What Does It Mean to Be Mentally Strong or Weak?

・No One Is Mentally Strong to Begin With

First of all, what does it mean to be mentally “strong” or “weak”?

Mental strength isn’t a given strength people have. It’s more about how good you are at navigating through emotions when a negative incident occurs.

For example, lets’ say a man was given the opportunity to do a presentation at his company. Over a few days, he gathers information, creates the necessary files for it, and presents everything at the end. However, the boss responds with very critical feedback. How does this man react to that critical feedback?

Scenario 1: Let me incorporate what he said and try again

Scenario 2: I’m not going to care about it too much

Scenario 3: I tried so hard, yet all I got was a critical opinion on it

Scenario 1 is a response from someone who is positive that tries to grow towards their next opportunity. Scenario 1 is the most ideal way to navigate your emotions. Instead of facing away from the problem, they improve their skills so that they can prepare and build their mental tolerance towards the issue.

At a quick glance, the scenario 2 response seems like a response from someone who is mentally strong. However, this does not consider fixing the situation to prepare for future possibilities. This response is effective in brushing off malicious and offensive acts carried out towards a person. It is important to assess how important the situation is before you choose this option

The most problematic is scenario 3. A negative response to feedback only grows negative emotions within that leads to a loss of self-esteem. This is spotted in people that are always too serious or are perfectionists. When they can’t achieve their ideal goals, they tend to self-sabotage.

・It’s Important to Shift Your Thoughts

When there’s an inconvenient event that happens, we feel unpleasant. After the unpleasant feelings, it turns into negative emotions of frustration or anxiety. This shift from unpleasant to negative emotion is part of how the brain reacts and we cannot change this mechanism.

Most people who are mentally vulnerable tend to be affected by these negative emotions that arise. Eventually, they feel trapped in a negative cell from the illusion that they’ve created.

People who are considered mentally strong are capable of shifting their thinking more positively before they get affected by these negative emotions.

This thought shift is a vital skill. If we use the example from above in the case of the presentation getting critical feedback from the boss, you can shift your thinking into the positive by focusing on your potential growth from this experience.

5 Mental Strength Training Methods to Try Now

Just like muscle strength or endurance training, we can build out our mental strength so that we become more tolerant of adversities. Below, we introduce the 5 training methods we recommend for you to try.

Method 1: Self-Reflect Through Self-Talk

By changing the pronouns while you talk to yourself, you can create a second-person dialogue. This allows you to see your situation from a distance so that you can see things more clearly and objectively.

You can specifically shift the dialogue by using first-person, second-person, and third-person pronouns. Below are examples if we continue the scenario of presenting and receiving critical feedback from the boss.

・First-Person
“I’m super nervous. I’ve perpared well, but I wonder if everyone will understand.”

・Second-Person
“Hey, you don’t have to feel so nervous. You’ve prepared well, so all you have to do is present with confidence.”

・Third-Person
“He doesn’t have to feel that nervous. He prepared well. I’m sure people will understand if he presents with confidence.”

As you can see, talking to yourself as if you were another person creates the necessary distance to gain clarity.

Method 2: Mindfulness Meditation

Mindfulness is a way of thinking that enhances the experience of the present “now.” Mindfulness meditation is applied in cognitive behavioral therapy within the mental health field.

It focuses on subtle sensory signs of the body, such as how it feels when a single bean is placed on the palm of your hand. The focus on these subtle actions helps steer our thoughts away from negativity. Once we displace ourselves from a position of stress, we can recognize new aspects that lead to solving the problem itself.

1. Sit with a straight back
2. Close your eyes and feel your breath
3. If your thoughts start to wander, bring back the attention to the breath

These 3 points are all you need to practice mindfulness meditation. Start from 3 to 5 minutes of practice and then expand to 10 minutes or 15 minutes as you go.

Method 3: Think Like a Fly on the Wall

The Fly On The Wall method is a great way to gain objectivity. As the word spells it out, you act as if you’re a fly on the wall as if you could understand the situation with a bird’s-eye view.

This method is test proven through an experiment at Ohio University and known to be effective as a stress care method. Similar to mindfulness meditation, it requires no tool.

The most important technique in this is to create an external view of what’s happening to yourself.

You’ll be affected less by negative emotions once you learn how to separate your emotions and actual reality. You don’t have to be a fly. It could be another bug, a cloud, a light pole. By continuing this practice, you train your mind to constantly take an objective perspective and this helps cool down anger when it arises.

Method 4: Organize Your Thoughts on a Piece of Paper

If a negative incident is straining your thoughts, try writing it all out on a piece of paper.

