There are popular therapies and techniques that works on changing our thoughts. What if we tried a few new things? Everyone has thoughts that cause us to feel different emotions such as anxious, sad, excited, or angry. Sometimes we might use a technique to try and change the thought by challenging what we are thinking and then we repeat the process when the thought pops up again. Some of those questions from Cognitive Behavioral Therapy that can help us challenge those thoughts include:
1. What is the evidence for that thought?
2. What is the likelihood that my thought will come true?
3. Am I focusing on only one aspect and leaving out important information or context?
Once we have finished challenging our thoughts, what else can we do when the thoughts continue?
Another way to work with our thoughts is by changing our relationship to our thoughts. These disturbing thoughts might continue to pop up into our brain and when they do, we can practice noticing that we are having that thought. That’s it! Sounds easy but it can be difficult at first.
“I notice that I am having the thought that I am worthless.”
“I notice that I am having the feeling of sadness.”
The coping tool here is to say aloud what we are noticing without going down our normal pathway of “I am worthless” and all of the reasons why. Instead of offering up the reasons for being worthless or arguing that we aren’t worthless, we just notice that our brain is putting this thought out there. Then we move on to notice the next thought. And then we move on to notice the next thought, similar to watching items go by on a conveyor belt. If you discover you’ve leapt on the conveyor belt to chase down a thought, simply hop off and watch the next thought/item go by. This takes a lot of practice but try setting a timer for 2 minutes at least four times a day for thirty days straight when you are feeling calm so that you can use this tool when you need it. This is part of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy.
Another method you can try is to befriend the thought and figure out what the intent is behind the thought. For example, if I just gave a speech and afterwards I ruminate on the mistakes, how the person wearing the blue shirt looked bored and therefore I am not an engaging speaker and on and on, I might say to myself, ‘thank you part of me that is going over my speech and determining where I could have done better. It seems like one of my values is to be an engaging and excellent speaker and I hear these criticisms as an intent to make me the best speaker I can be.” This is part of Internal Family Systems therapy and is one of my favorite way to focus therapy so we can discover the origins behind these strategies and work on transitioning these parts of us that are using these strategies into a different way of being.
