Thoughts on dealing with limiting beliefs shared or imposed by family?

[WyclefJohn]

I've very recently realised that in my family, we share a number of limiting beliefs. They're not beliefs that have been imposed by my parents, who I love very much, but are shared. They're often unspoken, and there is an element of social class mixed in. In my case, I just realise there were so many things people like us didn't do. These include travel, aim for certain professions, or take part in sports like skiing.

I was fortunate enough to go away to university, and my horizons have been massively broadened, but I have this nagging feeling, that I don't belong.

My parents have always supported me, and in many ways, they have limited themselves, me, and my brother implicitly. It's hard to put on paper, or on screen, and I love them so much, but it is something that has affected me, my brother, and my parents. There is a sense that we should always go for the safe option. It's just something I've been thinking about, wanted to get down, and share.

This is very interesting.

I'm the first one in my family to go to university, but luckily for me my parents realised early on that I was odd, so there was no worrying about "what people like us do", they knew that I should go to university because that IS "what people like Trills do".

Thanks Annandale that is interesting. One value I have inherited from my ancestors is the idea that you can't rely on people in authority to do the right thing, which I think has held me back in some ways.

This is an incredibly interesting thread. I've been thinking about this a lot as I'm mid 30s and NC with my mother, for my own sanity. Since I went NC with her I've got braver and finally ventured out of the self imposed prison I was holding myself in, and the more people I meet, the more I have realised I don't really below anywhere or to any class or type of person because I'm such a mish-mash of odd ideas and cultural stuff.

Whoever posted this was spot on: The cultural capital thing that Cuboidal talks about is really relevant and something that is a huge stumbling block for many people who would otherwise do very well in life - particularly people from different ethnic backgrounds who are 'locked out' of situations where they learn how things are done - I think people majorly underestimate the effect that not knowing the schema (ie the script) for situation has on a person

This is EXACTLY how I feel. I was raised by a deaf single mother with depression, anger issues and (I think) autism or ADHD or both. I was fed and clothed and taken to play dates and museums and stuff but otherwise I had nothing to watch and learn from. We lived on benefits and I am still on them now, although I am self employed and also a single parent. I find myself wanting to make different choices from my family and feel so... entrenched in this way of being that I don't know how to escape. I did the OU and got a First (which I have never used, it's in an arty subject) and when I started my studies my mum blurted out "You can't get a degree, because then you'll be cleverer than me!" and looked bashful and we both sort of stood there with her words hanging in the air between us.

I just feel utterly lost, I don't know who the hell I am or what to do with my life and I don't belong anywhere. I talk like someone off radio 4 but essentially was raised in isolation, with the view that there was nothing to be done but live on benefits for all time, being frightened and disempowered and small. I have no idea where to do about disentangling the things I've internalised. I paid for therapy for 18 months recently but I ran out of money to continue, and my therapist was very middle class, always dressed perfectly in classy clothes and once looked horrified and almost angry when I told her what my weekly food budget was.
Is there some kind of book I can read about this? What is it even called, to feel this way? I'd love to unpick it all and finally understand.

One value I have inherited from my ancestors is the idea that you can't rely on people in authority to do the right thing

There's some research going on at Warwick, I think, about how people who are successful underestimate the role of luck in their success. There is a lot of truth in that: you aren't successful purely because of your hard work and talent, being in the right place at the right time helps.

But the flip-side of that is that there are a lot of people who see all of life as a lottery, with success or failure the result of arbitrary good or bad fortune. That is immensely disempowering. One of the hallmarks of the middle classes is long term planning: the admission of children into aspirational universities, for example, is the result of a campaign of the complexity, and scale, akin to that of the land invasion of Europe over contested beaches in 1944. Whereas if you believe that it's all luck, or all connections, there's no point in doing anything, because the outcome will be the same either way. And it isn't just luck, so the result of doing nothing will almost always be failure.

Gary Player said of golf that the strange thing (he was being sarcastic) was that the more he practiced the luckier he got. He wasn't wrong. And a willingness to invest longterm (along with all the usual debates about deferred gratification) might not always bring the desired results, but will almost always produce something.

My mother gave me the impression very early that work was a pain. Even though she had a good profession that she had chosen. It's hard to articulate- but it was like earning money was compensation for drudgery/ dealing with the assholery of the general public all day. And that anything outside of that, especially if you enjoyed it, didn't really count as work and was kind of silly. I was over 30 before it clicked that I could potentially do something I enjoy and that it wouldn't have to be her martyrdom.