The content should be based on what happened and how you felt.

• I got into a fight with a friend – Unhappy
• I had to go to work on a day off – Sad
• I got stuck in traffic – Frustrating

When we write out how we feel on a piece of paper, the visualization of our feelings helps organize our thoughts. The understanding of why we feel unhappy or frustrated will give us the opportunity to recognize our biases and negative beliefs.

Negativity is contagious so it’s easy to roll down the negative spiral once you’re in it. Write out all your feelings and organize your thoughts. See if you can capture things in a more positive light.

Method 5: Learn How to Build Automatic Positivity

Mental weakness comes from us reacting negatively to incidents. This is called “automatic thinking,” and when our automatic thoughts are steered negatively it can trigger a state of depression.

However, this tendency can be fixed through training by continually focusing on the 3 points below:

1. Reflect on your past success
2. Think positive thoughts if you ever feel yourself getting negative
3. Think of the influences that positive memories bring

First, recall a positive success memory. It can be anything from receiving a compliment or a good score on a test. Think of what elements produced the results and try to unravel the secrets to your success and failures. Continually recalling your success will automatically kick your thoughts into positive gear.

It’s also helpful to recall how you’ve overcome failure. If you ever feel negative, remember the moment you grew from your failures. Perhaps it’s now a great story to tell or you recognize how important someone was to you. Try to understand the past as a positive event that made you who you are today.

If your friends encouraged you through failures, you can take it that you have great friends. If you’re able to make it into a great story from the past, perhaps you have the whit to do so. Sprinkle these positive aspects into your mind and this will help create an automated process towards positive thinking.

Strengthen The Mind and Body Through Mental Training

We talked about strengthening our mental tolerance through training, but weakness has its benefits too.

If you tend to be sensitive to small incidents, another way to see it is that you are expressive and have a strong sensibility. If you feel anxiety and pressure, it could mean that you feel more responsible than others.

If you feel that you’re mentally weak and need the training to build mental tolerance, just make sure that you don’t lose the great aspects that you already have. We hope you keep your unique greatness as an individual while building out parts that need support for a more enjoyable life!

Nowadays, an AI can help you on your mental journey without any restrictions on time schedule, or location. The more you interact, the more adequate advice it can give. It’s an affordable alternative counseling method with a free trial period. Give it a try!
→SELF MIND

Reference：

【World Health Organization】

【BlueCross BlueShield THE HEALTH OF AMERICA】

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3 Common Reasons of Negativity

According to a study at a university, there are 4 elements that create negative thinking: Regret and Shame, Negative Expressions, Lack of Confidence, and Criticism Towards Others. If we sum it up, the following 3 reasons are the most common triggers for negative thinking.

Severe Long-Term Stress

Stress can be a direct cause of negativity. When we mess up at work/school or can’t perform well, negativity takes over our minds, making less room for positivity to grow. If we surround ourselves with negative people, sometimes we end up being heavily influenced by them too.

Past Traumatic Experiences

Past trauma can impact us in many ways. A person full of optimism and positivity can suddenly change negatively due to shocking incidents. Some people can fall into a negative trap where they can’t believe in anyone after experiencing betrayal from someone they used to trust.

Hormonal Imbalance Due To Poor Lifstyle Choices

A neurological chemical called serotonin has to do a lot with our emotional control and stability. A lack of serotonin not only makes us less energetic, but it can also make us negative too. For your body to properly produce serotonin, a stress-free lifestyle with exercise, a healthy diet, and sunlight becomes crucial. If we can shift our lifestyle with healthier lifestyle habits that promote serotonin, that can push our minds back towards positivity.

3 Reasons Sleep Heals Negativity

Typically, if the cause of our problems is clear, we’d have to fix that first. However, causes such as past trauma or long-term stress cannot be fixed overnight and that can feel like a struggle. Therefore, we advise that you start easy with getting plenty of sleep. In this section, we’ll explain how sleep can heal negativity within our minds.

It Heals the Physical Body and Brain

The brain can rest and condition the body’s hormonal balance when it goes to sleep. A well-balanced hormonal function can fight negativity and build stress resilience towards the incoming negativity we experience.

The body needs to feel energized enough before we start exercising towards a healthy serotonin function. Sleep also helps our whole body restore itself. Without fundamental sleep, it’s hard to make the change we desire.

Leads To Better Lifstyle Habits

A structured sleeping schedule, sunlight, and a healthy diet all contribute towards getting rid of our negativity. A good night’s rest promotes serotonin secretion which helps us back to positivity. Good sleep also helps us stay efficient during the day. Most of us have pulled all-nighters during the weekday only to try and catch up on sleep during the weekends. We can start working on positivity today, just by starting off a healthy sleeping schedule.

