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Video Notes: 15 common cognitive distortions + restructuring negative thoughts (CBT)

Posted on August 8, 2020August 8, 2020 by Mag Nolia

  • Our brains get a lot of things wrong – our brains make predictions, they’re often not accurate. And behaviors that follow are often self-sabotaging.
  • A technique called cognitive-restructuring can help restructure our thoughts
  • Cognitive distortions — these are common ways people distort their thinking
  • We catch the distorted thought – and we label it, then tell ourselves something a little more positive, or rational and helpful — if we do so, our mood can improve, and our behavior can improve
  • Common distortions:
    • All or nothing thinking — black or white thinking, there’s no grey area
    • Overgeneralization — seeing everything as going wrong or through a negative lens
    • Mental filter — taking one negative experience and blowing it up
    • Discount the positive — ignoring everything positive
    • Mind reading — predicting what another person thinks about us
    • Fortune telling — predicting something negative will happen
    • Magnification — blowing things way out of proportion, often envisioning the worst case scenario
    • Emotional reasoning — looking at emotions as facts
    • “Should” statements — using “should” statements – we’re guilting ourselves, we’re criticizing ourselves – or other people 
    • Labeling & mis-labeling — judging ourselves or others
    • Personalization — taking everything personally
    • Control fallacy — when a person believes they have no control over their life
    • Fairness fallacy — fallacy that everything in life should be fair
    • Fallacy of change — expecting others to change
    • Always being right — internalizing thoughts/opinions as facts
  • When you catch yourself doing one or more of these distortions, try to reframe it in your mind. Try to re-narrate your thoughts and the story.

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