This is so interesting. My DM is just like this. I have a master's degree and had a fantastic career which I took a break from when the children came along. Then it was like all those limiting beliefs resurfaced - about what women and mothers and 'people like us' are capable of. In her case she thinks I should only do part time NMW work (preferably in a shop - like she did), drive a sensible little runaround car, stay stuck in an unhappy marriage and be a martyr/slave to my children. Unfortunately, it has taken me over 15 years and severe bouts of depression and anxiety to see that this is about her own fears and need to keep me 'safe' and not actually a reflection of my own abilities. Like a PP I'm not even sure who I am and what I can do any more but I know something needs to change.

Rhubarb that's such a complex situation. I don't know that I have anything helpful to say, except that you express yourself so well (that OU first isn't a surprise). I can only say that I'm going through an extreme experience at the moment (traumatic bereavement) and physical things are helping me as much as therapy; exercise (a couple of hours plus a day) and a massage from time to time (I'm lucky to be able to afford it) and, erm, some sexual 'self-care and development' which I'm happy to talk about on the Sex board but not here. From my very limited knowledge I believe that people with autism (if that's your mother's issue) have a very different relationship with their bodies than the neurotypical, and I doubt you will have been encouraged to enjoy your body and what it can do for you, rather in the same way that you weren't encouraged to enjoy your intellect. I'm not a yoga fan but something like that, or running which is cheaper, or swimming if you can afford it.

Also just because your degree is in an arty subject doesn't mean you can't do anything with it - though it sounds like you have found it very difficult to do so and I know it can be tough. Do you write regularly?

I've been following this thread and I think it's really interesting and quite sad in places. I think what I find so almost frightening about this for me is the feeling of being trapped within the confines of some expected boundaries, without being aware of being trapped. To use a terrible metaphor of being trapped by an invisible cage that you can completely walk through.

In my case, I don't remember too many explicit examples, if any, of being told "you can't do this", like some people have. But it's always been a bit more subtle. However, I do remember a few years ago, I'd got an scholarship to go to the US to attend a scientific workshop, and I was with my parents and my brother. I said I would consider a small roadtrip. My brother said he couldn't imagine why anyone would ever want to visit the US. Now, I understand many not wanting to move there, but there are a lot of fascinating things to see there.

@NotDavidTennant makes a good point that it is not all about class, but also personality and openness to experience.

My brother said he couldn't imagine why anyone would ever want to visit the US.

I've travelled fairly extensively for work (north and south America. Europe, various parts of Asia) and always looked forward to it. I enjoy both the process of travel and the being there, and even places I've been unimpressed by in that "OK, but not again" sort of way (and they have been few and far between) have been worth going to. Other places I've been back to on my own money, or have engineered repeat visits from my employer.

I have friends whose immediate response is, as you say, "why would you do that?" And they've drummed it into their children, who in turn regard travelling more than fifty miles from home as dangerous and pointless. But I stopped travelling, pretty much, for about ten years, and I'm now back doing it (four or five long-haul trips a year). It's bloody marvellous, and it means my children are entirely relaxed about making similar trips for their work and study.

Is it any consolation that this is a very common process? Not everyone goes through it - some people just accept what they're told and never question anything (and in a way a I really envy them) - but those who do go through it, I think, become happier, more 'whole,' generous and adventurous people. It's a tough process, especially if your upbringing was in any way odd or abusive, but it is worth it, I think. That feeling of not know who you are in a common one and there's an urge to get rid of it but I think you have to sit with it a while because you will figure it out. You know who you are, somewhere in there, it's just that you don't have full access to it yet. But you will.

It is absolutely a consolation. I am in the process of re-evaluating what to do with my career, and with a few other things, and absolutely, it is nice to see it is a process. It can be a bit uncomfortable, but yes, very much worth it.

It's worth remembering also that you don't need to have all the answers straight away - it's a process for the rest of your life, basically. And it's far better to keep learning and changing than to get stuck in one way of doing things, putting down the shutters to keep everything else out.

Absolutely fascinating - I’m recognising aspects of my own upbringing here and also that of friends. The clipping of wings is very prevalent where I come from.

