Anxiety and Depression Linked to Persistent Low Self-Belief – Neuroscience News
New research reveals that individuals with anxiety and depression tend to focus more on their moments of low confidence rather than successes, fueling persistent low self-belief.
New research reveals that individuals with anxiety and depression tend to focus more on their moments of low confidence rather than successes, fueling persistent low self-belief. Despite performing just as well as others and responding positively to feedback, these individuals build an overly negative self-image by discounting their confident performances.
I’ve experienced this same thing myself.
And I think the number one way to overcome this negative self-image is to continually reflect back upon one’s life and to become aware of and reacquainted with one’s successes that one often has forgotten about.
Overall, our findings offer a simple yet powerful message – that the persistent negative self-beliefs experienced by people with anxiety and depression are often illusory, and may be rooted in a dysfunctional view of how they evaluate themselves .
Dr Sucharit Katyal
But just to clarify. Just because something is illusory, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t feel real.
Carney doesn’t ooze charisma. But that is exactly the point, says the first Liberal lawmaker to back Carney’s party leadership bid following Trudeau’s stunning exit announcement.
“We’re not looking for charisma, we’re looking for competence and someone who’s real and someone who’s authentic,” MP Ali Ehsassi told POLITICO in his Toronto campaign office on the final weekend before Election Day.
Ehsassi met Carney about a year and a half ago. He was also in the room last April, when Carney delivered a keynote at a think tank event in a Toronto hotel ballroom.
To be sure, he’s shown an ability to come up with creative ideas. Carney’s solution for how to replace the dollar was imaginative but a little pie-in-the-sky: a synthetic token tied to a basket of central bank-issued currencies — something that would require a massive amount of buy-in from innumerable players to become the reserve currency.
“It was a very ambitious speech I would say, David, for a lunchtime audience at Jackson Hole, when all everyone really wanted to do was to go hiking,” Carney told host David Beckworth on the podcast Macro Musings in 2021 of the remarks he’d given in the waning days of his time at the Bank of England.
If Carney stays prime minister, he’ll have to do more than float ambitious ideas. He’ll have to deliver on them for voters who are impatient for economic solutions.
This is what blows my mind and I continually see this over and over again.
You see people demanding change but they want change to come through old ways of thinking that actually created these problems in the first place.
The only way truly stable change will occur is through different ways of thinking.
We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
Albert Einstein
Yet if people are fearful of different ways of thinking (ie thinking at a higher level of consciousness), we won’t see real change. It’ll just be the same old piecemeal “change” that most conventional politicians have done in the past.
In other words, “change” that really doesn’t change anything because it doesn’t directly address the underlying systemic problems in our world today.
When Carney himself says his speech is “ambitious,” he doesn’t mean it’s “pie-in-sky.” In effect, he’s not just making stuff up. He’s detailing a realistic plan that is possible but, yes, it does require “a massive buy-in from innumerable players.”
This is what people don’t get.
Real change can’t be achieved by one leader or one party.
It requires the collective effort and buy-in of many people at not just the collective levels of government (ie municipal, provincial, and federal) but from businesses and citizens as well.
In effect, it requires an entire society to want to change their ways of thinking, their ways of viewing of the world and themselves.
Yes, that could be considered “pie-in-the-sky” as well but it can be done, if people want to realistically work together to actually achieve it.
AI Education Won’t Future-Proof The American Workforce. Here’s Why
AI education is the right answer to the wrong question. To navigate an uncertain future, Americans need foreign language skills, not faster language models.
But the question shouldn’t be ‘How do we make AI part of every child’s upbringing?’ Rather, political and corporate leaders should ask themselves, ‘How do we cultivate the skills everyone needs to navigate an uncertain future with rapid changes in technology, geopolitics, health, climate, etc.?’ Being able to adapt to change, focus on what’s relevant, switch between tasks, manage conflict, and recognize systems that may be different are all important aspects of the answer to this question.
