Analysis: a self-fulfilling prophecy occurs when we adopt a belief that affects our behaviour in such a way that this belief becomes a reality
Self-fulfilling prophecy effects have been a topic of investigation in psychological research since the 1940s. Traditionally, there were two types of self-fulfilling prophecies identified: self-imposed prophecies, which as the name suggests, occur when your own expectations influence your actions. Other-imposed prophecies occur when other people’s expectations influence your behaviour.
A self-fulfilling prophecy occurs when we adopt a belief that affects our behaviour in such a way that this belief becomes a reality. This is why the beliefs we adopt should come with a buyer beware sign. Beliefs are not necessarily what’s true or factual in the real world and the power of each belief comes only from the individual believer. This means that you can believe whatever you want to believe: if you believe it to be true, it will be true in your life. As Henry Ford once said, "whether you think you can, or you think you can’t — you’re right."
Just like yin and yang, the power of positive and negative beliefs are two sides of the same coin. The beauty of a self-fulfilling prophecy is that you can choose whether your coin lands on heads or tails. Consequently, you will attract events, experiences and people into your life to match your beliefs. For this reason, it is crucial to adopt only the beliefs that serve you and to let go of those beliefs that limit you.
We need your consent to load this YouTube contentWe use YouTube to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage Preferences
From Social Psych Today, Andy Luttrell on the social psychology fundamentals behind a self-fulfilling prophecy
While beliefs can be very empowering, they can be equally disempowering. Many times, our beliefs are negative or pessimistic about a person, situation and even ourselves, and they limit us and sabotage our results. Our minds are very fragile so we lose confidence in ourselves when our self-beliefs are negative.
This can snowball into a vicious cycle of self-defeat where we not only fear failure, but also expect failure. When we create this narrative in our minds it distorts our social reality and subconsciously pushes us along a self-destructive path. The good news is that decades of social psychological research suggests that we can reframe our beliefs and by prescriptively describing a situation, we can evoke behaviour that makes the situation come true.
Here are three steps to guide us on our journey to developing beliefs that help to create a winning self-fulfilling prophecy.
Free yourself from a negative belief system
Have you ever actually taken the time to question or challenge your beliefs? Belief systems are the stories we tell ourselves to define our personal sense of reality. We all have a belief system that we use to make sense of the world around us. It helps us to define who we are in the world; it is our perceived reality. It influences how we behave, how we think, how we view the world, and how we talk to ourselves and others.
We need your consent to load this YouTube contentWe use YouTube to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage Preferences
From TEDxLinz, psychotherapist, clinical psychologist and health psychologist Michael Lehofer on the priniciples of the self fulfilling prophecy (in German).
These beliefs are reinforced by culture, religion, political viewpoints, life experience and our interpretations as to how society works. For many people, our belief system is invisible, like a silent mechanism working away in our mind formulating interpretations and responses to everyday life, without us ever questioning why we are responding in certain ways.
When we begin to explore our beliefs, we start to understand how reactions are formed and shaped. We can make a conscious commitment to stop looking at the external world for answers and realise that the power to positive change, lies within us, in our internal world. We can self-reflect by asking questions such as why do I think in this way? What evidence do I have to support my belief? Is this belief holding me back or supporting me to live a good life? And, because negative beliefs are ingrained in our minds, we must understand that beliefs can only be changed through persistence, patience, and self-reflection.
Set goals
It is essential that we clearly recalibrate and realign our belief system to embrace a more positive way of life, because our beliefs not only affect the goal setting process but also the execution. Setting the right goals is the first step towards planning for a successful future, because as vital as it is to expect success, nothing happens until we act. It is only through action that intended results are produced. Action is the muscle of belief.
We need your consent to load this YouTube contentWe use YouTube to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage Preferences
From Sprouts, a look at the Pygmalion Effect phenomenon where higher expectations lead to higher performance
Believe in yourself
You are at the helm in your life, and you have the choice to decide to keep driving down the same road you have always been on, or you can re-evaluate your beliefs and turn and go in a new and more focused direction. If we become more accountable to ourselves and view our mistakes as a valuable source of experience and learning, then it stands to reason that these actions will increase our self-confidence and in turn our mental resilience. Perhaps the most important lesson we can learn is that our beliefs hold tremendous power! Whatever we expect to find and experience in life is usually what we get, our own custom-made self-fulfilling prophecy.
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ
