The Three Lies

My friend Christina, a licensed therapist, tells me that Psychiatry 101 teaches therapists that when you and I choose to believe a lie about ourselves, it’s one of these three lies we believe:

I’m helpless.

I’m worthless.

I’m unlovable.

Reflexively I tried to prove her wrong. “Seriously, Christina? Only three?” I told her that I’ve been known to believe three hundred lies about myself—in a day. “Nope,” she said. “Each one of those three hundred lies fits into one of these three.” For the sake of argument, let’s assume that Christina is right. The question I have for…