Red flags for delusions

I thought I’d share some tips I’ve learned that help me recognize delusional beliefs. Things to look out for

-Simplest one. Would other people find these beliefs strange? If yes, it’s probably a delusion.

-Do the beliefs have “every time I do this, x happens?” Anything with a “every time” statement you should be skeptical of because it is very unlikely that something happens EVERY time. ex. Every time I’m mad, there is a storm–>I must control the weather with my emotions. I can guarantee in this case a storm does not happen every single time you are upset. You can challenge these beliefs by specifically looking for times when what you thought would happen does not happen and then logging them ex. I am upset today but the weather is nice–> my moods don’t actually affect the weather

-Conditional beliefs. This means there are a lot of conditions attached. “I have this power or ability but i can’t prove it and use it right now because x”, an example of this is “I am a werewolf but I can’t turn into one because it’s against monster laws to reveal myself so there is magic that prevents me from doing so”. Conditions are a way for your brain to try to protect your beliefs even when you don’t have any evidence for them. They are fake explanations and can become incredibly convoluted and in my opinion are the main culprit for keeping people trapped in delusion.

Those are a few of my findings. Feel free to share your own!

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wow that is really helpful. thanks for sharing!

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Those could be helpful for some, especially if they’re not fully in psychosis yet, maybe just beginning to decompensate. They require some sense of logic and reason, though. When I’m full-on psychotic logic and reason go right out the window. My so-called logic in that state makes sense to me and only me.

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Yes these are meant to be preventative. Most of the coping skills I built up are focused on preventative things to do to prevent symptoms from spiraling. I realize when you’re in an episode it’s pretty much too late for any of this.

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Great tips, thanks. My returning believe is that I am in a purgatory and am dead… When I feel well I think it is ridiculous. I am trying to think when being in my delusion the rational thoughts, how probable it is that it is true. I am a rational person, like statistics, hard facts, so maybe these help when sometimes lose touch with the reality, to quite quickly get back to here and now. But sometimes this is hard…

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