You cultivate them collectively with vertical development.
This is also similar to what I’ve said before in the past.
The future of work isn’t about learning to code. It’s about learning to recode yourself.
The Conservatives core message is primarily right but their approach to solving these problems are wrong and they will only exacerbate these problems, making them much worse.
Previous Liberal leadership may have had the right heart and vision but they also took the wrong approach, only applying band aid solutions to these problems.
Prior to Trudeau stepping down, neither party had the capacity to solve these big, long term, complex problems because they couldn’t comprehend them as a whole.
Mark Carney is actually the only person with the potential to tackle these problems, not because he’s a Conservative or Liberal, but because he’s thinking on a completely different level and mindset than most conventional Conservative or Liberal politicians have been in the past.
To put this simply, Mark Carney isn’t a transactional leader, like most conventional politicians today, he’s a transformational one.
The Conservatives core message is primarily right but their approach to solving these problems are wrong and they will only exacerbate these problems, making them much worse.
The Conservatives core message is primarily right in the sense that the problems we face today, problems relating to achieving our basic needs of economic survival, have not been dealt with for some time now. But these problems have existed for decades, becoming worse and worse under both Liberal and Conservative governments.
For example, housing affordability in Vancouver started prior to 2000. It’s just that it wasn’t on the radar of most people because it was just affecting the lower class and lower middle class. By 2010, it was starting to affect the middle class big time. Between 2015 and 2020 it started affecting the lower upper class, whereby companies trying to attract professionals with $150,000 salaries to Vancouver couldn’t because the cost of buying a home for your family was too expensive (even if you and your partner both had high paying jobs).
But even though the Conservatives are right in seeing these issues for what they are, they’re wrong in terms of how they believe they should be solved. That’s because they’re thinking from a conventional mindset. So they believe making cuts in the government will balance the budget and make everything better.
While it may balance the budget, it will only exacerbate the problems and make people’s lives worse. Why? Because in times of crisis, you need to invest in people not make cuts to them.
To put this in an economic sense, you need to spend money to actually make money. So by investing in things, you can get a bigger return on your investment.
But as the markets in the US are showing, business won’t take the risk in investing in people on their own, unless they feel there is a sense of certainty from a government’s perspective. This is why the Canadian government itself needs to drive this sense of certainty by spending money and investing in people first. This creates a sense of hope and certainty in the future and businesses will follow in kind.
Previous Liberal leadership may have had the right heart and vision but they also took the wrong approach, only applying band aid solutions to these problems.
I believe that Trudeau, as the previous Liberal leadership, did have his heart in the right place and perhaps could even see the larger vision of what Canada needed but good intentions don’t solve problems. How he and his party approached these problems was wrong. They really didn’t tackle these problems head on but just applied band aid solutions to them.
This is because he and his party were using a conventional mindset to try to tackle unconventional, complex problems. So they could only hit these problems from certain angles, one at a time, but they really couldn’t encompass and solve them as a whole.
Prior to Trudeau stepping down, neither party had the capacity to solve these big, long term, complex problems because they couldn’t comprehend them as a whole.
To put this another way, you can’t use conventional thinking, which actually caused these problems, to solve them. You need a new way of thinking. Not one that’s simpler but one that can grasp the complexity of the problem as a whole and thus tackle it as a whole.
That’s why it’s not so much about a change of leaders or parties that’s needed in our world today but rather a change of mindset.
Mark Carney is actually the only person with the potential to tackle these problems, not because he’s a Conservative or Liberal, but because he’s thinking on a completely different level and mindset than most conventional Conservative or Liberal politicians have been in the past.
He realizes that these complex problems can’t just be magically solved by the government alone. They need to be tackled by all levels of government (i.e. municipal, provincial, and federal), as well as with the cooperation of businesses and citizens.
In effect, he realizes that no one leader or party can save Canada. Canada, as a whole national body, needs to work together to save itself.