Stops The Negativity Loop

Once we fall into a negativity loop our problems seem infinitely larger than what they are. We need to reset our minds so that we can shift gears towards positivity. To easily do this, we recommend sleep.

When we sleep, our thoughts are forced to shut down and we can leave from thinking so much. This gives us the capability to look at things more objectively and calmly when we wake up.

If you have a hard time sleeping, an AI app can help you sort your thoughts through too. Try the SELF MIND app for a FREE trial!
If you’re looking for more tips on how to care for your mental health, check out some of our past blog posts!

Sleep Well for a Healthy Mind and Body

Good sleep nourishes our brain and body while it puts our negative thinking on hold. It’s a necessary step for proper serotonin secretion and the key to stopping the negativity. Next time you feel negative and down, stop what you’re doing and go to bed.

Reference：

Akutsu, Y., Odajima, H., & Miya, S. (2008). Changes of positive and negative affect by a stress task. The Annual Report of the Faculty of Education, Iwate University, 68, 1–8. https://iss.ndl.go.jp/books/R100000002-I000000001712-00

Konishi, M., & Yoshida, A. (2011). Life style and environment that influence serotonin secretion. Journal of Osaka Kawasaki Rehabilitation University, 5, 1–20. https://ci.nii.ac.jp/naid/120006866960

Shiraishi, S., Soma, H., & Shimazu, N. (2016). Characteristics of Japanese automatic thoughts in negative situations. Utsunomiya University Repository, 66(1), 3–12. http://hdl.handle.net/10241/10240

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The Effects of Overthinking

Not everyone is decisive at crucial moments of decision-making. The time it takes someone to think through for a conclusive decision varies depending on the situation and personality. However, overthinking can have the following negative impact on our mental wellbeing:

Starts or Worsens Depression

People prone to overthinking tend to worry a lot as they deal with life. Thoughts about negative scenarios will eventually bring our mood down too. An increase in stressful thoughts decreases the production of serotonin (chemicals produced to maintain mental stability) in our brains, contributing to depressive states. A lack of serotonin is also known to cause various symptoms such as constant fatigue, insomnia, and irritation.

Prevents Us From Being Proactive

When we act before we think, we are faster in taking action. When we think before we act, it prevents us from being proactive. It may not make a big difference in your personal life, but overthinking in business settings can lead to lost opportunities and networks.

Increases Difficulty in Tackling New Challenges

New challenges feel difficult when we overthink them. The more time we spend thinking, the more worrisome aspects of the challenge seem apparent. Of course, thinking through could keep us safe from possible risks, but it also prohibits us from taking the risks necessary to create change.

For example, the mental exhaustion from over-focusing on the problems will hold us back from taking courageous actions or risks necessary to create change. Avoidance of actions and risks may keep us in a perpetually hostile environment that potentially breaks us. There’s always a risk for depression and PTSD for people who feel like they have no escape.

5 Activities to Try When Overthinking

People who overthink tend to be perfectionists that want to seek answers until they can convince their own logic. The following activities are helpful when thinking becomes painful.

1. Try a Physically Active Hobby

Find a hobby that you enjoy. Indulgence in hobbies can change our focus and avoid perpetual negativity.

Any hobby is sufficient, but something physically active is ideal. This is because we want to balance out the activities in our left brain (logic, thinking, and mathematics) by activating the right brain (feelings, intuition, and creativity). Exercise helps activate our right brain as we focus on physical activity, and this helps us stay away from looping thoughts.

2. Write Out Your Thoughts

We overthink because we haven’t found a conclusion. Thus, writing out all of your thoughts on a piece of paper may be helpful in viewing ideas objectively. Verbalization of internal thoughts helps organize thoughts, calms the mind, and inspires solutions.
This is a great method for people who want to improve their mental health by finding solutions.

3. Sleep

Sleep is one way to help our brain recover from mental fatigue. If thinking through a matter isn’t helping, we can shut our thoughts down for a while by falling asleep.
For some, the mind can still continue to run wild even while trying to rest. In that case, we recommend the following activities:

• Soak in a hot tub
• Keep away from electronics (smartphones and tablets) before bed
• Surround yourself with pleasing scents using aroma oils or candles
• Read a familiar book that comforts you
• Don’t eat 2 hours before bed

4. Talk to Someone

Sometimes, we can move forward by talking to close friends and gaining new perspectives. It helps to proactively confide our feelings to someone close. Not just because of the solutions, we might gain, but the “comfort” we feel from it is as significant. The act to share our thoughts prevents isolation and makes us feel connected with society again.

