John Selby's "De-beliefing Process" for Anger

[Korpo]

Hello.

I came over a very useful exercise in John Selby's book "Quiet Your Mind" which I wanted to share. It is a process of uncovering a personal belief or emotional/mental pattern and challenging it, here adapted to anger:

De-Beliefing Step 1:

First of all, state clearly who you're angry at and why. Express the underlying thoughts that are generating anger. For example: "I'm angry at Philip because what he said last night hurt my feelings." Ideally write your statement down.

[...]

De-Beliefing Step 2:

The second step is to honestly question whether the statement, and the beliefs behind the statement, are true. Why "should" another person behave the way we want them to? And why "should" they be held responsible for our feelings, if we're the ones thinking the thoughts that make us feel bad?

[...]

De-Beliefing Step 3:

The third step in the process is to ask, "How might I be benefiting, from believing that my reaction is valid?"

[...]

De-Beliefing Step 4:

The fourth step in this process is to ask, "How is my life being upset or even damaged by holding onto the belief that someone has wronged me?"

[...]

De-Beliefing Step 5:

The fifth step, the primary provoker of rapid insight and "letting go", involves asking the question "How would my life change if I let go of the belief that this person wronged me?".

(John Selby, "Quiet Your Mind", pp. 83-85, Rider, 2004)

As simple as it may seem, you should put some effort into it, especially into looking into the other person's point of view in step 2. You don't have to adopt it, just see whether from their assumptions it has validity and if they could have acted differently. What was really disappointing - the person reacting according to an innate pattern we knew the person had or that the person violated our expectations, hopes, wishes?

The basic assumption is that we often cannot another person, but achieve a realistic relationship - to the person and to our own wishes, expectations and perceptions, which we can change.

I applied this process to an anger problem in my mind, with not much immediate change. Days later however I recognised how the anger had lessened by a good degree. It seems to untangle the emotional knot, loosen the ends, and start healing through inner insight.

Hope you find it useful, too. The book is chock-full of useful stuff like this, and also has detailed examples.

Oliver

[Serenity]

This could be a very useful tool, I agree.

The only big problem I can see with this is the deep, true anger. The kind that lasts for years. With that kind of anger, some people can't identify the cause.

There should be a prologue to this about identifying who/what you are angry at/about.

Still, a good technique for dealing with anger. Especially the day-to-day annoyances that can build up.

[Korpo]

Serenity, I agree.

I recently read in a book by David Richo - "How to be an adult" - how these changes usually come about. They usually come when the spiritual seeker is ready. I think I agree with this - often enough issues resurface when I can deal with them. I guess when you start applying techniques like this you sooner or later get to the core issues.

Similar in my energy work - which is just the most direct version of the process: Dealing with the underlying energy. You start with surface knots, recent events, easier problems. But in the mind and body, all energies are connected. Blockages link to each other, releasing energies trigger other blockages, releasing a seemingly easy issue can start loosening a long-term issue. Reversing the habit of anger may start a deeper healing where the subconscious releases the anger habit by de-conditioning, and then you can tackle the original motivator for the "anger personality".

I agree - the initial phase of step 1 strongly depends on your skills of self-insight. However, the more you tackle such problems and try to be truthful to yourself, the more of the right answers you get in my experience. This relates to "being ready" for change. The more readiness you develop, the deeper the insights will be you can work upon. Starting small is the key here, I guess.

Each tool depends on a certain skill to be useful - whether it is the trained ability to feel subtle energies or the self-insight that can only come from honest soulsearching. But in my experience not even knowing is enough - spelling it out like the technique above I think can make a big difference. Else you might just still want to hold on instead of let go.

Take good care,
Oliver

[Korpo]

Hello, Alex.

I'm not sure we need "to put something back". I think that is the fear of nothingness or no-existence. We can remove and go on, and what will surface at the end is our innate, true nature.

See, if you remove an ego belief, what you removed is an ego pattern. What you reinstate next is possibly just another ego pattern, albeit a better one. I agree this can be useful, especially if you feel strongly guided to do this.

If you however just feel afraid of leaving something undefined, empty and open you're still holding on to the principle of control instead of the principle of letting go. Spirit cannot be willed into us, we only can make space.

This is of course under the assumption you want spirit.

So - if you feel strongly guided, I guess it is okay to put "better beliefs" in place. If however you feel just uneasy about letting go then I would do nothing. It takes faith to let spirit in your life. Trust does not come easily. Nothingness and emptiness and letting go trigger our most basic fears of non-existence and death of ego. But only by letting go and making space for spirit the transformation happens in the end.

