Hello to everyone taking the time out of their day to read my blog, thank you😊
As the dark nights pull in and Halloween approaches, I thought it would be good to talk about trying to maintain a positive mindset.
Positive Thinking
When life throws you a curve ball, your reactions and choices are pivotal as to how you move forward with this problem or how embedded and stuck you become.
Are you a positive or negative person, or as some like to describe it, glass half empty or glass half full?
We all have the capacity to overturn our negative thinking, it takes time and reflection to work through what is really happening in any situation or event.
Have a look at a short film clip to see how you can try to reframe unhelpful thoughts:
A useful mantra for potentially changing your
AUTOMATIC THOUGHT PROCESSES
Having negative thoughts is normal, out of potentially 70,000 thoughts a day it's not surprising that quite a few of these can be negative.
Such thoughts have been hardwired into the brain to protect us from imagined or potential threat to our survival. As prehistoric man evolved the amygdala’s purpose was to recognise such threats, alert us then take action and of course learn from mistakes if you hadn’t been eaten by a sabre tooth tiger.
Thankfully we no longer have such threats well not the tiger, but our brain still has this function. There is also another important reason why these thoughts become a part of our lives, they have become a habit; 90% of all thoughts are repetitive. You will have the same thoughts today that you had yesterday. When an action or negative thinking is persistently performed you create a neural pathway in your brain. In other words, the more you do it the stronger those connections in the brain become and the harder it is to break the habit. So, let’s explore what some of those persistent random negative thoughts are:
Here are some automatic negative thoughts you might recognise:
I’m no good at this No one understands me I’m so weak
I’ve let people down
I can’t get started What’s wrong with me, I can't do this?
I’ll never finish this
It’s just not worth it
TIME FOR REFLECTION
Recognize and Isolate the Thought
Pause for a moment
try and recognize what you are thinking isn’t quite right
isolate and focus on that irrational, negative thought
recognize how it makes you feel.
Try to separate the thought from who you are. Think about what you are thinking about. Once you have an external view of your thought you have an opportunity to try to refute it.
This is known as Metacognition and occurs when your brain realizes, “Wait my thinking isn’t quite right.” It is a deeper level of thinking that allows you to really think about what you are thinking.
Write Down the Thought
Writing your thought enables you to have that higher level of thinking because you have to focus and think about what the thought was really about. This is again the metacognition mentioned previously.
Identify the Distress Level
Identify the Cognitive Distortion
Challenge & Reframe Your Thoughts
REEVALUATE THE DISTRESS LEVEL
OVERTURN THE NEGATIVE THINKING:
I’m no good at this | I am good enough |
No one understands me | I haven't told anyone how I feel |
I’m so weak | I am tired and have taken too much on at this time |
I’ve let people down | No one has actually said this |
I can’t get started | I need to seek support and advice |
What’s wrong with me, I can't do this? | Nothing is wrong with me, I am trying too hard to please. |
I’ll never finish this | I need to make a plan and be patient |
It’s just not worth it | I won't know until I try |
So that extra ten minutes stood by the kettle, or just staring out of the window is never wasted time, it is REFLECTION TIME FOR YOU.
Wishing you all a happy Halloween