Cognition: Disrupting negative patterns of thinking (I)
The Relational Worker
Slow disruption of the mind
Accumulated past difficulty is seeded deep in the mind. It is the foundation for unhealthy templates of self, of what others might do, of a world that deals bad cards.
If I do something wrong, people will leave me. No matter what happens, I will never get better. Everybody is out there to get me. If I let the guard down, people will hurt me.
Relationships disrupt how people think. They challenge negative underlying beliefs.
Relationships disrupt the mind by defying the tenets formed from previous failed relationships. The helper offers the helped something different from the past.
What is different?
Workers who do not behave as expected. Who stick despite the suspicion that they will quit. Who show interest in the person and do not get bogged down in their issues. Who keep their promises. Who show they care. All these behaviours begin to log in the mind of the helped.
Here’s a young woman on her experience of a different response:
Like she was just really honest with me, and I’d kind of been told by everyone that I was a lost cause, but she didn’t treat me like that or talk to me like that. She proper showed like she thought she could help me.
Another young woman: She just knows it’s me. She doesn’t react in a certain way. Like a lot of people. They’re like, oh my god, why is she acting like that? But she is not like that, because she knows me. I bounce off the walls a lot, I know that.
Some of the experiences are described as ‘first times’. First time when people feel listened to, cared for, when they hear that things could get better, when someone turns up to help.
Now the mind is open to new thoughts. And the conversations go much deeper. The helper and helped are now carving time to talk about how to be a man, how to behave in relationships, religion, views of the world. Bit by bit, a context is created. A space to re-assess templates about the self and others.
