Eleven Forms Of Distorted Thinking
If we find ourselves annoyed, irritable, depressed, unproductive or simply confused then our thinking process goes along these lines of distorted thoughts. By identifying which categories we usually fall trap into, we can easily untwist our deceptively distorted thoughts.
1. Black and white thinking- you look at things in absolute all or nothing. There are no gray area for you. Ex. " I’ll be at his mercy once he finds out how inexperienced I am."
2. All Embracing- you look at a bad situation in your life and see it as a never ending pattern. Ex. "If rejects me I’ll never be able to overcome my inexperience, because everyone else will also reject me once they find out.
3. Mental Sponge-you soak up all the negative details, leaving out the positive ones or vice versa.
4. Disregarding the positive- insists that the negative weighs more than the positive .Ex." Even girls who have boyfriends look at me, make eyes at me and flirt. It makes it seem like I’m a home wrecker".
5. Mind Reading- there’s an assumption of negative reaction from people which is unfounded. Ex. "he’s prejudged me without giving me a chance".
6. Fortune Telling-you irrationally predict that things can’t change or will turn out badly. Ex. "I will look like a fool trying to talk to her".
7. Inflation or Deflation- it’s either you blow things out of proportion or shrink their importance inappropriately. Ex. "She’s fantastic".
8. Emotional Reasoning-you rationalize things from how you feel. Ex. I Feel like a loser therefore I must be really one.
9. Shoulda , coulda , woulda statements. You tell yourself, you should have done this, could have done that, lots of "musts", "oughts" and "have tos". Ex. " But if someone rejects me, it means I should be doing something differently".
10. Tagging- you point out your weaknesses and mistakes and tag yourself as a loser, jerk, failure etc. Instead of identifying the cause of the problem you can learn from or try to correct it.
11. Blaming- the easy way out, you blame yourself or others or external events for something you were not entirely responsible. Ex. "But if he rejects me, I’ll think less of myself, because he will be rejecting my value system.
1. Black and white thinking- you look at things in absolute all or nothing. There are no gray area for you. Ex. " I’ll be at his mercy once he finds out how inexperienced I am."
2. All Embracing- you look at a bad situation in your life and see it as a never ending pattern. Ex. "If rejects me I’ll never be able to overcome my inexperience, because everyone else will also reject me once they find out.
3. Mental Sponge-you soak up all the negative details, leaving out the positive ones or vice versa.
4. Disregarding the positive- insists that the negative weighs more than the positive .Ex." Even girls who have boyfriends look at me, make eyes at me and flirt. It makes it seem like I’m a home wrecker".
5. Mind Reading- there’s an assumption of negative reaction from people which is unfounded. Ex. "he’s prejudged me without giving me a chance".
6. Fortune Telling-you irrationally predict that things can’t change or will turn out badly. Ex. "I will look like a fool trying to talk to her".
7. Inflation or Deflation- it’s either you blow things out of proportion or shrink their importance inappropriately. Ex. "She’s fantastic".
8. Emotional Reasoning-you rationalize things from how you feel. Ex. I Feel like a loser therefore I must be really one.
9. Shoulda , coulda , woulda statements. You tell yourself, you should have done this, could have done that, lots of "musts", "oughts" and "have tos". Ex. " But if someone rejects me, it means I should be doing something differently".
10. Tagging- you point out your weaknesses and mistakes and tag yourself as a loser, jerk, failure etc. Instead of identifying the cause of the problem you can learn from or try to correct it.
11. Blaming- the easy way out, you blame yourself or others or external events for something you were not entirely responsible. Ex. "But if he rejects me, I’ll think less of myself, because he will be rejecting my value system.
Comments