It Feels True, Even When I Know It’s Not

Bridging the Gap Between Knowing and Believing

Have you ever sat in therapy and said something like…

“I know it’s irrational, but I still feel it”? Or maybe: “I know they care about me, but I still feel like they’re going to leave”? If so, you’re not alone. Many emotionally sensitive people live in this space between knowing and believing—a chasm where logic and emotion feel like they belong to entirely different worlds. And when you're in it, it can feel like a kind of madness. Like you're gaslighting yourself with the truth.

What the Split Looks Like

I work with people who are exquisitely emotionally sensitive—people with eating disorders, borderline personality disorder, PTSD, and those who’ve been deeply invalidated throughout their lives. I once supported someone who was in a stable, loving relationship—and yet they were often overwhelmed by the fear that their partner was about to leave them. A slow reply to a text? Their body would spiral. Panic. Nausea. Inability to focus. Even while they logically reminded themselves that their partner was probably just busy, their emotional truth screamed: “They don’t love me anymore. I’m about to be abandoned.”

When we explored this in session, they could tell me those beliefs weren’t rational—but they still felt true. So true, in fact, that their nervous system reacted as if the breakup was happening in real time.

Why Emotional Truths Stick

Emotional truths often form in childhood or through trauma. They’re based not on current facts, but on past experiences. And in many cases, they helped you survive. Maybe the belief gave you a sense of control. Maybe it helped you prepare for hurt before it could happen. Maybe it explained why people treated you the way they did. So when someone says, “Just don’t think that way,” or “But you know that’s not true,” it doesn’t land.

Because emotional truth doesn’t dissolve just because rational truth walks into the room.

Bridging the Gap

So how do we begin to bridge that gap? How do you shift from knowing to believing?

Here’s where we start:

1. Validate the Emotional Logic

You're not broken. You're patterned. That belief might be outdated, but it made sense at one point in your life. Start there.

2. Name the Split

Use DBT’s three states of mind:

• Reasonable Mind: “I know this isn’t true.”

• Emotional Mind: “But it feels like it is.”

• Wise Mind: “Both can exist. What choice aligns with my values right now?”

3. Ask, “Is it Useful?”

Instead of “Is it true?”, try:

• Is this helpful right now?

• Is it effective?

• Does this move me toward the life I want?

4. Name the Emotional Payoff

Sometimes we hold on to beliefs because they serve a purpose:

• Safety

• Control

• Avoiding vulnerability

• Justifying self-punishment

5. Practice Mindfulness (the real kind)

Not the beachy, Instagram kind (although there is totally a space for that too). The kind where you notice when your mind time-travels into catastrophe or pulls trauma into the present moment. Then you ask: What’s happening right now? What do I need right now?

6. Act “As If”

You don’t need to believe a new story right away. Just try the behavior. It’s like emotional exposure therapy. Way more often than we would expect, belief follows action - not the other way around.

7. Accumulate Evidence, Slowly

Real-life experiences can start to disconfirm emotional beliefs. But you have to let yourself have those experiences first.

8. Practice Tolerating Distress

As someone who’s been there—bridging the gap between knowing and believing often means you're going to feel like shit. It can feel scary, uncomfortable, even panic-inducing. It won’t come naturally at first. But that doesn’t mean you’re doing it wrong. You can cope in ways that make it more bearable. I won’t say “practice makes perfect,” because I’ve never once had a client tell me that using a skill in a hard moment went perfectly. But practice does lessen pain. Practice reduces suffering. And eventually, practice can lead to pride—in the way you handled yourself, in the choices you made, in the way you stayed aligned with the life you're trying so hard to build.

(If you want a breakdown of actual distress tolerance tools that can help in moments like this, I’ve got you—[this post is coming soon].)

A Word on Frustration

If you’re feeling ashamed or frustrated—like you “should know better by now”—please stop should-ing yourself. This isn’t about intelligence. Or willpower. Or trying harder.

It’s about healing. And healing doesn’t always look rational. Sometimes, it looks like knowing better… but still feeling worse.

If you're stuck in that split between knowing and believing—you're not alone. You're not broken. You're just in the middle.

I’ll be posting more soon about distress tolerance tools for surviving that gap. But for now, just know this:

You don’t have to believe it yet.

You just have to keep showing up for yourself like it might be true.

– The Emo Therapist 🖤