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Tag: negative thoughts

WHAT HAPPENS IF YOU DON’T KNOW YOURSELF

November 19, 2019
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| Categories: Anxiety, Depression, Personal Growth

Very often you look to others, your friends, family, coworkers to see how you’re doing. Are you good enough? Do you fit in? Are you going to continue to rise up whatever ladder you’re looking at, professional or personal? You’re born like a plant seeking the light. If the plant is placed in a dark corner it will twist itself to try to grow toward the light. If a person, from a very early age, realizes what gets them love and attention, they will repeat those attitudes, beliefs, what they say or do, to continue getting love from others. However, you were already born a person, and maybe your family of origin doesn’t understand that. Perhaps they believe it’s their job to turn you into a person, not to be curious about who you are and to guide you into adulthood and independence as yourself, who you were when you were born. You begin wearing a mask you believe is you. The problem is that you have to keep changing masks depending on the other people you’re around and what expectations they have of you. Since you haven’t internalized a solid sense of self that allows you to put on...

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CATASTROPHIZING

March 31, 2014
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| Categories: Anxiety, Life Stress, Personal Growth

Is a big word meaning making things big when they don't need to be. In other words, if your boss had something to say to you about a situation you need to change or a deadline you haven't met or something else, and you feel sick to your stomach and stay awake half the night, worrying that you're going to lose your job because of it, you're catastrophizing. You're predicting a catastrophe when there isn't one. You might not like that you've disappointed your boss but it's unlikely you're going to lose your job over it unless you've messed up in a lot of other ways as well. If you have a fight with your partner and you predict it's the end of the relationship, you're, yes, catastrophizing. If your child gets a bad report card grade and you punish that child because you fear that child will never get into college, you're.... Yes, you get the idea. It's kind of like what Jeff Foxworthy does with his, "You might be a redneck if..." scenarios. It goes like this: You're catastrophizing if: 1. You didn't get a pay raise so you see yourself as never being able to retire. 2....

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GETTING UP OR NOT

March 26, 2014
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| Categories: Aging, Anxiety, Depression, Life Stress, Personal Growth, Relationships

O.K. It's Saturday morning. You wake up the sun is shining or not, it's raining or not, but you're warm, safe, and there isn't anything you have to do in the next two hours so you don't have to jump up and start hustling toward a work day like most of you do during the week. One would think it would be a time of relaxation, contemplation, or to make plans to do something enjoyable, and it is for some of you. For others, it's the time when depression, despair and confusion reign. To those people: If you're in a relationship, you wonder why you stay and if you're not, you're wondering if you ever will find that special person. If you work forty or more hours a week, you wonder if there's an end to this toiling away just to pay the rent, or maybe you don't have a job and haven't been able to find one. Maybe you have a job but your partner doesn't and you're tired of carrying the load, maybe it's reversed and your partner is tired of carrying the load. Maybe you're old and facing the unbearably sad truth that this culture doesn't value...

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Change Your Experiences by Changing The Way You Think

March 26, 2014
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| Categories: Aging, Anxiety, Depression, Life Stress, Personal Growth, Relationships, Seniors

What’s different about those two scenarios? In the first one you created what you anticipated would happen by your behavior and attitude. In the second one you didn’t create a negative self-fulfilling prophecy, rather you created a positive experience and you’re happy that you didn’t waste time on negativity.             This description of an experience is just an example. You can apply the same principles to any situation you’re in. Notice yourself and whether or not you’re experiencing cognitive distortions like “He/she is never any fun so I won’t have fun tonight.” You won’t have fun because you don’t expect to and your energy, attitude, and behavior will reflect that and you’ll create what you already thought would happen before it even happened. 2.  What you believe about something is what will cause the consequence not the action.             This is part of Albert Ellis’ theory of rational emotive therapy. He called it the A B Cs of Rational Emotive Therapy.             He believed that it wasn’t the action (having to change your shirt before you went out) that caused the consequence. He said it’s what you believe about the action that will cause the consequence. In other words, if...

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