”The world we have created is a product of our thinking; it cannot be changed without changing our thinking.”
Albert Einstein
Your thoughts and mind are truly powerful. A change or a positive
habit when it comes to your thinking can make a world of difference.
But on the other hand, getting stuck in the same old thought habit
can be that one thing that cripples you, paralyses you, causes much
suffering and gets you stuck instead of getting you to move forward
towards a happier and more positive life.
In this article I’ll explore 7 common destructive thought habits that
I have had to struggle quite bit with in the past and what I have done
to overcome or at least minimize them. I hope you’ll find something
helpful in this article.
1. You see things in black and white.
Instead of seeing life as it is, somewhat messy with a lot of
exceptions to different rules, you see things in black and white. You
are right and someone else is wrong. This way is good and that way is
bad. Things are either this way or that way and there no exceptions or
gray areas.
This makes it harder to make sense out of things, to take action in
the right way and can be a way of thinking that makes you more and more
inflexible as time passes. You get stuck and you can become terribly
critical and unfair towards yourself and other people. You put barriers
in your mind and life and this creates a lot more unhappiness and
suffering than necessary.
What to do about it:
- Try to understand the other side. It’s easy to
stick to your point of view. But you can gain powerful insights about
the other person and yourself too by trying to understand their point of
view. This also tends to decrease harshness and negativity and can make
it easier to reach an understanding where both parties feel more
satisfied with the solution.
- Be aware. Like with any habit in this article, just
being aware and paying attention during your normal day can help you to
discover and reduce these thought patterns by stopping that thread of
thought and then changing what you focus on.
- Find the exception. If thoughts pop up telling you
that you suck in school or that your partner never helps out at home
then say stop before those thoughts become a big black cloud of anger.
Pause for a second or two. Then ask yourself: what is the exception to
this thought? Find one exception or more to that black and white thought
you are feeding.
You may for example realize that your partner cooks a lot of the food at
home or do many of the repairs. Or that you are pretty good at writing
and geography but have some improvements to make when it comes to math.
2. You look for problems even when there are none.
This is a weird one. In the past I have found myself looking for
problems even when there are none really. I think in part comes from
snapping back into your old mindset. I used to be much more negative and
see problems everywhere for many years. So the mind is conditioned to
operate that way and so used to it. So on some days you sit around and
suddenly realize while thinking that you are looking for a problem in a
situation or area of your life where there are none.
What to do about it: One thing that really helped me
was to have this written down on my white board on my wall to remind me
each day: “There is no problem”.
Nowadays, if I am faced with what I start thinking is a problem I ask
myself: who cares? I most often then realize that this isn’t really a
problem in the long run at all.
I also think this can come from thinking a bit too much about
personal development and working on that. You become so accustomed to
looking for solutions that your mind wants to find problems that it can
solve. This personal development stuff is awesome. But read about and
think about it in moderation and not all the time.
3. You are addicted to your comfort zone.
If you are always thinking about how to feel and be really, really
safe then making a positive change will be impossible. The unknown and
change is uncomfortable and scary to the mind because it tends to want
your existence to be stable and continue to be as it has been so far.
What to do about it:
- Do it in small steps. What holds us back in our
zone of comfort is often a fear or that facing that fear head on might
be overwhelming. Doing things in small steps allows you to stretch your
comfort zone and slowly making it less uncomfortable and frightening.
- Focus on the positive past. Realize it can be fun
to get out of your comfort zone despite what your mind and feelings
might be telling you before you get started. Think back to the previous
times when you have broken out of your comfort zone. Focus on the
positive memories, when you got out there, when you took a chance. And
you will probably remember that it wasn’t so bad, it was actually fun
and exciting and something new to you.
4. You think that what you feel now is just how it is.
One habit I used to have was that I used to think what you feel right
now is kinda permanent. That it is how you really feel about things and
will feel in the near future too. However, it is really hard to predict
how you will feel just an hour or 15 minutes from now. The mind fools
you as you identify with the emotions you are feeling right now. This
can really hold you back.
What to do about it:
- Use and strengthen your discipline muscle. You may
for example not feel like going to the gym today. Your mind might say
“It’s ok, you don’t need that anyway, you were there three days ago”.
And so you lie back on the couch. But you can also say to yourself “No,
today is workout day and I will go even though I don’t feel like
it/don’t think I need to right now”. And so you go. And after you have
been there for maybe 15 minutes you start to enjoy it and you’re glad
you went.
- Just be aware that your mind doesn’t always want what you know is the right thing to do.
