Reality Testing

Thank you, Freud, for this helpful tool.

Some of the most profound shifts I see in therapy happen when a person starts eliminating judgement and guilt from the way they view themselves and how they relate to the world.

It means beginning to view things through a lens of curiosity and self-compassion. This allows us to most effectively explore what happened, identify our role in it, observe what underlying patterns might be driving our behavior, and take radical ownership where we can (and- importantly!- refuse to own anything that isn’t ours).

Now, this alone is incredibly helpful because progress cannot be made when we are in a constant loop of belittling ourselves; it takes bravery to say “I messed up, or I wish I would have handled that differently, or I feel lost *and* I have another chance to try again. What can I learn from this?"

But if we are so used to being self-critical, skewing things to see the situation in front of us as terrible or dwelling on our shortcomings- where do we even start?

Enter reality testing.

• Reality Testing is a concept coined by Sigmund Freud, which helps you distinguish your internal thoughts, feelings and ideas from reality.

It focuses on assessing the situation for exactly what it is rather than getting swept away.