5. Set a Routine Time Dedicated to Thinking

One of the reasons we keep overthinking is because we don’t know when to stop. Sometimes, stopping all thoughts can lead to better solutions.

Still, for people who overthink, letting go of their thoughts can sound like a challenge. If so, try to set dedicated routine times for thinking. It could be 30 mins before bed or the first 15 mins when you wake up. Set times dedicated to thinking each day will help prevent our minds from overrunning forever.

Find What Works for You

There’s nothing wrong with working through a thought. However, if you recognize that you’re overthinking, it’s healthy to take breaks. In this post, we introduced 5 specific activities that could combat depression and overthinking, but frankly, it can be any activity that calms your mind. The scale and depths of our issues are all different. We hope you find what works for you in facing your inner thoughts.

Looking to improve your mental health? Need someone to talk to? Try the SELF MIND app for a FREE trial!
If you’re looking for more tips on how to care for your mental health, check out some of our past blog posts!

Reference：

Matsumoto, M. (2005). How Overthinking Contributes to Continual Depression. Japan Society of Personality Psychology.

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Negative Experiences are a Part of Life

A Japanese university experimented to see how people socially share their experiences when they see images that evoke unpleasant feelings. When participants were left alone in a waiting room with a friend after seeing the unpleasant images, 95.3% of them told their friends about the images. Even when they were told not to disclose, 53% of them ended up talking about their experience a week later. Our desire to share bad experiences with others is so strong, and we struggle to keep it to ourselves.

In clinical psychology, verbalization of emotions is believed to have a cathartic effect that removes anxiety and tensions. Verbalizing emotions is also linked to better mental health, as it has significant implications for depression recovery. People seem to derive these effects from “cognitive” and “interpersonal” aspects of this behavior, which we will discuss below.

Emotional Support Stabilizes Our Feelings

Tough times can make us feel frustrated and anxious. When these experiences occur, our trust, self-image, perception of others, and the world can be shaken. We all desire to sort out what happened, why it happened, and know what kind of social support we can get. When there’s something out of our control, we feel the need to discuss it with peers so that we can restore our faith again. Receiving the emotional support from our peers makes us feel better about the mistakes we made. These are the “cognitive” reasons we vent our feelings to others.

Staying Connected to Society

When we’re upset, we tend to focus on ourselves and our negative experiences. As a result, we tend to forget about the rest of the world. We try to recover from the loneliness we experience during these times by sharing our negative experiences with friends and family. Our desire to communicate stems from wanting society to know how we’re feeling and to feel accepted through emotional support. This is the “interpersonal” reason why we talk about painful things.

Do We Want to Share Our Embarrassment?

It’s not rare to share the little embarrassing things that we experience. Like when we mess up during a presentation or trip on a flat surface. A Japanese university set to find out if and when students would talk to others about their saddest, angriest, and most embarrassing experiences. Researchers expected results to show that participants seldom shared their embarrassing experiences. However, 71.4 % of participants claimed to share their most embarrassing experiences with others. Also, more than half shared their experience almost immediately after it happened.

Everybody Shares Their Feelings with Others

Sharing feelings is part of our universal behavior. A social study of shared emotional behavior across six countries, including Belgium and Suriname, found no differences by country, age, or gender, in the way that humans shared emotions. Talking about embarrassing or upsetting occurrences seems to be a common phenomenon for men and women of all ages and backgrounds worldwide.

Nevertheless, it can be somewhat stressful for a listener to hear someone’s negative experience, as well as to provide undivided emotional support. It’s wiser to spread your venting among several people rather than dumping everything onto just one person.

Sharing difficult or embarrassing experiences is natural. We should always support our circle of family and friends to help each other get through these experiences.

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If you’re looking for more tips on how to care for your mental health, check out some of our past blog posts!

Image: Unsplash

Reference:
Kawase, T. (2000). Why We Talk About Our Emotions: Why Do People Talk About Negative Emotions to Others? Bulletin of Miyazaki Municipal University Faculty of Humanities 7(1), 135-149.

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What is Emotional Differentiation?

One helpful technique in regulating our negative emotions is called emotional differentiation. In short, this refers to our ability to identify and label our emotions. Ph.D. at Harvard University, Erik Nook explains, “Some people are very specific in making sense of what they’re feeling, whereas other people might just say they feel bad, but can’t be more specific than that.”