This requires a completely different mindset, one that sees the world and Canada’s place within it dramatically differently. One that doesn’t see Canada as “broken and needing fixing” but rather seeing Canada as an existing superpower with an abundance of untapped potential ready to be released upon the world.
By seeing Canada this way, he sees how problems can effectively solve themselves by transforming how we perceive them. Not by just seeing them as a crisis but as an opportunity for growth.
So a crisis of jobs, housing, and the US trade dispute affecting our country are each monumental on their own. But by perceiving how they relate to one another, he can transform and leverage them, seeing how they can work together to solve themselves as a whole (i.e. building homes creates jobs which also uses lumber affected by the US trade dispute).
To put this simply, Mark Carney isn’t a transactional leader, like most conventional politicians today, he’s a transformational one.
And if anything, he’s exactly what we do need today.
That being not “more of the same” conventional mindset that we’ve been getting from both the Liberal and Conservative parties over the past decades.
This is an awesome introductory video explaining the basics of vertical development by Ryan Gottfredson (which I believe I may have shared before, as it looks familiar).
Main Points
In reflecting upon the video, did you catch the following?
The difference between horizontal and vertical development is the difference between doing and being.
Vertical development helps us to embrace the challenges of life by elevating our mental maturity so that we can make meaning of our world in much more complex ways.
Vertical development is a part of developmental psychology which has been around since the 1880s.
Whereas developmental psychology often focuses on child development through predictable stages of development, vertical development focuses on adult development through more mature stages of development.
However most adults do not develop in adulthood. That’s because adult development is not based upon age but rather effort.
Mind 1.0 embodies safety, comfort, and belonging and encompasses 64% of adults and 7% of executives.
Mind 2.0 embodies standing out, advancing, and getting ahead and encompasses 36% of adults and 85% of executives.
Mind 3.0 embodies contributing, adding value, and lifting others and encompasses 1% of adults and 8% of executives.
Since people can operate at different levels at different times, your center of gravity is where you spend most of your time operating from.
Robert Kegan’s Minds
Now for those who might be aware of Robert Kegan’s work, here’s how it aligns.
Mind 1.0 = Socialized Mind
Mind 2.0 = Self-Authoring Mind
Mind 3.0 = Self-Transforming Mind
Richard Barrett’s Stages of Development & Levels of Consciousness
For those aware of Richard Barrett’s values-based work and how it fleshes out and provides greater detail of Robert Kegan’s minds, here’s how it aligns.
Mind 1.0 = Socialized Mind = Stages / Levels 1, 2, 3
Mind 2.0 = Self-Authoring Mind = Stages / Levels 4, 5
Mind 3.0 = Self-Transforming Mind = Stages / Levels 6, 7
What Richard Barrett does is differentiate stages from levels. While you can achieve stages, your level is what you are currently or primarily operating at. For example, you may have achieve stage 4 and thus level 4. But if you lose your job, you will immediately drop down to level 1 temporarily until you can gain employment once again, even though you’ve still achieved stage 4.
In terms of myself, I’m transitioning between Mind 2.0 and Mind 3.0, as per the video, or between a Self-Authoring Mind and Self-Transforming Mind as per Robert Kegan’s work. From Richard Barrett’s work, I’m transitioning between stage 5 and stage 6 but I have not achieve stage 5 yet. In terms of my level, I have brief moments at level 6 but I mainly operate at level 5 and occasionally drop to level 3 or 4 when I’m feeling down temporarily.
What you will notice is that the more mature your stage of development, the less time you will spend at lower levels of consciousness when you drop down to them. For example, a decade ago, I would drop to lower levels and could spend days, weeks, or even months completely dejected about my life. Nowadays, this time span is just reduced to hours within a day or a few days at worst.
Different Perspectives, Greater Understanding
To state the obvious here, all of these different ways of perceiving growth and development as an adult can feel confusing at first because so many different people have been working on it over the years.
