We've heard stuff like this so much we all want to puke: "Your thoughts create your reality" or some other thing like "Control your mind, control your life". The words are usually photoshopped onto some picture of a canoe on a lake, or a flower in the sunlight, or some other nonsense. Barf.
The reason I am saying "nonsense" is not because I think it's wrong, necessarily. It's because those pictures send a message that makes it seem like your mind should easily be this beautiful, calm, serene place. Like having a never-ending heavenly mind is the ultimate goal. That "controlling" your thoughts is as simple as laying under an umbrella on the beach. Well maybe for some people it is, but most people I talk to, as well as me and my brain, maybe have moments of serenity but most of the time it's like a tornado. Sometimes a war zone. It gets pretty dark and ugly in there. And while it's true that your thoughts play a huge role in your quality of life, what those pictures don't communicate is the amount of work, tears, pain, and struggle that can come with learning to manage your thoughts.
The other thing is that these messages don't give you any clue about how to even start. They just say "do it". And I'm sure we've all heard the same things from well-meaning family members and friends - "Just let it go", "Just turn your brain off", "Just go take a nap", "Just forget about it". Or my personal favorite: "You're over-reacting."
These phrases don't help and aren't true for a lot of us.
Managing your thoughts when you first start learning seems seriously impossible. You get pissed, you get upset with yourself, you feel ashamed. "It's supposed to be simple, why is this so hard? Why can't I get it?"
BECAUSE IT'S HARD!!!! THAT'S WHY!!! And it's totally normal and fine to feel upset about it being hard. Learning new things is hard work, especially when there are heavy emotions involved.
Especially for those of us whose brains are wired in very non-serene manners, or whose brains have learned to be torrential for a variety of reasons. (read my anxiety posts to learn about reasons your brains might be this way too.)
Another thing I want to really stress is that having doubts, worries, anxiety, negative thoughts about yourself or whatever else is fine. It's normal. Really, I'm serious. All humans have them. This is NOT about NEVER thinking anything negative or painful, because those kinds of thoughts are going to happen no matter what. Your whole life. And it's ok, because you're a human. That said, what this IS about is not letting them take over your life. It's about being able to start discerning which ones are valid and which ones aren't. It's about making a little more room in your brain to put some positive things in there along with the negative.
So I want to give you a place to start.
First of all, I want to set up better expectations. Learning about your own thoughts and how to have any sort of control with them is a skill, you can learn it. You can be taught and you can get better at it. Yeah, you're going to suck at first, but you'll get better. And it's not about doing it perfectly - EVER. No one has perfect mental discipline at every moment. Managing your own mind must be practiced, it must be practiced often, and you have to cut yourself a lot of slack because it is difficult.
There are a few mindfulness skills and a few CBT techniques thrown in there. There are lots of different ways to practice this, and you have to try different things until you find a good fit for you.
The basic premise is either 1) you stop the negative thinking dead in it's tracks and refocus, or 2) you recognize that your thinking is unhelpful or harmful, and keep reminding yourself of this as the thought fades away for now (because it will, even if it returns again later). Also, if you can only focus and keep the awful thoughts at bay for 2 seconds, fine! Do it for 2 seconds. Tomorrow maybe you'll do it for 5. You're just starting, and you'll get better. And it's better to have a 5 second break than none at all, right?
**DISCLAIMER: These are meant for people who are not experiencing flashbacks or severe traumatic stress, or who are already escalated past the point of calming down.
Let's take the "counting sheep" example. Imagine sheep in a field (or I always imagined them jumping over a fence repeatedly) and count them until you fall asleep. Part of the reason this might work is it gives you something to pay attention to. When your mind wanders, you just think "Oh, what number was I on?" and go back to counting. You don't go "AGHH I can't believe I lost count, I'm such an idiot!!" because they are just imaginary sheep. It's gentle and keeps your mind occupied in a pleasant enough manner. It's also boring as hell, which is why it has never worked for me, but for some it does and it's common enough that I could use it as an example.
Here are some mind tips that HAVE worked for me, that I thought were interesting, or I know have been helpful for others:
Windshield wipers
I used this one quite a bit when I was first practicing my mind-management. I imagine like I'm watching a black screen at the movies. When I notice that I'm having a thought appear on that screen, I then imagine windshield wipers wiping the thought away as if they are rain water and I'm in a car, and I go back to watching the quiet, black screen. I love driving in the rain, so this has pleasant connotations for me.
