What reframing your thoughts means …

My general disdain for platitudes isn’t a secret. The reason for my dislike of platitudes (often found plastered all over social media) is because they’re more untrue than true.

Take, for example, this tidbit from a very popular positive-thinking guru: “If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.”

Changing the WAY we look at things will likely have ZERO affect on what we’re looking at! Just because we change our perspective about something we’re looking at does NOT mean what we’re looking at has changed — we’ve just changed our thinking! Now keep this in mind — if there are multiple or many ways at looking at something, we’re likely missing the truth because truth is concrete!

The greater problem is that we human beings are usually so lacking in self-awareness and other-awareness that a lot of our thinking is irrational. We can go from the rational to the irrational very quickly, as darkly illustrated in this story related by Stephen Kingsley in 2014:

Recently a group of Ebola workers traveled to the remote village of Womey in Guinea, Africa in the hope of saving lives there by educating its people on how to help prevent the spread of the virus. The volunteers were seen using a disinfectant spray which somehow became rumored to be the cause of the disease itself. The lie was believed and a mob rushed the workers with knives and machetes. Nine were killed, the bodies all but one thrown in a latrine. A news report says, “The killers murdered, in cold blood, the very people that came to save them.”

When we’re struggling to think rationally, we may need to “reframe” our thinking. This concept is often misunderstood to mean simply changing our perspectives, with the idea that doing so will change what we’re looking at.

Nonsense!

Let’s take a closer look at what it means to reframe your thoughts by looking at a few steps to directing your self-talk to achieve rational responses:

REFRAMING YOUR THOUGHTS

STEP ONE: Identify/clarify your current circumstances without cognitive distortions.

STEP TWO: Honestly acknowledge your emotions.

STEP THREE: Apply context. Focus on realities rationally … eliminate any cognitive distortions or defective systems of thinking.

STEP FOUR: Apply your faith:

Is there any direct scriptural teaching for guidance?

If there isn’t any direct scriptural teaching for guidance, what biblical principles are there for guidance?

Ask yourself, “What would Jesus do?” in the exact same circumstances.

What glorifies God the most?

Pray for guidance and wisdom.

NOW respond.

If you would like a color handout of these steps for reframing your thoughts, email a request to me at dr.scott@ScottFreeClinic.org.

Scotty