You aren’t crazy. You’re caught up in a pattern.
Everybody thinks negatively at times. When you are anxious or depressed, however, you fall into repetitive patterns of negative thinking – thoughts that seem true, but aren’t. Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) refers to these thought patterns as cognitive distortions.
Recognizing them can go a long way toward addressing them. Here are the ten most common forms of cognitive distortion, examples of each, and how they hold you back.
What it sounds like: “If I’m not perfect, I’m a failure.”
How it manifests: One day you miss working out means the entire exercise regimen is now a total failure. One error at the office indicates that you are totally incompetent. You are either a success or a failure. There is no in-between.
Why it’s harmful: This pattern of thought transforms small problems into existential crises and makes any kind of correction or improvement near impossible.
Catastrophising
“What that sounds like: This is going to mess everything up.”
How it manifests: When your partner fails to reply to your texts, it must be an indication of the end of the relationship. You experience a headache so therefore you have assumed that something terrible must have happened. The slightest criticism turns out to be the sign that you are likely going to lose your job.
Why it is unhelpful: It assumes the worst-case scenario immediately without validating your assumptions.
“What that sounds like: Seeing the negative while not seeing anything positive.”
How it manifests: Out of nine compliments and one criticism you fixate on the criticism throughout the week. You remember every embarrassing moment in the discussion while ignoring the good parts.
Why it is unhelpful: You have created an alternative reality where only negativity prevails.
Mental Filtering
Description: Looking at only the negatives and nothing else.
Examples: You receive nine compliments and one criticism, but you fixate on the criticism for the rest of the week. You remember all of the embarrassing parts of a conversation, but none of the parts that went well.
Problems: It creates a distorted reality in which the negative is more powerful than the positive, despite the facts.
Description: “That doesn’t count.”
Examples: Someone gives you praise, but you brush it off by saying, “They’re just being nice.” You accomplish something and convince yourself that it happened through luck rather than ability.
Problems: It defends a negative belief system by ignoring contradictory information.
Jumping to Conclusions
What it sounds like: You presume to know what people think or that something is going to happen.
Variations:
Mind reading: “They think I’m boring.”
Fortune telling: “This presentation will go poorly.”
Why it’s unhelpful: You take your assumptions for facts and fail to verify the facts.
What it sounds like: “I feel it, so it must be true.”
How it occurs: “I feel worthless, so I am worthless.” “I’m anxious about flying, so it must be dangerous.” Feelings are facts, irrespective of objective reality.
Why it’s unhelpful: Emotions are information, not conclusions. This distortion turns emotions into the latter.
What it sounds like: Converting behavior into identity.
Examples: “It’s not just that I screwed up; I’m a screw-up.” “It’s not that they were nasty; they are a nasty person.”
Why this thinking is counterproductive: These labels are rigid and close off nuance.What it sounds like: Assigning yourself the blame for things outside your control.
Examples: You are late to meet a friend who has to reschedule, so you assume you made him angry. You child is having problems at school, so you take all the blame.
Why this thinking is counterproductive: Inflating the impact of your part in the situation.
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