Negative thoughts and mental health
Research shows that at least 10% of the population, at any one time, suffer from an anxiety disorder. But if you take into account the figures for those experiencing stress related problems – which are clearly related to worry and anxiety – the figures are likely to be far higher. And most of us have problems with negative thinking: gloomy thoughts about the future, guilt over the past, the idea that we can’t cope with the present, and obsessions about having to get it all right.
On that subject the National Institute of Mental Health – NIMH – calculates that around 1% of the population in the USA suffer from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder – or OCD – (that’s over 3 million people). But millions more are bothered by obsessions about work, about our personal appearance, about our success or failure in life and anything else that might have to do with the Ego. Incidentally, obsessions are also the driver for addictions to drugs, alcohol and gambling, about which I wrote in my last series of articles.
A new method for neutralising negative thoughts
The method work work for worries, obsessive thoughts, perfectionistic thoughts and depressive thoughts. It comprises four basic steps as follows:
- 1. Change Position
- 2. Change Attitude
- 3. Change Focus
- 4. Practice Mindfulness
For any worry, obsession or negative thought you first change your position to it. Instead of identifying the thought as coming from you, instead you change to seeing the worry as coming from IT – meaning the robot inside your head.
Next you change your attitude to the ‘robot’. Instead of getting upset by it you learn how to dismiss it through ridicule, boredom or contempt.
Then you change your focus of attention, immediately re-engaging the mind with something focused, productive, entertaining or calming to do.
Finally, you practice mindfulness on a daily basis. This could entail meditation, yoga, tai chi, sensate focusing or a myriad other ways of focusing on present moment awareness. This isn’t strictly a ‘fourth step’ but a way of making the other three steps easier to practice.
The first step is: Change Position
Change your position on negative thoughts
In this step your job is to distance yourself from your negative thoughts. However ‘real’ they might seem negative thoughts do not in fact belong to you. They belong, rather to the conditioned self, which constantly replays old thoughts, stories and judgments to you.
The Change Position step encourages you to see that the tapes are coming from IT rather from you. YOU are not your MIND. Instead, YOU are a sentient, living, emotional person grounded in the moment who needs have no fear of what your mind is trying to do to you.
To make this step work you first need to identify the content of the tapes: repetitive, conscious, or semi-conscious ideas that trigger anxiety. You will know they are running because you will suddenly notice that you are getting uptight, frightened, obsessed, panicky or worried. Your job now is to identify the tape and distance yourself from it.
Examples of negative thoughts
Some common ‘tapes’ include:
- An image of something terrible happening to you
- The thought that you cannot bear what is ‘about’ to happen
- The idea that you are going to ‘pay’ for past mistakes
- Self-talk that you are useless, worthless or otherwise messed-up
- Flash-backs to awful moments from the past
- Injunctions to ‘get it right or else…’
Once you have identified the unhelpful thought the mind has re-presented to consciousness, you are in position to separate.
A good way to do that is to engage in some self-dialogue, in which you label the conditioned self:
- The Chatterbox is working overtime today…
- The Robot is playing up…
- The Control freak is off on one…
- There IT goes again…
Changing your attitude towards negative thoughts.
In this second step you are changing your attitude to negative thoughts – from rapt attention to dismissing them as worthless.
The key to making this second step work is to belittle the internal voice that goes with the negative thought. Replacing that voice with other voices you associate with ridicule. Or, (if you prefer) switching off from the internal voice altogether.
These voices can come from comic characters in movies. TV programs, or cartoons. In the past my clients have selected characters from Disney (Donald Duck is a favourite), Laurel & Hardy, The Simpsons, Friends, Fawlty Towers, Monty Python, The Pink Panther (Clouseau), Dumb and Dumber and Scooby-Doo. But you can pick your own, so long as that voice makes you laugh when you hear it.
How to dismiss a thought
The first is step is to identify the thought that bothers you. We will use a common worry by way of example.
