Chapter 9 Changing the way you relate to your work

Introduction

  The beliefs and attitudes that we hold about ourselves, others and the world are formed by our early life experiences and consolidated by subsequent experiences in later life. Each of us is unique in this respect. For example, some of us are more positive in our thinking whereas others may be highly self-critical. Some of us are self-sacrificing in our attitudes whereas others believe they are entitled to special treatment. Some people are very trusting of other people, whereas others find it difficult to trust others at all. It is not helpful to describe a particular set of beliefs and attitudes as being right or wrong. It is, however, reasonable to describe them as being helpful or unhelpful to the individual. The utility of beliefs held can also change over time. For example, beliefs about not being able to trust others may have been adaptive in the context of an early childhood environment where those around you were actually untrustworthy. However, such beliefs could then become problematic later in life in the context of a marital relationship where mutual trust is crucial to the survival of the marriage, or at work where team working is crucial to the success of a project. At the same time, the belief that others cannot be trusted could be adaptive and have survival value for someone who is in a hostile environment such as a war zone or prison.

Our pre-existing beliefs and attitudes can therefore determine whether or not we find a situation stressful. Research has also shown that the experience of stress itself can alter the way we think. The capacity for rational and objective thinking can be impaired in individuals experiencing stress and the resulting irrational appraisals can serve to maintain or even exacerbate stress reactions. The camera analogy outlined in Chapter 1 (p. 9) likened an individual’s appraisal of a particular situation or event to taking a snapshot. The settings of the camera (e.g., lens, focus, speed and aperture settings) all determine what the eventual picture obtained will look like. In a similar way, the cognitive settings of an individual’s mind will determine the meaning that they attach to a situation or event and these settings themselves can become altered when an individual is under stress.

Recent research in the field of cognitive therapy has shown that it is possible to change unhelpful thinking patterns associated with stress and replace them with more rational, healthy positive ones, leading to reduced stress levels. The aim of this chapter is to teach you to identify, label and challenge your own unhelpful thinking patterns and learn alternative healthier ways of thinking about yourself, others and your environment in order to reduce the stress you are experiencing. In the context of work, this can be particularly helpful, since the working environment itself is not always readily amenable to change. Thus, learning to think differently about a situation can help you cope more effectively with it and make the best of what may be an objectively poor working environment. Up to this point in the book, the interventions described have focused mostly on identifying and changing unhelpful patterns of behaviour with relatively little reference to cognitive strategies. However, the cognitive skills learned in this chapter can also be applied to earlier chapters in this book. For example, positive thinking forms an integral part of a healthy lifestyle (Chapter 4) and healthy thinking patterns are also central to being assertive, socially skilled and managing one’s anxiety effectively (Chapters 5 to 8). Four steps to developing these cognitive skills are identified in this chapter. Briefly summarized, these are:

•  understanding the links between thoughts, feelings, behaviours and bodily reactions;

•  identifying unhelpful patterns of thinking;

•  labelling dysfunctional thinking styles;

•  challenging dysfunctional patterns of thinking.

  Each of these is covered in detail below.