Unhelpful Thinking Styles: Anxiety As An Asset — Act 3

UNHELPFUL THINKING STYLES:

Overview

Unhelpful thinking styles are habits. They are routine pathways we take, they come easy, and at one point they may have felt natural and normal, but they are not. They are extremely common. My recommendation is to look back and reflect on times you felt triggered and allowed your mood to change based on the thoughts you felt related to an event. Look below and you will likely find a thought pattern related to that event. Our thoughts are simply thoughts. They are always coming in and out of our brain based on our focus level and stimuli, but we are not our thoughts and we don’t have to allow them to change our mood. If you notice thoughts changing your mood, work towards labeling them as thoughts with the definitions below. There is a post-event process I would recommend. Begin by naming the situation and what happened, then the thoughts that accompanied the situation, then the emotions that followed that. See how and where your thoughts took a turn and how they affected your emotions. Then, once you have done that, name alternative thoughts you could have had that wouldn’t have resulted in unwanted emotions. This may be hard to picture now, but after reviewing the thought patterns I will have a tool you can use to help visualize this activity.

All-or-nothing thinking

All-or-nothing thinking is related to perfectionism. It is the idea that we need to complete something fully and perfectly or it was a waste and a failure. All-or-nothing thinking is a common thought pattern — it can be exasperated in those who struggle to plan or those who may be working on projects that are long-term investments. My recommendation is to break things into chunks, look at your accomplishments, and remember that you have been successful and perfect before and you will do it again. Allow yourself to be satisfied during the entire journey and not just at the end.

Overgeneralizing

Overgeneralizing is when we allow a single event to be a predictor of future outcomes even when historically that is not the case. We tend to be overly broad in the conclusions we draw and rarely in a positive way. Overgeneralizing is a common thought pattern when it comes to feelings of uncertainty or a lack of trust/faith/hope. My recommendation is to look back at the event you are overgeneralizing and ask yourself if there are past events that contradict your thinking, if there are then allow yourself to relax, you are overgeneralizing.

Fortune Telling

Fortune telling is when we jump to conclusions and feel like we can predict the future. Fortune telling can also be mind reading and imagining that we know what others are thinking of us as it relates to specific events. We may make a mistake and worry someone thinks we are dumb, but that is often hardly the case. Fortune telling can be exasperated by feelings of inferiority, lack of worth, and unworthiness. My recommendation is to live in the moment you are in, remember that we are all humans and we all make mistakes, we cannot predict the future and we also lack control over it. What we can do is live in this moment and work our best to accept that we are all doing our best and as situations arise we will take them in stride.

Should or Must Thinking

Should or must thinking is twofold — self and others. When we think someone else should or must do something that often results in frustration. When we put the pressure on ourselves that we must do something we often feel guilt or failure. When we allow these thoughts to come in they typically support external and not internal values. I should clean the kitchen, I ought to finish this before ending my work day, I must work out this evening. These thought processes give unworthy added value to tasks. My recommendation is reframing to either accept that these tasks do not need to be completed or reframe that we are lucky that we have the opportunity to complete these tasks.

Disqualifying the Positive

Disqualifying the positive discounts all the good or positive things that we have done or that have happened to us and treating them as if they don’t count or as if they are things that we are expected to do. When we are put into the perfectionist mindset and working to please everyone we find ourselves assuming everything we do is just a part of who we are and that is not true. Very often we all go above and beyond to do great things for others, and others do so for us as well. My recommendation is to pause and instead of disqualifying the positive work, or focusing on the negative, recognize and be grateful for it even if it is only momentarily. Realizing that good things do happen and this world isn’t as terrible as it may seem to be is very important to building a positive attitude and gaining excitement for getting out of bed in the morning.

Magnification/Catastrophic thinking

Magnification or catastrophic thinking is escalating things out of realistic proportion or inappropriately shrinking something to make it seem less important, both can be equally damaging. Both are very commonly used as coping mechanisms but when they rule our lives they become incredibly unhelpful. It is easier said than done, but my recommendation is when these thoughts occur that seem to be magnified or catastrophic, take a second to think of some thoughts that would contradict that belief. You are safe, the world is safe, people support you, and you are strong. This method of thinking is often best paired with deep breathing and sensation recognition to help bring you back into the present.

Emotional Reasoning

Emotional reasoning is when we take emotions and feelings and use them to validate something about us even if everything else points to that thing being false. Emotional reasoning is very common with anxieties. “I feel scared so I must be weak-minded” or “I feel embarrassed so I must be an idiot” We may feel these emotions even when we are the exact opposite of what we feel. We may know that we are strong, but giving a speech in front of thousands of people and feeling scared, but that does not make us weak-minded. My recommendation is when these thoughts occur work to prove that thought wrong, make it false, find a time when that was untrue, and move on with confidence.

Labeling

Labeling is when we assign labels to ourselves or others. Assigning labels holds thoughts that we don't need and wastes precious energy that could be used to make positive changes in our views. Labeling could be “I am so dumb” “he is such an idiot” or “I am a useless loser” These could have at one time been motivating, but habitual thinking is toxic and unhelpful. My recommendation is to slowly work to make your vocabulary less toxic, repeated behaviors become unhelpful habits. Break the chain and work to incorporate more positive labeling.

Point!

The practice begins with recognizing the negative thought patterns above. The more often we practice this process of recognizing thoughts, evaluating their accuracy, determining how they affect our mood, and reframing to something more realistic, the better we get at regulating our emotions and thoughts moving forward. This process is foundational in a therapeutic practice called CBT and is very valuable to practice daily if you are experiencing anxiety.