Unhelpful Thoughts

You firstly need to be able to recognise an unhelpful thought. Then you can challenge it. Being aware of the common patterns that unhelpful thoughts follow can help you to recognise when you have them. Here, you will find some of the common patterns that our unhelpful thoughts follow:

Predicting the future/Catastrophising/What if?

When people are worried about something it is common for them to spend a lot of time ruminating. You can end up thinking about the future and predicting what might go wrong. This is instead of just letting things be. You might blow things out of proportion, or come to expect a catastrophe. For example:

  • What if they laugh at me?

  • What if I lose all respect?

Jumping to conclusions/Taking things personally/Mind reading

When people are feeling emotionally vulnerable, it is likely that they take things to heart and become more sensitive to what people say. They can often make assumptions about why someone said something, being overly quick to draw conclusions, and thinking that they are the focus of what has been said. For example:

  • They did that on purpose

  • They must think I'm stupid

Focusing on the negative/Ignoring the positive/Filtering

Often people can ignore the positive aspects of life or their situation. Instead you may focus on negative elements. This style of thinking stops us feeling good about ourselves. It can lower your confidence. For example:

  • Despite that person letting me out, he is now right at my bumper

  • My kids are a nightmare, nevermind how nicely they played with each other earlier

Black & White thinking/ All or nothing thinking/Perfectionism/"Should" thinking

Sometimes people only see things as black and white, with no grey area or inbetween. Having this polarised view can lead some people into setting themselves impossibly high standards, being overly critical and struggling to recognise any achievement due to their perfectionism. For example:

  • That was a complete waste of time

  • They must hate me

  • I should always get full marks

Over-generalising/Labelling

Based on one isolated incident you might assume that other events will follow a similar pattern in the future. You might find it hard to see a negative event as a one-off. This can also mean that you label yourself, often unkindly, which can lower your mood and confidence, perhaps even leading to feelings of hopelessness. For example:

  • Failing my GCSEs means I'll fail at everything

  • The neighbour's dog growled at me, all dogs are vicious

  • I'm useless