The cognitive distortion I’m covering for today is “Shoulds”!
Shoulds are things we expect ourselves or others to do. Like a list of rules 📝 we have about our behavior or the behavior of others.
When people break our rules (or when we break our own rules) it might make us feel angry, 😡disappointed, hurt, shameful, guilty, resentful, or even disgusted.
You might believe that you are motivating yourself with shoulds and shouldn’ts, but you’re leaving yourself with a big emotional consequence of guilt and shame.
A toxic “should” I hear all the time is “I should diet”, “I ate Taco Bell today so I should go for a run”, “I shouldn’t eat that”, “I should lose weight”. I’m totally guilty of this too. These ideas are symptoms of DIET CULTURE- a huge land mine of shoulds that prescribes expectations, rules, and behaviors for create perfect bodies (but not perfect minds, I might add). Diet Culture is a symptom of PATRIARCHY- and we all know how we feel about that, right? 😉
What “shoulds” do you tell yourself!?
Happy #FeistFriday everyone! For those who haven’t met her yet, this is my therapy dog 🐶, Feist!
She is available for animal assisted therapy. Feist reports she is also available for treats 🍭, pets, walks, and snuggling!
She is a great listener (look at those giant ears!!) and she is great with kids. Feist can pick up on the emotions of the room and knows when to give some love.
Do you have an important pet in your life? How do they help you in your mental health? ⬇️
As of September 1st, Sprout Therapy PDX will be operating out of a new location on 1135 SE Salmon St in the historic Winslow building. We're just about a mile from our old office, so just around the corner!
Check out some photos:
