been complaining about how unfair life is, and how it is always them that has the ‘short end of the stick’, they often refuse. It is difficult to continue playing the martyr when you accept help from others. The truth is, some people are actually at their happiest when they’ve got something to be miserable about. Sad, but true.
The fourth type of faulty thinking… Trivial Pursuits
Another way of understanding this type of thinking is when we make mountains out of molehills (although we’ll see in our final chapter when this is appropriate). People have the ability to get angry or upset over the most trivial issues. Relationships are ruined and people suffer from anxiety, often not because of something major, but due to something insignificant. Trivial Pursuits can have a snowball effect and completely distort your view of reality.
This inability to see things in perspective can result in a reaction or outburst that is completely disproportionate to the actual event. Sound familiar? It does to me.
This type of thinking can be closely allied to the others. You can be a ‘Broken Record Inner Critic’ about something quite trivial. And we may play the martyr because of some insignificant event.
For example, let us say that at work some information was not passed on to you, and although it was of little relevance, your response is, ‘No one ever tells me anything around here, I’m always the last to know’. Now this next point is really important. So much so, I want you to read it twice and make sure you digest its significance.
Your emotional energy can be exhausted due to trivial pursuits and your focus can be distracted from the really important issues in your life.
Now most people just scanned through the exercise and didn’t complete it. Remember, the value of this book is not just what you read, but your engagement with the exercises. So if you’ve moved on from the exercise without completing it, I challenge you to go back and complete it. It won’t take you long, but its insights for you could be helpful.
For instance, I’m aware I experience faulty thinking far more in my home life than I do at work.
So it will be interesting, having completed the above, to see if you experience one or two types of faulty thinking more than others. You will also find it enlightening to see the context in which you experience the faulty thinking. Why don’t you put in your diary, say three months from now, a follow-up action to re-visit this exercise and see what changes there have been.
Why slip into faulty thinking?
At times we all slip into faulty thinking and often for quite irrational reasons. So why do we do it? In the chapter E + R = O we explored three reasons why we respond the way we do to certain situations. Here’s a reminder of what they were:
- Habits
- Conditioning
- Emotions
All three could be reasons why we slip into faulty thinking. It could simply be habitual. Secondly, we’ve been conditioned to think in a certain way. Finally, our emotional state can influence our thinking. But there’s a fourth reason:
- Fatigue
Mental or physical exhaustion can lead to us being unable to think in a way that is helpful and constructive. So it’s worth being aware that there are a number of factors conspiring against us developing Fruity Thinking and causing us to slip into Faulty Thinking.
Now, in this next section I’d like to explore with you how your brain works (in a simplified way). This will, in turn, provide further understanding and awareness as to how we think and how that impacts upon our behaviour.
How the brain works
If we were to take a cross-sectional view of your brain, we could divide it into three distinct sections.
- Rational brain. Sometimes referred to as the neo cortex or ‘higher brain’.
- Emotional brain. This is part of the limbic system and is sometimes referred to as the ‘mid-brain’.
- Primitive brain. Also known as the reptilian brain or ‘lower brain’, it controls our fight or flight response, our desire for food and our sex drive.
So when we are feeling tired, hungry, anxious or threatened, we are not feeling particularly rational. In the heat of the moment, we may lash out physically or verbally, or run away from a situation in a state of panic. This is our fight or flight response. We react to a situation without first thinking through our response. (This might explain the scenes in my household when I can’t find my toothbrush.)
The upside of the primitive and emotional brain
However, to be driven by our emotional or primitive brain is not necessarily wrong; it is part of who we are as human beings. If everyone were completely rational about things in life, our world would lack passion, variety and excitement.
Appreciating the highs only happens because we have experienced the lows.
And being rational can sometimes be dangerous. If you are in a meeting room and a man-eating lion (which also has a taste for women) walks in, the rational response: ‘How did that get in here and why isn’t it wearing a visitor’s badge?’ will do little to save you. When it comes to matters of life and death, primitive brain wins every time. We don’t have time to be rational; we must react instinctively.
Our emotional brain helps us to appreciate art, to be passionate about something and to engage creatively in an idea. People are moved to take action over an issue, not due to some rational urge, but because emotionally they feel compelled to do so.
The upside of the rational brain
But here’s the reality. Some of the problems and challenges we face in life are due to our inability to tap into our rational brain. You see, being rational can bring a fresh perspective and new insights to an issue. It helps us to utilize the problem-solving attributes of our higher brain. It can prevent us over-reacting to an event, and avoid saying and doing something that we later regret. By accessing our rational brain, we can discover an antidote to faulty thinking, and that’s a process I call ‘Developing Fruity Thinking’.
So how can we engage our rational brain?
The key to engaging your rational brain is to ask yourself questions. Questions are powerful. The quality of them determines the quality of your answers. To understand this more fully, let’s explore for a moment how our amazing brain works.
The influence of your RAS
Your RAS (Reticular Activating System) is a part of your brain that filters information. Our brains are being continually bombarded with thousands of pieces of information from the environment around us. If we were to consciously take note of them all, we would experience brain overload. So your RAS acts like a filter and helps you to ‘notice’ information that is relevant, important, of interest or perhaps unusual.
I do a great deal of driving. Ask me which car is the most popular on the road and I would not be able to tell you. However, when I was thinking of getting myself a different type of car, I suddenly noticed that car everywhere. When my wife became pregnant, we immediately noticed how many other women were expecting babies. (Although because of my previous experience I couldn’t always be sure and I certainly wouldn’t ask when they were due.)