The mind often tries to get us to choose the easiest option in our
daily lives. It makes it seem like what you feel now is reality. Even
though emotional states are fleeting and you can change them around in
just a few minutes or hours by going to that gym.
5. You think you already know how things work.
If you think that you already know something then your mind will not
be open to actually learning it. Whatever someone is telling you, your
mind will sort through based on what you think you know. You’ll only
hear and learn what you what you want to hear and learn.
What to do about it: Whenever you want to learn
anything it may be a good tip to disregard as much as possible of what
you think you know. Keep your mind as open as you can. In my experience
this makes it easier to pick things up and not disregard important
stuff.
Of course, the ego often wants to jump in to meddle and strengthen
itself by making you think that you already know whatever you’re about
to learn. Be a bit careful with trusting that somewhat arrogant inner
voice.
6. You get stuck in envy and it poisons your life.
Envy can be like a tiny devil on your shoulder that whisper words
into your ear, gnashes on your soul and makes life into something that
is often filled with suffering and much negativity. Or the envy can just
be something that irritates and distracts you from time to time.
What to do about it:
- Focus on yourself when it comes to comparing. Comparing
what you have to what others have is a good way to make yourself
miserable. It feeds your ego when you buy a nicer car or get a better
job than someone else. You feel great for a while.
But this mindset and the focus on comparing always winds up in you
noticing someone that has more than you. That someone has an even better
job or car than you. And so you don’t feel so good anymore. The thing
is that there is always someone with better or more than you. So you can
never “win”. You just feel good for a while and then you don’t.
A more useful way to compare is to just compare yourself to yourself.
Look at how you have grown and what you have achieved. Appreciate what
you have done and what you have. See how far you have come and what you
are planning to do.
This will make you make you more positive and emotionally stable since
you are no longer comparing and feeling envious of what the other guy
have that you haven’t.
- Be grateful for what you got. Besides comparing
yourself to yourself it can be helpful to add a regular gratitude
exercise to your life to minimize the envy. So take just two minutes out
of your day to focus on being grateful for all the things you got. Make
a list of them in your head or write them down in journal at the
beginning or end of the day.
- Get a life. If you find yourself sitting around too
much and not having enough to do then it’s very easy to feel stuck and
to get stuck in thought loops and go into a downward spiral. Simply by
filling your life with more fun activities and people and the things you
want out of life you won’t have time or a reason to be envious.
Other benefits of getting a life are that you become a lot more relaxed
and less prone to overreacting about the little things. So spend less
time analyzing life and more time living and exploring it in whatever
way you’d like.
7. You overthink.
I used to be a chronic overthinker. This makes taking action very
hard, you analyze small things until they become big and scary in your
head and in general overthinking things most often leads to a negative
view of those things.
I have however successfully reduced or almost eliminated overthinking
in my life. It did take time, but on the other hand you are in the
company of your mind each day so you might as well start working on a
better relationship between the both of you.
What to do about it: How did I do it? The most
important thing was probably that I focused a big part of a year in my
personal development on reading/listening to books by Eckhart Tolle like
Stillness Speaks, A New Earth and The Sun Will Also Die and
establishing a habit of being in the present moment.
I listened to those books over and over on my mp3 player while out
walking, while riding the bus and so on. This had two big benefits: I
was very focused on his advice and it popped up in my head during the
day which made it easier to stay aware of though patterns and Tolle
became a sort positive influence in my weekly life. Just like a friend
can influence you with his/her positive, negative or ambitious attitude
and vibe.
Practice being present and it becomes a lot easier to minimize
overthinking and to use thinking as a tool rather than letting thoughts
control you.
One effective way to realign yourself with the present moment and to
let go of overthought thoughts that just run around in circles in your
mind is to breathe. To just sit down for 2 minutes, close your eyes if
you want and take relatively deep belly breaths. Focus 100% of your
attention on the air going in and out of you during these 2 minutes.
This calms the mind and body and gets you back into living in the
moments that are unfolding right here, right now.
Set short deadlines for decisions. Another very
helpful thing is to start using short deadlines. Instead of thinking
about something for days, tell yourself that you have – for example – 30
minutes to think. Then you will make a decision.
I also use even shorter deadlines for smaller, daily decisions. I
don’t sit around thinking about decisions like if I should exercise,
make a phone call, try some new food or anything where I may feel a bit
of resistance from within. Instead as soon as I think about it I make a
decision to do it within maybe 10-30 seconds and I start moving.
I have found this to be a good way to become more decisive instead of falling into the paralyzing trap of overthinking.
