A CBT look at Blitz's core beliefs
Ok first off a core belief is this how the world works sort of thought. It has a ton of evidence on it side, or some big life altering event. Acting within is designed to kept you safe. And everyone has good and bad ones.
Think of it as of a short bit of base code running in the background, helping you go with your gut. A quick a short cut, but one that's got a lot of logic and past facts behind it.
They're mostly set up in childhood. So if you have an abusive parent, or trauma, you can get ones that become unhelpful for you in other situations. Like with people that really care about you.
A distortion is a little different. They affect how you look at the world based off your mood, and are always negative. They specifically don't have a lot of evidence on their side. Like a prism that makes things a little different than what's really there.
They are an action to do based on your mood: catastrophizing (when everybody I love leaves me next year)
Black & white thinking (yes there's all this evidence showing Stolas cares, but that doesn't count as it just sex).
Thought spiraling (this one goes to Moxxie heh)
Or snap judgments based only only how your mood is (Ghostfuckers is fun and sexy, so we should take the case when I know they don't exist).
So 'all royals are assholes' and 'no royal will care about an imp' are a core beliefs. Because this is definitely true, the 1% don't give a fig. (Stolas and Ozzie are basically round errors from what we've seen).
"I'm going to die alone" is also one.
So is "I make everyone's lives worse"
But his good ones are: "we don't get rid of family",
Ok with these two good ones we're going to have to go into rules for life. Blitz core belief is about family sticks together and protects each other. That's his code that always wants to run.
But he's also got evidence that family will kick you out for not being good enough, and hurting/killing people on accident. When you get code clashing you get cognitive dissidence, which physically hurts.
So you do a patch to reduce that pain. A rule to live by. 'If X is right and Y is right, then the variable that off is me.'
'We don't get rid of family, but we do get rid of me = I'm the only one who we can get rid of'.
With Loona it's we get orphanage lady saying words that could have come straight out of Cash's mouth. (I want Blitz to get a song telling that git off so hard).
Those hit Blitz hard, so hard he changed his mind on adopting a small little child, to a older teenage. CBT says that when something hits that hard it's because it hit at least 1 core belief. He sees himself in Loona in that moment, and never want another kid to be gotten rid of.
And other one could be bad or good depending on what's around it. 'I will be of use to family/people I love'. Blitz needs to feel useful to the people he loves, especially with growing in a family business working from being a kid.
And the rule Blitz has made for himself between the "I'm going to die alone" + 'I will be of use to family' = 'But maybe if I'm useful they won't abandoned of me yet'
(Also how sad it is that Blitz feels he's only allowed help, and support if it's a tit for tat, favours for favours exchange).
So everyone has a mixed bag of these good and bad. The problem happened when trauma responses give you ones that don't help you in a new situation. Like say a demon prince falling head over heels for him.
The idea of CBT is that if your struggling to look at what's changed since the core beliefs were set up. And if it isn't keeping you safe anymore, then you try to replace the old one with a new one; that has new evidence that backs it up. A update.
Like how Millie shows Blitz concrete examples of him improving her life. Just telling him he hasn't wrecked her life wouldn't work.
(This is one of reasons why Stolas' confection doesn't stick with Blitz. Blitz needs to know reasons why someone like Stolas loves him. It why he asks him in apology tour. Stolas tell your boy why he's so amazing for flips' sake).
Millie shows how joining IMP positively improved her live. "He gave me so much...A career, a husband, a future. And now...He's my best friend."
And Blitz helping Millie through alot of her own negative self talk she had. That 'she's not good enough', 'she's only the muscle', 'that Pride's too fancy for imps', and 'no imp works for them selves'.
These we're all Millie's core beliefs before joining IMP, if she still had these Rolando's words would have hurt her. But through having the support and example of Blitz she's removed those old bits of code.
When see her mum it obvious where and why she has these ideas about herself. Lynn describes her full time job, being employed direct by a company; as "Freelance". Because Imps can't work for themselves. (Even if she is impressed by Blitz). It's like different between working for Uber, instead of taxi firm. No protections, and an unsafe unstable job.
She pulls up her daughter's valid explanation why she lost the fight as "Excuses!", because Millie was "'raised better than that' as the muscle of the team.
She's very against Moxxie for being too week, and not having the same melee skills as Millie.
It obvious that she wants her daughter to have a similar life as her, where she keeps her head down, and has a partner that is able to defend Millie. This because there's a level of safety in this crab bucket attitude. She'd very unlikely to come to the notice of higher-ups. Like how Stolas being very involved in IMP and with Blitz.