Original thought = “It’s all going to go wrong”
Now take that thought and exaggerate it a little for comic effect.
Edited thought = “It’s going to be a total disaster”
Let’s say your selected voice is Homer Simpson’s:
Homer’s tape: “It’s not only going to be a disaster but it’s going to be on the six o’clock news.”
Rather than using a funny voice to defuse from the thought you can dismiss it using your own voice.
For example:
There it goes again. I really don’t have time to listen to this.
Same old same old rubbish. Time to move on.
This is getting boring. I have better things to do.
You can get aggressive about it, too. Anglo-Saxon swear words are especially effective:
What a load of crap!
Complete bollocks!
F*ck that!
Switching off from negative thoughts
Finally there are some visualisation techniques you can use to tune out, or switch off. These work especially well if you have a replacement thought ready. For example: ‘The more I practice, the better I get” instead of “I can’t cope with this.”
The Radio station
Imagine that the thought is being replayed to you in your head by the wrong radio station. Visualise pressing a button to change the station. Keep pressing until you hear a different thought, or one of your favourite music tracks.
The TV station
Same as before, except that you are switching channels.
The Conveyor belt
Imagine that the thought is being cycled through your head on a conveyor belt. When you notice it there, press a button to activate the conveyor belt, spinning the old thought spinning back into the machine, while you wait for a better thought to come out.
Changing your Focus on Negative Thoughts
The third step is change focus. Meaning that, as soon as you have separated away from the thought and dismissed it, you refocus your attention on something productive.
For some people this step can be difficult to achieve at first, simply because they have spent so long listening to negative thoughts they have been conditioned to take them seriously and, as a result, they become entangled with them.
This programming can be broken up though, and sometimes that can happen surprisingly quickly. However, for most people, breaking the pattern takes time and practice. Bear this in mind when using any of the ideas and techniques described in this series: daily practice is essential. Don’t wait for anxiety attacks to happen to you before working with the four steps; practice on minor worries and obsessions three or four times a day, then build up to bigger ones.
How to refocus away from negative thoughts
Your ability to refocus away from negative thought depends to a large extent on your success with the first two steps. If you have separated away from the thought and dismissed it for good, this third step should be simple to do. If it is not simple, you may have to revisit the earlier steps.
A further key to successful refocusing is that you must select an activity which fully absorbs the conscious mind in a way that is more compelling than listening to the worry, obsession, guilt-trip etc. You don’t in fact need a technique to do this, useful as those can be. All you need are your ordinary daily activities.
Here are the most popular:
- Aerobic exercise
- Music (preferably loud!)
- Social contact (includes texts/emails)
- Meditation
- Tai Chi
- Dance
- Entertaining DVDs
- Creative tasks
- Satisfying chores
- Games (of any kind)
- Engaging with anyone or anything that makes you laugh
- Grounding techniques. See this article here for suggestions.
Remember that speed is vital. Do not dally with the thoughts but ignore them and throw yourself into activity. As a general rule, activities that keep you grounded in the body work best, particularly (hard) exercise, dance and creative work.
Mindfulness is key to overcoming negative thoughts
The final ‘step’ in this four-step process is not really a step at all. It is the ground for the other three steps. When you learn to practice mindfulness you are – by that very fact – changing your relationship to thought. For meditation is the art of separating from thought. Looking at thoughts, rather than through them. As you do that it becomes easier to separate from, dismiss and focus away from the specific negative thoughts you identify.
For more information on therapy for negative thoughts, overthinking and anxiety use the links below:
Listen to the podcast: Float: The Anxiety Podcast
Brief Therapy for Overthinking described here
Free guide: Why Anxiety Won’t Go Away (And What You Can Do Next) – Link here
The book: FLOAT: Exiting the Anxiety-Stress Loop, out now. Click here for the Amazon link
Appointments: For therapy for anxiety click here to make an appointment.
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