Is it possible to will yourself to believe something that, at heart, you don't?

Question

I post this in psychology because I'm curious about it from a psychological perspective. The question springs from Pascal's Wager, but it applies to many other concepts too.

So, to ask it again: if there is something that you really want to believe in, but don't believe in, is it possible to 'force' that belief? How?

Answer 1

Wow, great question, and a hard one to answer definitively.

I think it's affected somewhat by personality. My eldest son is firmly anchored in reality and never fudges the facts, even when it would benefit him or make his world less painful.

My younger son, though, is a perpetual fabricator -- he tends to rewrite the past in the way that is most emotionally pleasing and/or beneficial to him. He's not TRYING to do it... he simply does, and we've had to work to help him establish a hard baseline.

My daughter, meanwhile, can repress her emotions easily and just block things out (something I've noticed runs strong in people with her personality type). Such people, if they so desire, are capable of simply "blanking" sections of memory that hurt them badly.

I think ultimately the mind still knows the truth when someone tries to believe something that they know was not true. Usually it shows itself in anxiety or annoyance on the surface when the fiction is challenged. The person either has to actively repress things or else becomes unsettled and knows that something is inconsistent and should be explored further.

I do think people can change their opinions over time. This is different than "believing something not true," since they are coming to believe something TO be true after all and thus changing their stance.

Like the example of the guy dating a Christian girl and changing his belief after a year, either he actually changes his belief (so there is no issue there) or the fact he has conformed to her belief without accepting it himself will come out at times when the relationship becomes emotionally stressful.

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In reference to Pascal's Wager... well, I don't think religious belief (which is what Pascal referred to) is all intellectual. Christianity is supposed to be a relational faith; you can intellectually "understand" or be able to "explain" God without actually loving him or wanting to serve him, and thus you're not really a believer per se.

I think Pascal's Wager is thus ultimately flawed. God doesn't want a bunch of followers who chose him simply out of "risk management" (well, if I don't follow him, I could go to hell if he's real; if I do follow him, then at least I'm no worse off if he's false).

The whole point is to love God, want to model your life after Him, want to love others like He loves them, want to serve him completely.

I wouldn't want a spouse who married me as insurance -- in case she never finds someone "better." That's not a real marriage, it would suck. Same thing with Pascal's Wager. I love the guy, but I think his rationalization is a lousy way to relate to God.

Answer 2

I don't know Pascal's Wager, but this sounds like something a Christian would say who was trying to reconcile intellectual analysis and religious doubt. Can Rene Descartes help? Remember that after he said, "I think, therefore I am," he went on to attempt to prove the existence of God on just such a solid footing. What he came up with was reasonable enough, but sounded very like forcing belief.

You can indeed convince yourself of things. Logic is part of it, and reasoning more generally; induction and deduction, and all of that. But "belief" is not really something which is forced. There is a thing called an "act of faith," which is apparently an act of will. You decide, "I want to be a person who believes this. So I will take this on faith." And you act as if you believe it, and you may convince yourself.

Or you may start thinking about how lying to yourself is a dangerous practice.

Answer 3

Yes, it's possible. Humans are very good at deluding themselves into believing anything they want to believe in. Most people are excellent at the art of self-justification. For example, there was a girl who made up lies about a principal at her high school. I won't go into detail, but basically she said that they'd had sex together. She ruined his reputation at the school, he lost his job and the respect of his community, it has had tremendous financial and psychological impact on both him and his wife. It finally came out in an interview with the teenager that she'd lied, and she'd made up that lie to tell the police as an excuse because she didn't want her grandma to know she'd been cutting class.

The interesting part about it was that when the interviewer asked her what she'd say to the guy, she had nothing to say....The interviewer was obviously rather taken aback by this, and said, "Well, are you sorry about it? Would you apologize?" The girl responded as though she had no idea she had anything to be sorry about, as though she had no conception of what she had done to this man's life.

Basically, when people do things to others that are bad, they justify it. Obviously this girl had justified her actions in her own mind, or she never would've lied in the first place. She rationalized that the police wanted her to tell them the answer that she did, maybe she rationalized that it wasn't going to hurt him, who knows. That is human nature, and it's very disturbing, but people do it every day. Look how we've justified the war going on right now. "Those damn foreigners, they're evil, we should just bomb them..." That kind of thing. You can justify anything in your mind, and if you try hard enough, you will believe your own events of the truth.

Answer 4

Many alterative health care providers believe in the importance of connecting the concious mind with the subconcious mind. Meaning, you can conciously think something, but your subconcious may not be buying into it. For example, lets say you have a spouse who cheats on you and leaves you. You are hurt, but you get over it. You even feel you have forgiven him. However, the subconcious mind is the irrational part of your brain that reacts on feelings, whether they are real or perceived. It can still be sending brain signals due to that traumatic experience and causing health problems, etc.

They say that if you speak something outloud, like "I am completely full of forgiveness and happy every day" - a few times a day - even if you don't "buy" it, eventually the subconcious mind will accept it as truth and it will become so.

Hey, won't hurt to try it!

Answer 5

I don't think a belief can be forced if you're already an adult, but you can end up believing in something by example and by practice. Example: You don't believe in God, but you meet a woman that you like and you go to church with her. After one year of attending church and seeing how devote she is, you may convert.

Answer 6

I would think so in the case of our so-called president. I'm sure he believes he's not a liar, or a murderer, or an illegal wiretapper, or a functionally retarded draft dodger! Somewhere in the abyss that he calls a brain, he must know that he's all of the above!

Answer 7

No. It's always going to be in the back of your minds that you don't agree w/it and it will soon fester to the point that you will have to do something to change it. It's being hypocritical to yourself and if you have a strong sense of who you are you will always feel like a sell-out.

Answer 8

i dont know, i have a lot of those thoughts and feelings all the time, i think after time it will probably have some effect on you, now that i think about it, theyve affected me, but mine are kind of the opposite, things i dont want to believe but i believe anyway, and not things that are based on facts, just things about myself and my life.

Answer 9

Yes, and people do it all the time. Look at people with drug abuse problems, denial plus dependence of a substance can convince the smartest of people that they do not have a problem.

Answer 10

if you keep telling yourself something, like " i believe in Leprechauns", over time, it should have an effect, just like when you do affirmations.