Hello again I’m Audrey Sussman and this is the 3rd of a 4 part post on using pain to change negative thoughts. I believe there are better ways of changing habits than the use of pain.
Continued from yesterday’s post discussing the Rubber band snap to change negative thinking Part 2.
Today is Part 3. The habit that the instructor was trying to help participants break was the habit of negative thinking and limiting beliefs. Specifically he was talking about the little voice that runs in the back of the mind. The one that causes fear, procrastination and stress.
So, I agreed with him that when statements or beliefs running in the back of the mind are dis-empowering it is important to change them. It is also important to create new supportive empowering ones. . .
But the directions he gave for this exercise were alarming. He told the participants to take the rubberband he gave them, and it was a sturdy, thick one, and pull it “all the way back” . . . And he demonstrated pulling it all the way and then letting it go. He even went to so far as to say, I thought he was kidding at the time, that even a little blood would be good. And, you will probably find this hard to believe, but the people in the audience did as he said.
Whenever they had a negative thought, or thought I can’t do something, they took those rubberbands, pulled them really far and let it go, snapping it on their wrists. This continued for the next few hours. People had big red welts on their swollen wrists.
Thank goodness this instructor didn’t have tazers to hand out to each person, I can just imagine what would have happened. Yes, I guess it is true that if you cause enough pain it can stop a bad habit, but there are much better ways to do this without trauma to the body.
I was horrified to see the damage people had done to their wrists, in hopes of stopping negative thinking.
Please, it someone in authority, even someone that seems wise and charismatic tells you to do something, if it sounds wrong, please, please pay attention to the wisdom of your own mind.
There is a way that the rubber band snap can be used to “snap” you out of a the negative of negative self talk. Continued tomorrow with a way to use the rubberband if you choose this method. . .
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