But one thing I’ve realized above all is that looking at something from multiple perspective is the best way to understand it, as this embodies a Mind 3.0 perspective naturally. In effect, it’s like walking virtually around something unknown and understanding it from different angles, so as to make it known.
From a creativity perspective, it is shifting from looking at life as this OR that (i.e. black or white) and looking at life as this AND that (i.e. a spectrum of colours).
In effect, he only wanted people who had actually experienced the journey of levelling up their level of consciousness because articulating this to someone who hasn’t experienced it is effectively next to impossible.
It would be like asking someone to see something that is invisible to them.
But what I just realized about this is that the experience of it is not enough.
You need a common language with which to communicate with each other by, so that you can actually articulate and put into words what you are experiencing as you progress further on your journey.
And if you don’t have this common language then everyone communicates with different words that have different meaning for them.
So you effectively get a Tower of Babel experience whereby people are speaking words that someone might “know” but with which they don’t understand the deeper meaning behind the words.
For example, someone might say their journey has been like growing a garden. So they use terminology that someone who is familiar with gardening might know. But again what these words mean from that person’s perspective won’t be understood by others (even those familiar with gardening) unless that person explains their deeper meaning.
Now imagine twenty people in a video call all talking about their growth and development experiences but each using their own metaphorical language to explain them.
It would quickly become quite confusing for most people.
This is why a common language is needed.
And this is why I believe vertical development is that common language because it gives you words that can help you express the psychological journey across the inner terrain you are experiencing within your “self.”
I no longer want to try to explain who I am or what I’m seeing to anyone anymore…unless they are on the same journey and understand the basic language of it.
Nollind Whachell
So when reflecting upon what I said above, I obviously do need to explain who I am and what my purpose is in plain English as much as possible, so that it can potentially resonate with others.
But after that, I would need to highlight and communicate the language I’m using to express my purpose which would be vertical development.
And I would need to help people understand that unless they want to learn this common language of growth and development, I won’t be able to communicate with them, share my journey, or even help them on their own journey.
Again this common language is essential for understanding this psychologically inner journey.
And only after I have communicated all that, can I share my own metaphorical language which is just an extension of the vertical development language.
But obviously the person would have to understand the basics of vertical development first because my own metaphorical language and framework for life (i.e. Life’s a Role-Playing Game) is scaffolded on top of it.
So all that said, I’m totally fine if people don’t get my metaphorical language at first but I want to work and collaborate with people who understand the common language of vertical development at least.
That is essential for collaboration and shared growth amongst us.
This is the experience of most people on the planet.They find it difficult to meet their survival, safety and security needs. Consequently, like my father, they never get the opportunity to explore the fourth stage of their psychological development; they never get to individuate.
Let’s assume that you are a young adult, in your mid-twenties or early thirties, and you are fortunate enough to live in a nation where you can get your survival, safety and security needs met. You will now want to find freedom and autonomy to become independent and accountable for your life; to adopt the values and beliefs that are meaningful to you, rather than the values and beliefs of your parents or the community in which you were raised. You will want to individuate.
If you are successful, and you can also meet your survival, safety and security needs, then you will feel a sense of well-being. If you are successful at individuating, but for whatever reason you are no longer able to meet your survival, safety or security needs, then you will not feel a sense of well-being.
The contrary is also true; if you can meet your survival, safety and security needs but cannot meet your individuating needs, you will not feel a sense of well-being. This was the situation that precipitated the Arab Spring.
Young adults from the Arab nations of North Africa and the Middle East had studied abroad and come home to relatively high-paying private sector jobs that allowed them to meet their survival, safety and security needs. They now wanted the freedom to explore their own values and beliefs; they wanted to individuate. Unfortunately, they came up against authoritarian regimes that were operating from a lower stage of development. Although they demonstrated over several weeks, their needs were not recognized. Many of these people left their respective countries because they were being prevented from growing and developing. They could only find well-being by settling in a country that was operating from a higher stage of development that allowed them to individuate.
