FORTUNE TELLING

I'm pretty sure you are very familiar with this one. It's when you know how something's going to turn out. Let's say you're revising for your exam and in your mind you're already telling yourself that you're going to fail. Here predictions turn facts, a possibility is turned into a probability.

This is why so many of us hold ourselves back in life. You might avoid going to the social gathering just because we think there won't be anything that will interest you, you decide not to book an outdoor holiday because you predict that it will rain anyway, you might decide not to apply for this job, because you think you won't get it anyway. We can get stuck in this vicious circle and never move on, if we let our thoughts being taken as facts and develop a really low-self esteem.

How to challenge this?

• Identify exactly what your prediction is — exactly what will happen and when and where it will happen;

•  Examine evidence for and against your fortune telling.

• Ask yourself: 

1. How many times your predictions never happened?
2. How can you prove that your thought is right or wrong?
3. Are your fears responsible for fortune telling? 

•  Identify your fears and check what really happens when you embrace them. 

We direct this kind of thinking not only to ourselves but also to others, especially when we don't agree with other people's choices, lifestyle, etc. We might say to them "your relationship is not going to work" or "with a haircut like that you will only get laughed at". What I want to say here is that we simply can't predict anything, so it's not fair to put other people down. Life is not that simple, so why would we impose our opinions on other people (and ourselves) when there's very little chance the things we predict will ever happen. Accept that you just don't know and stay open to various of possibilities.