If you leave the space, you open up for the possibility of your true self to manifest more strongly within you every day. That is what I try for.

Thank you for your thoughts,
Oliver

[Korpo]

I think you are right.

Your Higher Self can manifest and tell what belief would serve you better - for now. It just depends on how you feel - do you feel putting the new programming in is a good idea and feels right - bingo! If you feel uneasy about leaving something undefined and resolve itself - I'd be inclined to think that is a fear-based reaction. The key here is the feeling of confidence and trust in your own decision.

The other aspect is this - how do you know your ego does not drive the de-beliefing process? There is a simple trick - de-belief only fear, anger, worry, anxiety and guilt. De-beliefing negative emotions does the trick, because when you are freed of those, you also stay more in the present moment and get more in touch with yourself. When you always start out with these emotions, I would consider it a safe bet doing it will lead to you settling into a more peaceful state allowing your heart-mind to manifest strongly.

Again - thank you for your thoughts,
Oliver

[Korpo]

PS -

Alex, I know you have more experience with similar techniques to this.

I speak from my experience with meditation/energy work on blockages that removing a block that I *never* lost something in the process except something holding me down or shutting me down.

If you restrict the de-beliefing process to negative emotions like I said above, it is guaranteed IMO to remove emotional blocks and to be helpful, and you don't need to replace those. Instating a new belief instead would mean instating a new pattern to react to people.

You don't need those - to be spontaneous is within our nature. Patterns override the natural reaction through conditioning.

But maybe you can just affirm after de-beliefing something like this: "Now that I resolved the old belief that blocked me I react accordingly to my true self and spontaneously. I allow my Higher Self to manifest within me."

I found your analytical thoughts on this helpful to get a better understanding myself, thank you!

Oliver

[Korpo]

PPS - I among other things now read "How to be an Adult" by David Richo.

One of the first things he describes is the personal evolution - the unmature ego, the mature ego and the True Self. You get from the unmature ego to the mature ego by reprogramming the ego with better beliefs. And then you can let go and manifest the True Self to become fully free.

It is a matter of where you see yourself in this spiritual journey.

Oliver

[ButterflyWoman]

I had a long think about this process. Tried it on a couple of things. It only really works (as written) when it's possible to accept that the other person isn't necessarily at fault.

In some cases, you cannot escape the fact that the other person DID act improperly and the hurt inflicted was intentional, or at least, their actions were so negligent or thoughtless as to make the situation truly "their fault".

An example would be an abusive parent, or someone who has sexually assaulted you, or someone who knowingly embezzled your life savings from you, etc.

You can't just say "Well, why should they be responsible for my emotions..." Obviously, they're not (no one is ever responsible for someone else's emotions). You MUST acknowledge that they hurt you on purpose, and that they intended to do you harm.

The only way to get rid of anger in that case is to forgive, and I don't mean "pretend it's okay". Some things are NEVER okay. To forgive is to let go of the debt. They DID harm you. They DO deserve your animosity. But carrying it around with you harms only yourself. They probably don't care at all if you're still angry, hurt, upset, whatever.

I compare forgiveness to erasing a debt. They do owe it to you, for sure, but you eventually realise you're NEVER going to collect it, so you write it off and stop carrying on your books and stop pursuing it. It doesn't mean you're saying it was okay never to pay you back.

With some things in life, yeah, you can look at the situation and realise that you over reacted or that it was mutual misunderstanding or you have to take responsibility for your own emotions, etc. etc. But sometimes the ONLY thing you can do is let go and move forward without that burden.

[Korpo]

Yeah, that does sound right and insightful.

Maybe he formulated it only for the more common anger, and not for the deep issues? Seems like that.

Oliver

[CFTraveler]

I think that in works like these, the authors are addressing the types of hurts that people inflict on themselves as attempts to resolve past issues, in which one hurt piles on another and they lose the ability to heal from them. So even though, from a present perspective, it may not be your fault (or responsibility) that a parent inflicted some damage on yourself, the way you are dealing with it is directly related to it, and without that 'cleaning of the slate' healing becomes virtually impossible.
Back to the abuse scenario- a parent abuses a daughter, the daughter recreates the scenario with a future partner with the same characteristics as the abusive parent, with no deliberate intent to do so, more a pattern of behavior that comes to be because of the past hurt. So now forgiveness has to happen to the 'new' perpetrator of the grievance who has come into a codependent relationship.
Anyway, forgiveness is always crucial, even if it isn't for the purpose of reestablishing a relationship.