Nook says our ability to differentiate emotions score high as a child. This is because we only start with very straight-forward single emotions to identify with. However, from childhood to adolescence, our emotional differentiation skills decrease to an all-time low. This is due to the shifting developments we deal with to understand complex emotions. This is part of the reason why we struggle to make sense of emotions during our teen phase. Then, as we grow into adulthood and gain more experience with complex emotions, our emotional differentiation skills tend to improve again. In other words, you learn how to control your emotions as you grow older. Emotional differentiation skills are also crucial in building our future emotional intelligence.

Why is Emotional Differentiation Important?

We Can’t Fix What We Don’t Understand

As adults, we all vary in our levels of emotional differentiation skills. For instance, a 2012 study at Michigan University asked participants to identify and note their emotions throughout the day for a week. As a result, emotional differentiation skills widely differed between depressed and healthy individuals.

• People vulnerable to stress have a vague understanding of how they feel and have more trouble differentiating their negative emotions.
• People resilient to stress are skilled at differentiating their negative emotions.

In other words, mentally healthy people put labels such as “anxiety” or “sadness” to their negative emotions. In contrast, people prone to stress tend to leave them unarticulated in one pile as “bad”. Therefore, unless we can clearly identify the core of our negative emotions, it becomes a challenge to help ourselves or reduce stress. Overall, the more you learn how to identify your emotions, the more you learn how to control your emotions in a healthy way.

Emotional Control and Coping Skills

Another 2015 joint study by George Mason University and Northeastern University found that emotional differentiation correlated with how well we could cope in intensely stressful situations.

• People with LOW emotional differentiation skills were up to 50% more likely to resort to unhealthy coping methods such as binge drinking, aggression, and self-injurious behaviors.
• People with HIGH emotional differentiation skills naturally down-regulated their neural reactivity in the brain regions that formed negative feelings. Thus, they experienced less anxiety and depressive disorders.

According to these findings, the experience of a negative emotion widely varies depending on our skills. Thus, this is an essential developmental processing skill that reduces our psychological problems and increases our sense of wellbeing.

How to Control Your Emotions Using Emotional Differentiation

Identify Negative Emotions

All of the above research teaches us that we should never over-simplify our negative emotions. Moreover, carrying a vague sense of terrible feelings will not help us in any way. Instead, let’s try to ask questions that assess these negative emotions. For example, are you feeling angry? If so, what’s one of the root emotions that’s causing this anger? In effect, focusing on identifying these feelings can instantly steal our attention away from experiencing the damaging effects of negativity. Consequently, you will have a better grasp on how to control your emotions and reduce stress in an appropriate manner.

The Negative Emotion List

However, it’s not easy to immediately identify our feelings in the heat of the moment. In this case, a reference list of negative emotions comes in handy. According to psychologist and California State University professor Tom G. Stevens, our primary negative emotions can be grouped into three main groups of anxiety, anger, and depression.

Emotional Control Takes Practice

Of course, there are many more emotions, and complex emotions can have more than one label. The lines between the emotion groups can also be blurry, as some emotions may overlap groups. In essence, try to create group categories and labels that work best for you. Write them down on a piece of paper or on post-its. Whenever you need to reduce stress, take a look at the list of words and try to see if you can identify and organize the source of your feelings. Above all, ientifying and understanding feelings is the cathartic step towards better understanding how to control your emotions.

Overall, if we want to help ourselves, we must first allow ourselves to understand how we feel. Although it may seem unpleasant to explore negative emotions, this is an essential step in developing our emotional intelligence skills. Next time you feel “bad” don’t discard it so quickly. Instead, pull out your chart of feelings to find better coping methods and figure out how best to control your emotions.

Looking to improve your mental health?

Try the SELF MIND app FREE for 1 week!
If you’re looking for more tips on how to care for your mental health, check out some of our past blog posts!

Images: Unsplash
Reference:

Demiralp, E., Thompson, R. J., Mata, J., Jaeggi, S. M., Buschkuehl, M., Barrett, L. F., Ellsworth, P. C., Demiralp, M., Hernandez-Garcia, L., Deldin, P. J., Gotlib, I. H., & Jonides, J. (2012). Feeling Blue or Turquoise? Emotional Differentiation in Major Depressive Disorder. Psychological Science, 23(11), 1410–1416. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797612444903


Kashdan, T. B., Barrett, L. F., & McKnight, P. E. (2015). Unpacking Emotion Differentiation. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 24(1), 10–16. https://doi.org/10.1177/0963721414550708


Reuell, P. (2018, September 21). Harvard researchers examine evolution of emotion differentiation. Harvard Gazette. https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2018/09/harvard-researchers-examine-evolution-of-emotion-differentiation/