This is so interesting! I’m university educated - Russell Group, arts degree followed by a Masters - and from a very middle class background. My DP & I have very similar tastes and aspirations, but my ILs are so suspicious and often quite dismissive of me and of our lives. They’re horrified that you could spend £35 on a top and claim people ‘just do that for the designer’ (?!) and yet easily spend that much on a bunch of cheaper tops that disintegrate after a few washes. They live 40 miles away but my MIL will never come to our city as she doesn’t think it’s for the likes of her. There will be a lot of problems once grandkids come along and they’ll have to accept that we do things differently to them.

Fascinating thread! One aspect I've been pondering is about relationship with house and home, which I think is also a little related to class and upbringing. I have standard middle class upbringing with music lessons and house full of books, while DH was first to go to university, immigrant father etc. DH (and MIL) are obsessed with doing up our house, prioritising that over holidays, time with the children etc. Is there an element of class at being so 'houseproud' for want of a better word? DH is very well read and loves books but only wanted nice hardbacks on display, with my paperbacks consigned to upstairs. Books as objects V books as tool/escape/knowledge?

Crikey, I can definitely relate to the doing up the house, but whether that is related, I don't know. My parents are always having something done in the house (new carpet in that room, new cupboards in the kitchen, move the steps in the garden). That said I had a house full of books, and always a stack of library book (my parents are quite well read)

Yes- my mother also has a weird thing about money even though they were decently well off. It's a kind of 'you can't afford nice things' attitude. I think it's given me a weird and not always necessary financial anxiety. Going to have to think that one out further but it's similar to a pp- she'd only buy from a cheap brand and get something that doesn't last yet treat (me) buying something good (and consequently holding onto clothes) with tuts and a lemon face and an attitude that it's too extravagant for the likes of you. I still feel guilty getting something decent.

I've seen it said fondly that 'real' upper class people don't stand on ceremony, often have extremely messy houses and scruffy clothes, are irreverent and sweary etc as a way of implying that 'keeping up with the Joneses' people are getting it all wrong by worrying about appearances. What they seem to fail to grasp is that it takes a certain privilege not to give a shit about what people think of you and it takes a great sense of entitlement and security to not worry about how you come across - you don't have to act 'well brought up' because anyone can see you are wealthy and thus have a free pass into the upper echelons. It's similar to how people behave around different guests - when my sister is visiting I don't think twice about how the house looks, I don't bother tidying up - she's my sister, she knows how messy I am, I'm not going to fool her. But when a new guest is visiting I spend hours cleaning and I worry about what they'll think. Likely they are just as lovely and accepting as my sister is (otherwise we wouldn't be friends) but I don't have that sense of security - to an extent I have to put on an act to show I've made an effort. That's not to say that's a bad thing - the 'act' is a sign of respect in that I am courting their good favour as I feel it's worth something - but it's easier and less stressful to get through life only ever feeling like my sister's visiting - ie never having to 'prove' myself to anyone.

Similarly I may wear jeans to an office like everybody else once I see that the dress code is casual but I would never turn up to an interview in jeans - I need to impress and part of that is being seen to make an effort to dress well. However, if I know you have to look and act a certain way to go to an interview but I'm not entirely sure what way that is, or I don't have ready access to a suit, then that fairly simple process of being 'right' for an interview may be a total barrier to me. It may be very scary and I may not engage with it at all, and accept that it's just not for me (and also not for my children)

This is a very blatant example of how relatively minor expectations can have a big impact. A black student was told her braids, which are a perfectly ordinary hairstyle for a black person, constituted an 'extreme' hairstyle and was told to remove them. Thankfully her mother is a badass and roundly taught them a lesson but you can imagine the effect that being told your hair isn't right, even when your hair is in no way unusual in your cultural circle. The very strong message that sends to the person is that they need to be like the other members of the powerful group they are trying to be part of (ie white people) in order to be acceptable.

Hahaha re raw steak and education levels!!!

I have a PhD and sometimes, when noone is looking, i eat a bite of pretty raw beef that I'm cooking. "Just to try if it's done", I tell myself.

A colleague from Oxford is so well educated he even eats his pork pink.

I want to meet someone with a Nobel to see if they eat raw chicken.

