What Good Are Opinions

Transcript

What good are opinions?

Sometimes when we do use techniques like from Cognitive Behavioral Therapy or Neurolinguistic programming.

Say when sometimes somebody has a strong belief or strong thought about how a situation is going to turn out.

I say okay let’s look at this from a few angles, what’s the worst that could happen in this situation?

And they tell me. Then I say what’s the best in this situation and they tell me.

And I say what actually is likely now that we have the upper and lower bounds, what do you think will actually happen, what’s the 90 percent likelihood here and that gives a bit of cognitive flexibility to open your mind a bit so you can see things in a different light.

And then there’s other things like reality testing I was reading about today. Reality testing as a cognitive technique goes all the way back to Freud of trying to look at things and asking how does my belief actually comply with reality?

I’ll tell you what I’ve been thinking lately is what we do sometimes with these thoughts we try to replace them with something more positive. Or that situation isn’t all that likely or I have an emotional feeling like this thing is 50 percent likely but the reality if I go through and analyze it is only 10 percent likely or even 1 percent likely.

Maybe it’s not something I need to worry about.

In that way it can affect our emotions and we can calm ourselves down a bit.

But there’s also things that happen, we have these opinions like the shower argument.

A lot of people if you’re a verbal thinker is the shower argument.

I don’t know why it happens in the shower I guess you have time alone to think to yourself and you start thinking about all the times you got into an argument with somebody and you think “I should have said that, that would have been good, he wouldn’t have had any place to go it would be check mate.”

And what I find when I look at these mental habits, that’s not increasing my happiness. That is not making happiness a priority.

It gives you some payoff, some ego advantage like “Hey, I really showed that guy” in this imaginary situation that will probably never happen and is completely hypothetical and probably has nothing to do with your life anyway.

You really showed that guy, right? And you get yourself worked up and start getting frustrated and angry and shaking your finger at the loofah or soap and what good is that?

What good is it?

It’s not just that is an extreme example. Extreme in some form, a more extreme example is when we get into an actual argument.

And there’s a lot more subtle examples just when I’m thinking to myself today when having breakfast and thinking about some position that I hold or libertarianism or governments or whatever kind of thing I was thinking about.

Like I said it was a bit more subtle, this time not shaking my finger at my fork or spoon or my banana but there’s still something going on there and I think to myself: Would I be happier if I didn’t have such a strong opinion?

A lot of time the answer is yes and I’m actually receiving very little long term benefit of having an opinion, just that short term ego payoff and I can just let it go.

I don’t need to think so much or believe so much about a particular thing.

I go through life and a situation presents itself and I act accordingly to a situation, not necessarily to a strong opinion or belief I have, more in the moment.

So belief is something quite rigid, like a rock. Something quite solid which also means its inflexible and also about something of the past.

A belief isn’t something that’s happening now, it can’t be because it’s a response to situations that have occurred long ago.

Why do I need a belief right now in the moment? Why do I need an opinion? Can I just let my beliefs go and just enjoy breakfast?

As it turns out I can and I think you can too.

Thank you so much for listening.

Thank you for taking the time to step aside from your ego and looking at things a little more objectively or maybe a little more freely.

Thank you for having a great day and relaxing a little bit when it comes to your cognition.

Have a great day, I’ll talk to you soon.