Richard Barrett, Worldview Dynamics and the Well Being of Nations
I wanted to highlight this important quote because it touches upon what I experienced myself. Not in terms of wanting to move to another country but wanting to move to another company.
Simply put, I couldn’t find a conducive organizational setting that would align with where I wanted to grow and development.
So even though my survival, safety, and security needs where being met by having a job within a company, my growth needs were not being met because many of the leaders within these companies I worked for often operated from at a lower stage of development than me.
What this created was a continual catch-22 situation whereby I would need to fulfil my survival, safety, and security needs, so I would get a job. But then after being in the job for six months to a year, I found I couldn’t really express myself and grow within it because management operated from a lower of stage of development than me. This caused me to eventually quit in frustration and start back at square one, needing to get a job again to meet my survival, safety, and security needs.
For many people in the United States right now, who are operating from a higher stage of development, they are probably feeling the same way about living within the United States and having a president who is operating from a lower stage of development. They probably are feeling like they want to leave the country and go to another country where the leader is operating at a higher stage of development.
I’m tired of continually beating myself up and asking myself, “What’s wrong with me?”
Yes, everyone probably does this everyday but let me explain the context of why I do this.
I beat myself up and wonder what’s wrong with me…when I’m able to perceive and understand something that apparently not many others can perceive and understand.
So because I can perceive something that others seem perceptually blind to, I label myself as a freak or an oddity, effectively seeing myself as an outcast.
And when I did, it felt like both returning home and returning to an exciting adventure that I’ve been on at the same time.
Like I just get “it” and “it” gets me.
And this doesn’t feel like work, it feels like play—glorious, adventurous play.
That’s it.
That’s all I wanted to say.
I’m tired of beating myself up about a potentiality of myself that makes me feel wondrously alive.
Actually no, I think there’s more.
I think what I want is to find my “tribe.” In effect, find the same kind of people who are able to perceive what I can perceive.
And it’s not like this is impossible because I know there are many people who value Richard Barrett’s work.
So if I had to describe what I’m seeking and need, it’s to find a community of people who are fully aware of vertical development and are sharing their own journeys and perspectives of it.
I guess the other thing I want to say is this.
I realize what I’m experiencing and communicating is monumentally challenging for people to grasp but I’ve done the journey myself.
I’ve crossed the inner terrain, expanded my worldview, and have learnt the language of the people of this realm, so anyone else can.
They just have to be willing to undertake the journey.
All the knowledge is out there, freely accessible on the Web, they just have to have a desire and resonance to read it.
No matter what I say, I can’t force someone to start that journey.
They have to want to start it themselves.
But when they’re on the journey, seriously on it, and want to understand the language of these different realms, then I’d be happy to help translate and help them understand the characteristics of these stages of psychological development.
But they have to understand the basic terminology of this space first. Until they do that, I can’t help them because they won’t understand my language.
They have to want to step beyond the horizon of their current mind and explore into an unknown space.
And ya, it’s scary as hell to do but there are people doing it everyday.
All I want to do is connect these people up and help them realize that they are all on the same journey of growth and development and not alone.
That’s it.
I no longer want to try to explain who I am or what I’m seeing to anyone anymore…unless they are on the same journey and understand the basic language of it.
In doing so, I think I’ll finally just be able to accept myself as I am, instead of continually beating myself up for having a potentially beyond others.
Somehow I think this is an essential step I have to take if I want to step beyond a Self-Authoring Mind and stabilize myself with a Self-Transforming Mind.
I have to fully accept who I am at all levels of my being.
Also in light of the upcoming election in Canada, I’ve been reading Mark Carney’s book on value(s) as well.
I’m particularly interested in seeing if there is any correlation between Mark’s perspective and how the future of work requires both individuals and organizations to level up their consciousness via vertical development, thus allowing them to contribute on a national level as well.