Stevens, T. G. (n.d.). Choose To Be Happy and Overcome Negative Emotions such as anxiety, anger, or depression. You Can Choose To Be Happy. Retrieved August 26, 2020, from https://web.csulb.edu/%7Etstevens/anxiety,_anger,_and_depression.htm

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The Basics of The Four Good Things

This technique is a modified version of the “Three Good Things” method.
You can read more about that in the article below:

In mental health care, keeping a diary is a rudimentary approach to stress-coping. A record of our daily state of mind allows us to see our situation objectively. This also helps us recognize cognitive biases so that we can correct them in the right direction. Given the benefits, it’s a frequently used technique in cognitive behavioral therapy.

The “Four Good Things” method was created by Professor Elaine Fox at the University of Oxford. The use of the diary format through this method effectively relieves stress and steers our thoughts towards a more positive direction. Here is the simple way to do it:

1. Write down one negative thing that happened that day.
2. Write down four positive events.

The positive events can be anything at all, as long as it’s something that makes you feel happy. Here are some examples:

・I was complimented on my work today.
・My family was in a good mood.
・I woke up feeling well-rested.
・The food I ate today was delicious.
・I saw my favorite actor on TV today.

The key is to write down one negative event that happened. In the same way that sprinkling a pinch of salt into a cookie dough can help bring out sweetness, awareness of a negative event will serve as a contrast against the positive. This allows positive events to really shine through to make a stronger impression on the brain.

While there is still little data on this Four Good Things method, Professor Fox’s experiments have confirmed that it has a higher stress-relieving effect than just writing down three good things.

Outshine Negativity With More Positivity

Unfortunately, negative events are more likely to leave an impression in our brains, creating a cognitive bias. For example, let’s say we hop on a train and feel pleased that “the train arrived on time smoothly”. This thought fades away pretty quickly. On the other hand, a negative thought like, “I just missed the train by a few seconds, and now I have to wait until the next one,” will leave a stronger impression on the brain. The stronger the impression, the longer the memory will be retained. Soon, we find ourselves repeatedly experiencing the same feelings every time a similar event happens. As a result, a cognitive bias is created in our minds, leading us to believe that, “I always miss the train by a few seconds. I’m so unlucky.”

In order to avoid creating this bias in our thinking, we need to counteract the impressions of negative events as they occur. Since negative events leave stronger impressions than positive events, counteracting one negative event with one positive event is not enough to achieve our desired outcome. The Four Good Things method aims to eliminate the impact of a negative event by fighting it with four positive events. The idea is simple. Even if something negative happened, if there are even more positive events to remember, the overall impression will turn positive.

If you’re asking yourself, “why am I always so unlucky?” or hold beliefs that, “things just don’t work out the way I want them to,” you may need to correct your own cognitive biases. We can definitely try to increase our stress tolerance and positivity using the Four Good Things.

Throw Away the Negative, Turn to the Positive

The Four Good Things method can potentially eliminate your negative cognitive biases and create a more positive mindset. Give it a try if you want to build a strong mentality to combat stress.

Having a coping mechanism on hand, such as the Four Good Things, keeps our mental health in check. This is just one of the many easy stress-care techniques you can try. Figure out what works for you and get into the habit of practicing. One of the keys to living a healthy and happy life is knowing how to properly cope with stress.

Image：Unsplash
Reference：
Fox, E. (2013). Rainy brain, sunny brain: The new science of optimism and pessimism. London: Arrow Books.

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All You Need is a Pen and Paper

The Negativity Trash Can”, as in the name, means to “throw away your negativity into the trash.” In practice, you write down negative or troubling thoughts onto a piece of paper and rip it to shreds before tossing it in the trash. It is that simple. Writing out your negative thoughts only requires 2 or 3 minutes. It can be as simple as a single sentence, or a whole paragraph, but the important thing is to write down your current emotions directly as they are. The paper you use can be a piece of notebook paper, a sticky note, or even the back of a scrap paper. It’s an easy stress-relief method that can be done anytime, anywhere, whether you’re at home, at work, or at a cafe.

Build Stress Tolerance with Practice

The negativity trash can was proven effective through a study held in 2012 at a university in Spain. When we write down a hazy thought on paper, that act is called “thought materialization.” This action convinces your brain that your stress has become a material object. Throwing away our materialized “stress” in the trash can will help eliminate stress, leaving our minds lighter from the mental load.

