Learned something new...
This may be helpful to many of you...it's psycho-babble for "negative thinking" but it makes sense!
COGNITIVE DISTORTIONS
1. ALL OR NOTHING THINKING: You see things in black-
and-white categories. If your performance falls short of
perfect you see yourself as a total failure.
2. OVER-GENERALIZATION: You see a single negative
event as a never-ending pattern of defeat. For example,
you think that your friend's inconsiderate response means
that there is no caring for you even when there have been
other examples of consideration at other times.
3. MENTAL FILTER: You pick out a single negative detail and
dwell on it exclusively so that your vision of all reality becomes
distorted, like the drop of ink that discolors the entire beaker
of water.
4. DISQUALIFYING THE POSITIVE: You reject positive experiences
by insisting that they "don't count" for some reason or other. In
this way you can maintain a negative belief that is contradicted
by your everyday experiences. For example, you don't believe a
compliment because you think it is given just to be nice.
5. JUMPING TO CONCLUSIONS: You make a negative interpretation
even though there are no definite facts that convincingly support
your conclusion.
6. MIND READING: You arbitrarily conclude that someone is reacting
negatively to you, and you don't bother to check it out. "I just know
he thought I was an idiot," even though he acted politely toward you.
7. THE FORTUNE TELLER ERROR: You anticipate that things will turn
out badly, and you feel convinced that your prediction about a future
event is an already established fact. "I just know I'm not going to get
the job I want."
8. MAGNIFICATION (CATASTROPHIZING) OR MINIMIZATION: You
exaggerate the importance of things (such as your goof-up or
someone else's achievement), or you inappropriately shrink things
until they appear tiny (your own desireable qualities or the other
person's imperfections).
9. EMOTIONAL REASONING: You assume that your negative emotions
necessarily reflect the way things really are: "I feel it, therefore it
must be true."
10. "SHOULD" STATEMENTS: You try to motivate yourself with "shoulds"
and "shouldn'ts" as if you had to be punished before you could be
expected to do anything. "Musts" and "oughts" are also offenders.
The emotional consequence is guilt.
11. LABELING AND MISLABELING: This is an extreme form of over-
generalization. Instead of describing your error, you attach a
negative label to yourself: "I'm a loser."
So the idea is to be aware that you are doing this negative thinking and to get a
handle on it. Start doing the opposite. Good luck! This has been heidiweidel's
self-help LJ forum.
COGNITIVE DISTORTIONS
1. ALL OR NOTHING THINKING: You see things in black-
and-white categories. If your performance falls short of
perfect you see yourself as a total failure.
2. OVER-GENERALIZATION: You see a single negative
event as a never-ending pattern of defeat. For example,
you think that your friend's inconsiderate response means
that there is no caring for you even when there have been
other examples of consideration at other times.
3. MENTAL FILTER: You pick out a single negative detail and
dwell on it exclusively so that your vision of all reality becomes
distorted, like the drop of ink that discolors the entire beaker
of water.
4. DISQUALIFYING THE POSITIVE: You reject positive experiences
by insisting that they "don't count" for some reason or other. In
this way you can maintain a negative belief that is contradicted
by your everyday experiences. For example, you don't believe a
compliment because you think it is given just to be nice.
5. JUMPING TO CONCLUSIONS: You make a negative interpretation
even though there are no definite facts that convincingly support
your conclusion.
6. MIND READING: You arbitrarily conclude that someone is reacting
negatively to you, and you don't bother to check it out. "I just know
he thought I was an idiot," even though he acted politely toward you.
7. THE FORTUNE TELLER ERROR: You anticipate that things will turn
out badly, and you feel convinced that your prediction about a future
event is an already established fact. "I just know I'm not going to get
the job I want."
8. MAGNIFICATION (CATASTROPHIZING) OR MINIMIZATION: You
exaggerate the importance of things (such as your goof-up or
someone else's achievement), or you inappropriately shrink things
until they appear tiny (your own desireable qualities or the other
person's imperfections).
9. EMOTIONAL REASONING: You assume that your negative emotions
necessarily reflect the way things really are: "I feel it, therefore it
must be true."
10. "SHOULD" STATEMENTS: You try to motivate yourself with "shoulds"
and "shouldn'ts" as if you had to be punished before you could be
expected to do anything. "Musts" and "oughts" are also offenders.
The emotional consequence is guilt.
11. LABELING AND MISLABELING: This is an extreme form of over-
generalization. Instead of describing your error, you attach a
negative label to yourself: "I'm a loser."
So the idea is to be aware that you are doing this negative thinking and to get a
handle on it. Start doing the opposite. Good luck! This has been heidiweidel's
self-help LJ forum.