Tricks to stop negative thoughts
Happy Sunday, friends. I used to think that thinking in ever-spiraling, ever-more-negative patterns of thought was a totally normal thing to do. (Did you ever think this, too?) What human brain doesn’t want to imagine, and thereby somehow magically protect, itself from all of the one hundred and one billion ways something could go wrong?
Then one morning I heard Jessica Lanyadoo on her (AMAZING) podcast, Ghost of a Podcast, say this: “Negative obsessions are like prayer for what you don’t want.”
Woah.
I realized I was giving all of my energy away to the worst-case scenario — and thereby never investing any of my brainpower in expansively thinking about all the ways things could go right. And I really wanted to stop doing that.
I still struggle a lot with negative ruminations, but at this point in my life I've pulled together a few reliable ways of stopping or at least shifting them, and I wanted to share them with you, too.
Even noticing that you tend to HAVE negative, spinning thoughts can be a game-changer. It does NOT have to be like this, and those spinning, cycling thoughts - guess what - they are not YOU. So first, just catch yourself when you've gone deep into the spiral, off the cliff, whatever you wanna call it. Just notice it.
Get moving. Negative thoughts exist in our mind, and I find there is nothing better for knocking them off course then getting up and flailing around in my body. Have a go-to dance song to turn on. Walk outside for a 10-minute stroll. Do 15 jumping jacks.
Adapt the 5-4-3-2-1 grounding technique for anxiety. Again, the trick is to return to the present, to your body, to the moment, and get out of the whirling that's going on in and above your head. This technique asks you to name 5 things you can SEE; 4 things you can FEEL; 3 sounds you can HEAR; 2 things you can SMELL; and 1 thing you can taste. I shorten this - I look for one color I can name, one word I can read, one thing I can feel on my skin, and one thing I can smell.
Try out some grounding meditations. If you are somebody who tends towards negative ruminations, you are likely also somebody who spends a lot of time in their mind. When I realized there were people who were NOT constantly thinking things and building worlds all day in their mind, but living quite simply in the present and in their bodies, I was flabbergasted. These people are what's called "grounded" -- they're not spacey, over-thinking, totally in their minds. And there are a lot of meditations that can help you get there, too, that work to connect your body to the earth. I have one here that's about four minutes you can try.
Try to turn the negative fantasy into a positive reality. Negative thinking is really just actually fantasizing about the worst. Now, you don't have to fantasize about the best (though frankly, why not?) but you can turn the negatives into a totally reasonable positive. Ask yourself: What is a reasonable positive outcome here? Then, work to envision that in your mind when you catch yourself thinking in a negative thought pattern. It will feel weird to envision a positive outcome; just work through the discomfort and try it anyways. It's like a muscle you can practice strengthening.
If your negative ruminations tend to take the bent of beating yourself up, you may have a stronger inner critic. The book Soul Without Shame was a breakthrough for me to stand up to that inner critic and dismantle it.
A couple of readers wrote in with really thoughtful advice, too. Here's what they had to say.
From Sue: "Full credit for this goes to Natalie Sudman, the lovely author of The Application of Impossible Things. I heard an interview with Natalie where she talked about negative self talk. Of course, I don’t remember verbatim, but here was the gist of what I took away and started to apply on a regular basis: Negative self talk is always rooted in fear. Fear of failure. Fear of being seen. Fear of coming into our power. All of it comes from fear, if you get to the root of it. Natalie’s suggestion is to acknowledge this and to take a moment to appreciate that the Ego self, the small self, is bringing us this fear (the negative comments) because she wants to keep us safe. She wants to protect us. So, we thank her. When the negative self talk happens, we step back and say, oh, thank you for trying to keep me safe. I see what you are trying to do, but I am ok. Thank you. And once I acknowledge that the emotion coming forward is fear, and the fear is intended to keep me safe, I can move on. The negative thoughts subside. For me personally, this has worked better than affirmations or replacing negative self talk with positive self talk — which always comes across a bit disingenuous to me. Once I thank the Ego for bringing these ideas forward, I notice that they stop coming forward. So this has helped immensely in releasing the patterns."
From Matt: "This is something I have struggled with for years. It comes up in therapy and with my psychologist every time. One particularly helpful thing that works for me (via my wife) is when we feel those types of thoughts begin to take root, we treat them like someone else's voice. We consider them basically like an intruder - something or someone apart from our core self who is saying those things to us. Seems to put psychological distance from the negativity and allows examination of the thoughts instead of being subsumed by them. That word is clumsy, but I think of it all the time - subsumed, but not like drowning. More, being dragged in and absorbed by this place where I am doing damage to myself that I know is simply not helpful. And part of where I have learned to absolutely forbit rumination is at bedtime. I found this Ologies podcast with a sleep scientist to be a bit meandering, but with lots of nuggets about what is happening with our brains. One wrinkle for me that has been extra helpful is the recommendation to do repetitive, yet not boring, thought experiments to achieve sleep. And in my case, the most effective thing has been replaying my beer league softball highlights in my head over and over. It's actually pleasant, because that goofy softball league is the one thing in my life that I am unequivocally good at. It helps keep rumination at bay to think about those fun successes."
Thanks, Matt & Sue -- those are fantastic strategies.