However, just practicing this won’t actually get rid of our negativity completely. In fact, the thoughts might still linger in our minds. Still, our brain will remember the fact that we threw it away, and the repeated process of this exercise will slowly negate our negativity. This repeated deception to our brain will also help improve our stress tolerance at the same time.

Throw Away the Negative, Embrace the Positive

Next time you’re feeling a little negative, try the Negativity Trash Can method. It’s easy and very effective!

Having a coping mechanism on hand, such as the Negativity Trash Can method, keeps our mental health in check. This is just one of the many easy stress-care techniques you can try. Figure out what works for you and get into the habit of practicing. One of the keys to living a healthy and happy life is to properly cope with stress.

image：Unsplash
Reference：

Briñol, P., Gascó, M., Petty, R. E., & Horcajo, J. (2012). Treating Thoughts as Material Objects Can Increase or Decrease Their Impact on Evaluation. Psychological Science, 24(1), 41-47. doi:10.1177/0956797612449176

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Do you know about “automatic thinking”?

“Let’s try to think positively!”
“Just stop having negative thoughts!”

These are some things many of us may frequently hear in daily life.
Being able to look at things in a positive light, or being optimistic about life in general – it’s much easier said than done.

Contrary to these words, some of us may remember all the things in our lives that didn’t work out, then think about everything negatively, assuming that it might not work out the next time either.

Feeling like you’ll fail at anything you do, or feeling inexplicably anxious everyday… These feelings are thought to stem from ‘automatic thoughts’. Is there a way to deal with this troubling pattern of thinking negatively?

What are “Automatic Thoughts”?

The concept of ‘automatic thinking’ is mainly used in cognitive behavioral therapy, which aims to modify negative thoughts and perceptions. It’s a reflexive thought that pops into your head whenever something happens. When this is habitual in a negative direction, it can be quite troublesome.

A strong sense of ‘past and present denial’ – being convinced that you’ve had only bad experiences – and a strong sense of ‘self-denial’ – being convinced that you are a bad person – can lead to depression and a lack of positive outlooks on oneself, believing that there will never be anything happy or enjoyable in the future.

Turning Automatic Thoughts More Positive

Even if a depressive thought pops into your head, recognizing it from a positive perspective makes it possible to minimize the negative impact.

There are two ways in which we think about and perceive things.
・Implicit cognition: Beliefs and ideas that have been gained through daily living
・Explicit cognition: A momentary reaction that pops into consciousness

Some people are able to always look at things through a positive lens. For example, as a general belief in life, they may think, “There is happiness in everyday life. I have many strong points, and my life has value”. As a momentary thought, they may think, “This is a difficult situation, but I can overcome it!”

Experts believe that the cyclic nature of negative thought patterns are the cause of depressive thinking. One unpleasant thought leads to another, and creates a repetition of negative self-evaluation. Being pessimistic about the future can cause you to feel like you’re unable to put a positive spin on anything. Moreover, when this belief of being unable to solve anything on your own continues, it can lead to a continuous desire to just run away.

On the other hand, if you’re able to continue looking at things from a positive pespective, they might gradually be able to counteract painful thoughts such as above. You might also be more likely to find a successful distraction, through the power of thought.

How Can We Fight Negative Automatic Thoughts?

So, what exactly does it take to make our automatic thinking more positive?
Below outlines one such example.

1. Look for experiences that have produced positive consequences. Think about what qualities in yourself they were derived from.

For example, let’s say you had the experience of a successful presentation. There are many possible reasons for the presentation to have succeeded. For example, “because I worked diligently”, “because I was able to focus in a limited amount of time”, “because of my high presentation skills”, and so on. One or two of those factors, and possibly more, would have intertwined to create this success.

2-1. Think about the positive elements that can counteract your negative thoughts.

For example, let’s say you made a huge mistake at an important sports event.
In that moment you might have some negative thoughs. For example, “I’m the type of person who fails in important situations.”
However, as a result of the failure, you might practice a lot more and ultimately excel at the sport. You might also find that many people around you were comforting and encouraging towards you.

2-2. Think about how these positive memories affect you now.

Let’s think about the continuation of 2-1.
If you were ultimately able to “practice a lot more” as a result, you can look at your own persistence. This becomes proof that you are a person who is able to continue working hard, not intimidated by failure. If the people around you “comforted and encouraged” you, you might be the type of person who receives support from many people.

By repeating the above method over and over again, positive thoughts will start to interrupt the negative thought patterns. Subsequently, this allows for more and more of these positive thoughts to come to mind as time goes on. As the link between negative thoughts that accelerate depression is severed, the less likely your automatic thoughts will turn negative.