But Blitz talked Millie round, and also showed her that she doesn't have to pigeon hole herself like that. She has years of evidence that Blitz could do it, and him pointing out how good she is when she fell back into thinking of herself as just the muscle.
Rolando's trying to exploit vulnerability that she's updated against. (It's super ineffective).
Ok after that sight side tangent of with Millie's head, back to Blitz's.
The "your going to die alone" has become a self-fulfilling prophecy, tripping Blitz up alot. Because it comes twofold for his fear of hurting his loved ones, making their life worse, and his fear of abandonment. Because he was abandoned, that did happen.
Making him feel like he has it to push away the people he love for there own, and that they'll leave him eventually so might as well push them away now. He's got a lot of previous evidence tied to this.
It's going to take more then Fizz and Millie telling him he didn't ruin theirs, for him to start to be able to unpick this. Because he's still certain it's true. Even if he's improved the lives of most of the people he knows.
And even Fizz who were directly effected by the mistake Blitz still punishing himself for, has told him that being made disabled didn't ruin his life.
There's a whole debate in my head whether Barbie would have had such trouble with addiction; if she wasn't assuming/told that her brother started the fire on purpose, that killed their mum. I'm honestly not sure. But it does seem like her resentment over it has made it harder on her. And that all seems to stem from Cash abuse. (I'm sure Cash is the one to tell Blitz that Fizz said he'd die alone).
Ok on to how the these are interacting/fucking up his relationship to Stolas. Blitz is definitely is afraid to love Stolas for a number of reasons. (You knew I'd get there at somepoint right 😛).
Cus a whole load are clashes together for him, making it really difficult for him because about see things from the outside. with the "royal demons don't give a shit about guys like us" one.
Making Blitz rationalize that it's gotta be about the sex, and being of use. Anything that shows this assumption is wrong has to be disregarded with distortion.
But when Stolas takes sex off the table, and still talking about feeling, and relationships; it makes Blitz's fear of abandonment go turbo. It's not rational but it's the only rule Blitz has that might make Stolas keep him.
He feels like that sex is all he has to give to a prince after all. And he wanted Stolas to stay for a long while now. It's not a grimoire his hallucinations put on a golden pedestal after all. And there a a lot of similarity to how Stolas and his Mumma vanish.
(Debøra pør favør pointed out this emotion damage so now you have to suffer too 😭)
"I'm going to die alone" and 'I must be of use' Blitz freaks out badly in queen Bee after Ozzie's. Blitz believed that he's be rejected by Stolas, he's been shoved back into the box of it just being about lust.
Because he wants more, but feels he's unworthy, it's got him hurt coming and going. He's got to shut down any attempt by Stolas to have something real. But he was also hurt constantly feeling sex is all that he's got to offer, and all Stolas would want.
"I make everyone's lives worse" and "We don't get get rid of family". Ok this is into theory level but think Master Mind and Sinsmas are going hit these last two harddddd. (We're one week from mastermind).
It looks likely that Stolas is going to lose Via, face punishment for the illegal deal, and be dragged for the affair. With Via swallowing a lot gaslighting about not being loved by Stolas (lines from the trailer).
Blitz will probably going assume it's another another life he's made worse, where he's caused them to lose their own family. Don't think this will play well with last guy he fell in love with he blow up.
It's going to make it much harder for him to remove the idea; that that him loving some will only hurt them.
Alot of the reasons Blitz thought it was ok to get close to Stolas are tied up in these beliefs. He assumes Stolas was powerful and immortal, so couldn't be hurt physically like Fizz or Mumma.
He assumed that a prince would never fall for an imp, so only he could get hurt emotionally. It couldn't end the same way as Verosika. Blitz thinking he's the only one to be able to be hurt, and get to be useful not just to Stolas, but provide a better life for his whole family. It would seem like a bargain. (And the self punishment aspect probably wasn't going be a turn off for him, cus Blitz thinks he deserves it).
This season seems slow be eroding that pedestal Blitz put Stolas on (and vice versa). It's hurts, and it's knocking the stuffing out of both of them; but it's bring Stolas to earth for Blitz. Making his more of a real person in his eyes.
Eh probably a lot way to go, but I'm here for it.
(was very loosely based on this post, because it got me thinking about distortions vs core beliefs. But then I went off on a whole thing, so thought it would be weird to put it as a reblog. Still loved @akirathedramaqueen analysis and would recommend giving it a read 😀)