Seek balance in your beliefs to make necessary changes
Stress for Success
July 25, 2006



If you worry about the effects of stress on your mental and physical health but do nothing about them, you're in good company along with half of all Americans. The reason for your inaction might be that you have life-schemas that perpetuate your inertia.

All behavior is dictated by your beliefs. Life schemas are a way to organize your beliefs to more easily understand them and to change them where necessary.

According to the authors of “Why Can't I Get What I Want”, Drs. Kirby Lassen and Elliott, there are two maladaptive schemas and one adaptive one that fall along each continuum in the zones of self-worth, empowerment and relationships. For instance one schema deals with your level of desirability. This continuum runs from feeling undesirable to desirable to irresistible. The trick for your mental health is to have a balance between the extremes, which in this example means to see yourself as desirable.

Here’s the list of all the schemas, which influence your reactions to everything. The first and third of each continuum are the maladaptive ones. The center schema in each is the adaptive, or healthiest one. They're mostly self-explanatory so as you scan through these guess which ones might be keeping you in your unhealthy patterns. (To truly benefit from this concept you’ll need to read their book.)

The self-worth zone:
• Blameworthy - accepting - blameless
• Undesirable - desirable - irresistible
• Unworthy - worthy - entitled
• Inadequate - adequate - perfectionist

The empowerment zone:
• Acquiescent – assertive - domineering
• Dependent - capable - stubbornly independent
• Powerless - empowered - omnipotent
• Vulnerable - resilient - invulnerable

The relationship zone:
• Other-centered - centered - self-centered
• Abandonment - intimate - avoidant
• Undefined - defined - aggrandizing
• Distrusting – trusting – naïve

The trick, remember, is to seek balance between the two extremes.
Let's say that the schema that’s keeping you from making healthier routine choices is the dependent schema. This means that, “you often feel incapable of handling everyday decisions and responsibilities and usually seek help from others.” To become more capable, the authors encourage you to do a cost-benefit analysis for your maladaptive schema. Unless the costs are great enough you aren’t likely to change.

Benefits to being dependent:
• Having someone to depend upon keeps me from being alone.
• When something goes wrong someone will be there to help me.
• Life is easier when someone else handles the decisions.
• If something goes wrong it's not my fault.

Costs to being dependent:
• Some people may get tired of making decisions for me.
• Being dependent keeps me vulnerable and stunts my personal growth.
• My spouse, upon whom I depend, doesn’t encourage me to change my habits possibly because he doesn’t want to change his.
• Sometimes the people I depend upon don't really have my best interests in mind.
• Being dependent makes it more difficult for others and for me to respect me.

The first step in breaking a schema’s hold on you, is to be aware of not only which ones are operating but also their costs. When the cost becomes too great you’ll hopefully find more motivation to change.

The second step is to strive for balance between the extremes; in this example to become more capable and less dependent in making your own daily choices. Making healthier lifestyle choices, even if you start with one little decision at a time, will eventually make it easier for you to actually change your habits, turning your inertia into movement.

Jacquelyn Ferguson, M. S., of InterAction Associates, is a trainer and a Stress Coach. Her mission is to inspire people to live conscious lives of personal responsibility in relations with themselves and with others. E-mail her at www.jackieferguson.com or call 239-693-8111 for information about her workshops on this and other topics or to invite her to speak to your organization.