You might often hear that positive thinking is the key, but if you find this difficult to actualize, give this method a try.

Automatic thoughts are tricky, but they can be very reliable if you have them on your side. Let’s keep our daily thoughts bright, for a brighter daily life!

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If you’re looking for more tips on how to care for your mental health, check out some of our past blog posts!

Image：Unsplash

Source:
The Relationship Among Irrational Beliefs, Automatic Thoughts and Depressive/Anxious Mood (Fukui, Itaru & Sakano, Yuji. Human Welfare Studies (3), 1-12, 2000.)

Mediating Effects of Automatic Thoughts in Facilitating and Reducing Depression (Yoshida, Toshiyuki & Nakamura, Tomoyasu. the Japanese Journal of Educational Psychology. 55(3), 313-324, 2007-09)

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“Not Thinking” causes Counterproductive Thoughts

For example, when people who quit smoking constantly focus on the idea, “don’t think about smoking,” their minds will actually fill with thoughts of smoking. Every visit to a corner store, they’ll be checking the cigarette shelf or unintentionally staring at others who are smoking. In another scenario, when someone asks us to keep a secret, we end up thinking about it all day and night, racked with the temptation of telling a friend. In these ways, counterproductive thoughts can be detrimental to our process of healing and self-improvement. We can fall into a self-loathing trap by thinking about the things we shouldn’t and conclude that we’re weak-willed. However, it all comes down to the mechanism of our thought processing than about will.

How to Better Deal with Counterproductive Thoughts

The more we try not to think, the more we end up thinking. We become overwhelmed by things we don’t want to think about, stressing our hearts away. What can we do to break this negative cycle? Here are a few ways to naturally avoid counterproductive thoughts.

1. Weaken the Need to Forcefully Shut Down

As mentioned, the more we force the mentality of ‘trying not to think,’ the more it lingers in our minds. We need to weaken the idea that we ‘should not think’ about something. To achieve this, we can carefully monitor our thoughts. The conscious choice of “not thinking” implies our effort to avoid a certain thought, yet as a result, ending up with more attention towards the thought. It’s time-consuming and difficult to completely cut off our counterproductive thoughts that cause stress. Try not to impose yourself with the strenuous task of “not thinking”, as this may be counterproductive. In other words, try not to stress about it too much.

One way to reduce stress and clear your mind is through meditation and mindfulness.

2. Analyze Your Thought Process in Detail

When we feel frustrated, we tend to only focus on events that left the strongest impression. In this case, this would be a frustrating incident. Try to look back on your actions before the incident. What were you doing and what was your state of mind? What triggered your frustration? Analyze your experience and sentiment from an objective point of view. What kind of action should you have taken in hindsight? This practice will help organize your thoughts and calm you down. Moreover, this type of thinking is much more helpful compared to counterproductive thoughts.

Repeating this approach helps gradual focus on the positive aspects of the matter, thus allowing our minds to accept. The process of detailed analysis may seem counterproductive, but this actually helps faster for the disperse and release of unpleasant feelings.

3. Introduce Alternative Thinking

It’s not easy to focus on many things at the same time. Instead of thinking about what you’d rather avoid, introduce an alternative thought. When negative thoughts start filling your head, shift your focus and attention to something fun and joyful. This should naturally get rid of those negative thoughts. If you can make alternative thinking a habit, you’ll gain the capabilities to subconsciously avoid focus on the matters that stress you out. As opposed to an unwanted, counterproductive thought, voluntary alternative thoughts will likely not cause you any stress.

Cast Your Mind Into Words

An effective way to practice the three steps above is to “disclose” your feelings and thoughts. Many studies show significant positive effects on mental health when experiences, feelings, and incidents are shared. “Disclosure” mentioned here doesn’t necessarily have to be towards others. Our deepest thoughts and feelings can be expressed through writing or speaking out loud alone. A diary that no one can see or self-talking at home is sufficient enough for it to be effective.

Forget That You Want to Forget

When you repeatedly remember an event you want to forget, or when your mind is full of negative thoughts, please don’t force yourself to forget. This causes counterproductive thoughts to fill your mind, and will not help you. Instead, try changing your experience into words and let them out. Facing yourself head-on may actually be the shortcut to getting rid of your negative memories.

Looking to improve your mental health? Try the SELF MIND app FREE for 1 week!
If you’re looking for more tips on how to care for your mental health, check out some of our past blog posts!

References:

Kimura, H. (2003). Effects of thought suppression and effective strategies of mental control. Japanese Psychological Review, 46(4), 584–596. https://doi.org/10.24602/sjpr.46.4_584

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