What is Schema Therapy?
Schema therapy is a type of therapy that helps you uncover and understand patterns of thinking that may be holding you back. These patterns, called schemas, often develop early in life when certain emotional needs aren’t met. As you grow, these patterns can lead to unhealthy ways of coping, like avoiding challenges, overcompensating, or putting others’ needs ahead of your own. If left unchecked, they can affect your relationships and emotional well-being.
For example, you might believe, “I’m not lovable,” “People don’t care about me,” or “I’ll never be good enough.” These thoughts can be tough to shake, but schema therapy helps you change these patterns and develop healthier ways of thinking and coping.
Think of schemas as the lenses through which you see the world. If those lenses were shaped by difficult early experiences, they may cause you to see yourself or others in a negative light, even when it’s not true.
What Do Children Need?
In childhood, we all have basic emotional needs, like:
- Feeling safe with the people around us.
- Knowing who we are and being able to make our own choices.
- Expressing our feelings and asking for what we need in a balanced way.
- Being able to play and be ourselves.
- Having clear boundaries set by caring adults.
When these needs aren’t met, unhealthy schemas can form.
Schemas and Coping Styles
Schemas are emotional patterns formed in childhood. Once formed, they can be hard to change. There are 18 different schemas, and they fall into five main categories. How we react to these schemas is called our Coping Style — these are the thoughts, feelings, or actions we use to avoid painful emotions that come from our schemas.
The Five Categories of Schemas
- Disconnection and Rejection
- Impaired Autonomy and Performance
- Impaired Limits
- Other-Directedness
- Overvigilance and Inhibition
The Three Unhealthy Coping Styles:
- Surrender: Giving in to the negative schema.
- Avoidance: Trying to escape feelings or situations that trigger the schema.
- Overcompensation: Over-correcting by acting in the opposite way of the schema, often to an extreme.
How Can Schema Therapy Help?
If you’ve ever felt stuck in the same unhelpful patterns no matter how hard you try, schema therapy may offer the deeper understanding you’ve been looking for. The goal of schema therapy is to help you identify and understand your behaviours, recognise their underlying causes, and begin to heal. It’s a process that takes time—often months or years—but it’s worth it. Schema therapy teaches you how to meet your emotional needs in healthy, adaptive ways that don’t lead to distress.
Your therapist will guide you through different strategies to challenge unhelpful schemas and develop a stronger, healthier adult mindset. This may include cognitive techniques, like questioning your negative thoughts, and behavioural approaches, like practicing new responses to situations that trigger unhealthy schemas.
In schema therapy, you’ll work with your therapist to first identify the schemas affecting your life, then challenge these patterns, and finally develop healthier ways to cope. Each session builds on the last, helping you take concrete steps toward change.
Seek help today
At Private Space Medical, we provide a compassionate, non-judgmental space where you can explore and heal deeply ingrained patterns. Our therapists offer empathy and guidance, helping you break free from unhelpful behaviours. If you’re ready to break free from patterns that no longer serve you, reach out to Private Space Medical today.