When we are experiencing faulty thinking, our brains seek out information to support what we are thinking. If we believe we are always failing, then our RAS spots examples to reinforce that belief. Interestingly, it also ignores the evidence that we were not looking for. For example, asking me to count how many BMW cars I see on the motorway means I ignore and fail to notice other makes of car.
Equally, when I am looking for my failures, I ignore my successes. Questions such as ‘Why am I so unlucky?’ or ‘Why does this always happen to me?’ tune your RAS to seek out information as to why you are not succeeding.
But when you change the question, you change your focus. Your RAS starts to notice ‘things’ it had previously been ignoring. So let’s explore how to re-tune our RAS and tap into the benefits of using our rational brain.
The following seven questions have provided me with a way of moving on from the Faulty Thinking of the Inner Critic, the Broken Record, the Martyr Syndrome and Trivial Pursuits and into Fruity Thinking. They are the questions I use when I’m listening to the Inner Coach. With each question I have included its underlying message.
Where is this issue on a scale of 1–10? (where 10 = death)
Decide what is really important.
How important will this be in six months’ time?
See the big picture. Get things in perspective.
Is my response appropriate and effective?
You choose your response.
How can I influence or improve the situation?
Identify your own resources to bring about change.
What can I learn from this?
Look for the learning in everything – even setbacks.
What will I do differently next time?
Learning brings change.
What can I find that’s positive in this situation?
Searching for the positive opens our minds to new possibilities.
There is nothing remarkable about the questions, but it is the answers they lead to that can help us succeed. They have become part of my ‘life tool kit’ and one of the strategies I use to help me tackle various challenges and situations that I regularly face. (You can download a copy of the seven questions by visiting www.theSUMOguy.com/downloads.aspx.)
So let’s explore the importance of each question. The first three questions are designed to help you Shut Up. To Shut Up means to pause, to reflect and to listen. It means get off auto-pilot and stop reacting to a situation like you always do. They are designed to provide perspective. When we are in emotional and primitive brain we tend to lose perspective.
1 Where is this issue on a scale of 1–10?
I am often asked what I mean by the scale of 1–10. For me, 1 on the scale means something insignificant and minor, whereas 10 represents a major issue, such as death, for example. Your scale is determined by your values. A scratch on my car is definitely a below-5 event, whereas I appreciate for some people it is close to being a 10! Sometimes in the immediacy of the moment, I react to an event as if it is a 9; yet this question can quickly remind me it may only be a 2.
2 How important will this be in six months’ time?
This is very similar to the first question. Again it is asking us to put things into perspective. It can serve as a reminder that what we are allowing to cause us great stress at the moment could actually be forgotten in six months’ time. (Stop reading for a moment. Cast your mind back six months. Can you remember what was causing you stress at the time? Probably not, eh?) Is your issue something you may struggle to recall six months from now? If not, fine, but at least you are gaining some perspective.
3 Is my response appropriate and effective?
What a great question to ask ourselves. This question allows you to consider whether or not your response will ultimately help or hinder the situation. A knee-jerk reaction that might seem reasonable at the time may seem very different a few hours or even a few minutes later.
The next four questions are designed to help us to ‘Move On’ and to focus on how to achieve a different outcome.
4 How can I influence or improve the situation?
When we are under stress, our emotions have a habit of hijacking the problem-solving skills within our higher brain. Asking ourselves this question immediately helps us to focus on how we can resolve the situation. It helps us Shut Up blaming circumstances and people for our situation and to Move On to identifying ways we can help ourselves. Remember that learning to help ourselves may still involve the support of other people.
5 What can I learn from this?
Life is always trying to teach us things. A great many people I talk with relate to having spent time beating themselves up over a mistake they’ve made. I have found a great antidote to my Inner Critic is this question. Rather than send myself on a guilt trip, can I use whatever has happened as an opportunity to learn?
6 What will I do differently next time?
If I repeat the same mistake, then I have not actually learnt anything. Real learning brings about change. Learn from it. Make changes. Move on.
7 What can I find that’s positive in this situation?
In my work as a speaker, I realize this: sometimes it is not new ideas that people crave, it is the inspiration to implement the ideas they have. This question moves us away from what is wrong in a situation and directs our attention to what we can find that is positive. When we do so, we may identify possibilities we failed to see previously. We need inspiration to move forward. This question can provide it.
Just as you do not cut the hedge with the lawnmower, so it is also important to recognize that each question is appropriate in some situations but not in others. As you will see in the next chapter, sometimes people are not ready emotionally to ask themselves these questions. They are not a quick-fix magic solution. However, what they can do is cause us to take time to reflect and focus our minds in a more productive way.
In a nutshell
Faulty thinking is often based on the following false beliefs:
- Inner Critic: ‘I lack value. My only worth comes through my performance and what other people think of me. When I fail to reach a particular standard I must punish myself.’
- Broken Record: ‘Talking and thinking about something for long enough is an adequate substitute for taking action.’
- Martyr Syndrome: ‘Life is what happens to me. I am not responsible for what happens; fate, luck and other people determine my destiny.’
- Trivial Pursuits: ‘Urgency determines importance. That is how to prioritize. Ignore the big picture.’
The antidote to faulty thinking is Fruity Thinking. It comes when we listen to our Inner Coach and take a conscious grip of our thoughts. Fruity Thinking is based on the following beliefs:
- I am of worth because of who I am, not because of what I do.
- I learn from the past but I do not remain rooted in it. I know when to let go and when to move on.
- I am responsible. I have choices. No one else plays as big a role in determining my destiny as I do.
- I choose to major on the majors. I am aware of the big picture and focus on what is important. I see things in perspective.