What are Cognitive Distortions?
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Cognitive Distortions are thought patterns that cause you to view reality in inaccurate — usually negative — ways. They’re automatic and habitual errors in the way you are think about a certain situations. When you’re experiencing a cognitive distortion, the way you interpret events is usually negatively biased.
What Are Cognitive Distortions?
There are a few common distortions that you may have experienced from time to time. Take a look at the list below:
Magnification and Minimization: You exaggerate or minimize the importance of events. This also included catastrophizing, which includes seeing only the worst case outcome for any situation.
Overgeneralization: You making broad interpretations from a single or few events.
Magical Thinking: You believe that you can do something to influence the outcome of unrelated situations.
Personalization: The belief that one is responsible for events outside of their own control.
Jumping to Conclusions: You interpret the meaning of a situation with little or no evidence. This also includes things like Mind Reading, where you interpret the thoughts and beliefs of others without adequate evidence. Or Fortune Telling, where you expect that a situation will turn out badly without adequate evidence.
Emotional Reasoning: You assume your emotions reflect the way things really are and make decisions based solely on the emotion.
Disqualifying the Positive: You recognize only the negative aspects of a situation while ignoring the positive.
“Should” Statements: You believe that things should be a certain way.
All-or-Nothing Thinking: You think in absolutes such as “always”, “never”, or “every”.
Raise Your Awareness:
Cognitive distortions can take a toll on your mental health, leading to increased stress, depression, and anxiety. If you don't raise your level of awareness around when these thinking patterns appear, these thought patterns can become automatic and may negatively influence your rational and logical around making decisions. By adjusting your automatic thoughts, you're able to influence your emotions and behaviors. Becoming aware of these thinking patterns can drastically improve your ability to improve your mood and how you're showing up in your relationships, work, and other environments. Raising your awareness looks like, being mindful of your negative self talk on a daily basis, identifying what patterns you default to in stressful situations, and actively seeking out opportunities to see things from a different perspective, one that doesn't always lead to a negative outcome.
How to Disrupt Unhealthy Thinking Patterns:
Here are a few things you can try right away:
Therapy: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is great for learning how to challenge negative thinking patterns and replacing this behavior with healthier ways to cope with stressful situations.
Get curious: Ask yourself questions like, do I have evidence to support this thought? How would I react to someone saying these negative things to a person I loved? Also, start to notice how your thoughts are effecting your mood and also your behaviors.
Identify your patterns: Which type of negative thought patterns do you you often fall into. Do you always use should statements? Are you always reasoning with your emotions? Do you often think in all or nothing scenarios? If you can identify the common patterns, you can use a skill called cognitive restructuring to challenge or reframe your thoughts in the moment.
Challenge or Change the thought (Cognitive Restructuring): Cognitive restructuring is a technique that has been successfully used to help people change the way they think. When used for stress management, the goal is to replace stress-producing thoughts (cognitive distortions) with more balanced thoughts that do not produce stress. Ask yourself questions like is this the truth of what I am experiencing or is this just how I feel? Then develop an alternative and more balanced and helpful thought and determine how you will feel (outcome) when you adopt this new way of thinking.
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