Imagine thoughts as cars driving by
This is one of my more recent tricks. Sometimes I will imagine as if I am standing on the side of a busy street. I literally imagine my thoughts as appearing before me, and then I watch them as they pass by out of my line of vision, like when you're a little kid playing outside and you watch a car drive by on your street. This helps me tune in to my "observer" self, and helps me stay separate from my thoughts so they don't consume me. I don't try and push them out and I don't say "crap I got lost in my thoughts", I just go back to my side of the street and watch it go.
"5-4-3-2-1" Grounding
Lots of my patients and even my family say this works for them, even when they have no previous mental health treatment. With this technique, you use your five senses to get out of your head and into the world. One sense at a time, notice what's happening RIGHT NOW in your environment. What do you see around you? What do you smell? Really pay attention and let yourself notice. What do you feel on your skin? Is it cold/hot? What can you hear? Often there's nothing around to taste, but if there is, what do you taste? This technique puts the focus outside of your wild brain and into your surroundings, where you often see that there's nothing scary going on THIS MOMENT and that you're ok in the bigger picture.
Putting your brain in a drawer
This one is from Amy Poehler's book "Yes, Please". It's something like when her brain gets loud, she imagines putting it in a drawer and letting it holler and whine and do what it needs to do, but it's muted and she doesn't have to pay as much attention to it. I thought this was a lovely practice, and who doesn't love Amy Poehler?
Naming your anxiety/depression/negative self-talk
I love this way of separating yourself from your hurtful thoughts. Come up with an identity for that voice or those thoughts that criticize you. Names I've heard of are "Steve" and "Mrs. Quibble-Wibble". I love the idea of naming it something silly, because when you catch yourself in awful thoughts you can just say "Oh, there's Steve again", or "Get out of here, Mrs. Quibble-Wibble". It helps you take those thoughts a little less seriously. I personally haven't named my thoughts (I can't seem to come up with a fitting name), but I've personally seen this work for other people.
"Cancel"/"Stop" and "Try again"
I use this idea with my patients sometimes. Sometimes they get caught in ugly, ugly thinking. Depending on their mood and personality, I can sometimes get away with cajoling them with this and they end up giggling at themselves. When they say something in a negative way, I'll point it out to them. If it happens again, I gently tell them "Stop", point out their thinking, and say "Try again", always good naturedly and to try never make it blaming (because I get it). I'm challenging them to rephrase what they said in a different way. Often it takes 3-4 tries before they figure out how to put their phrase in a neutral, realistic, or more positive way. This is something you can practice doing on your own, too.
Example: "I'm never going to get better"
"Try again"
"I might never get better"
"Try again"
"(sarcastically) I'm going to get better tomorrow"
"Ha ha, ok yeah sure, try again" (or depending on the person I match their sarcasm)
"(more seriously) I can probably get better, even though it's really hard and doesn't seem like it"
"STOP!!"
Sometimes it goes too far and you need to stop a thought dead in it's tracks. Yell STOP in your brain (or out loud, if you're in a situation you can do that) for as long as it takes to make it louder than those ugly, mean thoughts: "STOOOOOPPPPPPPPPPPPP!!!!!!!!". Hopefully you will hear a quiet when you're done mind-yelling (that is what has happened for me, at least). Then pick yourself up and get out of wherever you are and whatever you're doing. Get distracted, do something else. Get out of the house. Call someone you love. If you're REALLY good, correct yourself and think something nice, but this can be really hard.
Again, it will take practice to re-focus after you get lost in your thoughts. When you first start you might have to re-focus yourself 4 times a second and that's normal. I don't expect that these will work for everyone and especially not in every situation. But they are a place to start.
As always, if you don't do it perfectly, it's totally ok. If you try all of these repeatedly and none of them help, that's fine. If you find something else that works for you in a healthy way, awesome! Do that. If you find that you keep having negative thoughts pop in, that's totally ok too, they are just thoughts. They are just there, and they suck, but they will go away at some point, at least for a while. Everybody has negative thoughts sometimes. In fact if someone said that one of these or any other technique made their painful thoughts go away completely I wouldn't believe them one bit.
Some other things you could try are pretty much anything called "mindfulness" skills or "thought stopping techniques".
If you have any comments or questions feel free to comment or email me!
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