The Difference Between Knowing and Believing
“It is hard to fathom, but try to trust me when I say, there are many parents who gleefully ignore the needs of the child they have, so they might focus more intently on punishing the world for the child they didn't get. There are many MANY adults who will attempt to hold us all back, as a country and culture, to satisfy this need for parental revenge. They lived their whole lives unconcerned and unbothered when it comes to issues of ableism, and they resent being forced into the identity and experience of disability by the life they made and are charged to care for. Do they know that? Maybe. But knowing isn't the same as believing, and their ultimate belief is that they would only have a disabled child if someone, or something else, intervened.”
This is a quote from my friend, Ashley Ford, written in response to our president’s recent comments suggesting that Tylenol causes Autism. There is no science to support this claim. Ashley points out, and I agree, that some parents are looking for an escape from the reality that they have a child with disabilities. For them, it feels easier to blame Tylenol, vaccines, or any outside source, rather than to engage in the hard emotional work of accepting their child’s diagnosis without needing to hold anyone or anything responsible for the challenges the diagnosis brings.
But I don’t want to spend my time today debating Autism, Tylenol, parenting, or politics. Instead, I want to reflect on an idea Ashley names, which is: knowing isn’t the same as believing. It’s a distinction that circles my mind often, and one I’ve come to know as true both personally and professionally.
Knowing isn’t the same as believing
As a therapist, I see this often. People don’t live from their intellect; they live from their beliefs. We can know something in our heads and still not live it in our behaviors. Our behaviors are the outward expression of our internal belief systems.
Here’s a personal example: I know it is important to eat well and exercise. But if I don’t actually believe those practices are worth prioritizing, I won’t do them. More information about the benefits won’t change me. Fear tactics about health risks won’t either. Change only comes when I believe those changes are both possible and worth my investment.
Or consider relationships. I might know that a relationship is unhealthy, but if I believe it is my responsibility to rescue the other person, I’ll stay. Only when I believe it’s unacceptable for someone to harm me, or that it is not my job to heal them, do I become free to make different choices.
Much of my work, as a therapist, is helping people become curious about the belief systems that keep them stuck. My clients don’t need more information. They don’t need me to tell them why they’re wrong. They need support in exploring what it is that they believe, why they believe it, and whether those beliefs are helping or hurting them.
When clients realize that their beliefs no longer serve them, we begin the hard work of confronting old narratives and experimenting with new ones. Change isn’t just about thinking differently; it’s about believing differently.
(I want to quickly name that sometimes changing beliefs means leaving behind a community of people who are still beholden to an old belief system that no longer serves you - and that sucks.)