I've seen it said fondly that 'real' upper class people don't stand on ceremony, often have extremely messy houses and scruffy clothes, are irreverent and sweary etc

In a book I read a million years ago about class, it recounted the claim that when asked "would you like to look around my house?" the upper class guest replied to the middle class host, "whatever for?"

Certainly, the students I occasionally meet who are wearing second-hand watches and when there's a formal event turn up in what is quite clearly their father's old DJ aren't poor. Quite the opposite. That's one of the huge ironies about weddings in which the bridal party wear matching new, cheap clothes. The smooth would be wearing high quality, perhaps even couture, of uncertain age.

It was certainly noticeable that the parents' cars in the car park at one of the older Oxford colleges, where my child was, were a great deal older and scruffier than those in the car park at my Redbrick on moving in day. My 150k miles estate car (I was going to say "shooting brake") fitted in perfectly at the former, but would look most out of place at the latter.

This is a very interesting thread, and mirrors lots going on in my own life at the minute- I thought it was possibly age related, or certainly lifestyle related. Definitely influenced by local culture in my experiences.

When I was a teen I was clever enough, doing well at school. At 16, I got a 23 year old boyfriend, constantly heard 'we can't stop her, she'll be pregnant before you know it'. I could easily have been stopped! But they were right, and I ended up having DD at 18.

I was easily clever enough for uni, but it just wasn't the done thing- I can probably name 4 people in my year at secondary school who managed it. We lived on a council estate, I was expected to get a council house, I did. It was expected that I'd become a single parent, I did. Holidays were the norm, but to somewhere hot where you laid on a beach/pool on the day and drank in the bar on a night, you didn't go exploring. Even as a teen, this was allowed up to a limit. Your job was part time around the kids- shop work, dinner lady, etc. Your spare time was watching the soaps. You didn't bother to vote

As I grew up, I rebelled against these expectations (because I'm stubborn and hate being told what to do).

I worked up to management in the shop role, and studied part time for a degree with the OU (massive kudos on the First Rhubarb, that's a job well done! I ended up with a 2:1 and that was bloody hard work!), changed careers and work in finance. I bought my house. I bought a car that was purely because I LIKED it, not because it was cheap or practical. I saw that my daughter was heading down the same direction I was at 12, and took her out of school, rented out my house and moved us to a local market town with an excellent all girls school, and that has changed her attitude massively. I am with my partner, and we are actively planning a child/ more children, rather than it just 'happening'.

The result of this is that my family often tease me for thinking I am better than them for living in xx town. It's 20 mins down the road, but a different lifestyle and culture. I'm not having DD growing up with it being 'expected' to spend her life like I was. Like a PP above, the question is not 'will you go to uni?', but 'which uni will you go to?'. My family look aghast when they spoke of the local uni, and I expressed a wish that she goes as far away as she feels comfortable, to spread her wings and broaden her horizons.She expressed a wish to do an NVQ type qualification, which got an explanation of how you may end up in a minimum wage job, as I have often enough, but you aim high with your expectations in life. That was never instilled of me, clever people may become a teacher but that's it.

Families don't always get it in my experience. They are too influenced by those closest to them in culture, and it's very hard to break out of the mindset.

I can identify with so much of this. I grew up in a very working class environment, a council estate in a shithole ex-mining town in Derbyshire.

As a bright teenager, I developed an interest in politics and started reading the Guardian. The first time I brought a copy home, my dad said “who the fuck do you think you are?” I was accused of thinking I was ‘above’ the rest of my family. The Guardian was most definitely ‘not for the likes of us’.

When I started listening to R4, they were utterly baffled. Not only did they not listen to the station, they had no idea it even existed. To them radio = pop music.

The culture of conformity and massively limited horizons was incredibly oppressive. Leaving that world to go to university was incredibly liberating. I could finally be myself.

Same for me BonnieF, I started listening to R4 in my mid teens and fell in love with this world of politics and imaginative dramas and comedy. I was very isolated though as I was home educated from age 9 and living in the middle of nowhere for much of my teens. I had literally no friends so I read and read and walked in the woods and listened to R4, was was surprised when I then became very depressed and suicidal aged 17.
I really want to go back and just rescue my younger self, tell her to leave home and do something, anything. But actually I was mired so deep in fear that it's only aged 35, after a year of NC with my controlling, oppressive mother that I'm finally starting to feel like I may have other options than a life spent on benefits, in quiet and constant fear. I'm just not quite sure what to do next...