Recently I received an email from someone requesting any advice I had for stopping negative thought processes.
One almost constant symptom of anxiety and panic disorders is increased worry. Not just worry about big problems but obsessive worry about small things, irrational or unlikely things, and things about which nothing can be done anyway.
Of course worry is natural and we all worry at sometimes. There is a point however when worry can get in the way. Unhealthy worry could be considered as being worry which becomes more of a barrier to success than the thing you are worrying about.
As anxiety is often fear of fear itself worry is often fear of worrying…overly worried people tend to worry not so much about a negative outcome but how much a negative outcome will make them worry, how bad it will make them feel.
So, what can the anxious worrier do about worrying?
The first port of call is the original CBT technique: Every time you catch yourself having a negative thought you say audibly, or under your breath if you are in public “Stop!” and immediately focus on something else. An alternative to this is to wear an elastic band around your wrist and ping it every time you notice your negative thinking.
But how do you actually change the thought?
So, noticing negative thinking is the easy part, what do we do next? As I said above, you can force yourself to think about something else, but sometimes that negative thought or worry just comes right back. At this point in time I would take pen and paper, preferably a notebook you can keep with you at all times, and write down the negative thought. Right it down as a definite:
People will laugh at me.
or a “What if?”
What if I lose my thread half way through the presentation and run out of the room?
Then, underneath, argue against it. Argue against the chances of it happening, and about how terrible it would be if it actually did happen:
People won’t laugh at me, I don’t laugh at others when they make mistakes, everyone makes mistakes, and anyway, I could just gather my thoughts and carry on after a short pause, what seems like eternity to me is only a couple of seconds at most. And even if it did all go wrong, and I did feel I couldn’t continue, it wouldn’t be the end of the world, I could make an excuse, say I had a stomach bug or felt sick, people understand these physical ailments much more and won’t remember in a few days time.
Go on like that with every negative thought you have. There is something about writing the thoughts down which allows you to view them in a much healthier light, and I think you will find that you can calm them a lot.
What if this doesn’t work?
If this doesn’t work it may well be worth talking to a therapist. It can take a long time to deal with the underlying issues, and many many people don’t need to. But for some it is life changing and well worth the investment.
I also recommend you read this section on the work of Byron Katie and the Sedona Method, as both can be very effective at removing negative thought processes.
