February 14, 2008
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Here’s some help for those of us who have problems with negative emotions and feelings, especially those who get overwhelmed easily:
The Ten Forms of Twisted Thinking- (Or reasons to get over oneself)
1) All or Nothing thinking- You look at things in absolute, black and white categories; shades of gray do not exist.
2) Overgeneralization- You view a negative event as a never ending pattern of defeat.
3) Mental Filter- You dwell on the negatives and ignore the positives.
4) Discounting the Positives- You insist that the positives do not count.
5) Jumping to conclusions- You jump to conlusions that are not warranted by the facts. Fortune telling and mind-reading are two common forms of jumping to conclusions.
Fortune Telling: You predict that things will turn out badly. Before you give a talk you might get public speaking anxiety because you tell yourself, “My mind will go blank! I’ll make a total fool out of myself!”Mind Reading: You assume that other people are upset with you or looking down on you.
6) Magnification or Minimization- You blow things way out of proportion (mangification) or shrink them in your mind’s eye (minimization) I have also called this the “binocular trick.”
7) Emotional Reasoning- You reason from how you feel: “I feel like an idiot, therefore I must be one” or “I feel hopeless, therefor I must be hopeless,” or “I feel inferior, therefore I must be inferior.”
8) “Should” Statements- You beat up on yourself or the other people with “shoulds”, “shouldn’t's” , “musts”, “oughts,” and “have to’s”
Should statements that are directed against yourself lead to guilt and depression. “I should have left my wife! Now I ‘ve lost her forever and screwed up my whole life!” Or “I shouldn’t be so depressed. i should be better by now.”
Should statements that are directed against the world lead to frustration. “Darn it, the darn bus should be on time when i’m in such a hurry!”Should statements that are directed against other people lead to anger: “You shoudl’tn feel that way! You’ve got no right to say that.
9) Labeling and mislabeling- Labeling is an extreme form of overgeneralization. You label your entire self based on some flaw or shortcoming. Instead of saying “i made a mistake”, you tell yourself, “i’m a jerk” or “a loser”.Mislabeling is where you use overly colorful and emotionally loaded words when you think about your problems. If you catch a cold before an athletic competition you might get excessively angry because you tell yourself “unfair” that you got a cold. This thought makes you feel like you have been singled out by God for some undeserved punishment. In contrast, if you tell yourself “unfortunate” that you got a cold at just the wrong time, you will probably feel less frustrated.
10) Personalization and Blame- You blame yourself (personalization) or others (blame) in a judgmental way.
Self-blame is usually associated with feelings such as inadequacy, guilt, shame, and depression.
Other-blame is usually associated with feelings of frustration, resentment, and anger.www.feelinggood.com/tutorials/full_distortion_list.htm
