Cognitive Therapy: Free Yourself From Negative Thoughts

Our thoughts determine how we feel and, in turn, our feelings prompt or discourage us from taking certain actions or assuming certain attitudes.

This is the principle from which cognitive therapy starts , originally created as a complement to behavior therapy and whose top representatives are the Americans Albert Ellis and Aaron Beck.

Although cognitive therapy was created to treat depression, over time it has proven useful for all types of psychological conditions.

These two therapists designed two lists, one for irrational ideas and the other for cognitive distortions. Its objective was to expose those negative, exaggerated and unrealistic thoughts that generate feelings of hopelessness, sadness, apathy and frustration and, likewise, can lead to illness.

Find the origin

Its purpose is to identify negative or distorted thoughts that lead to pathology.

Thus, for example, when someone ends an important affective relationship in their life, it is natural for them to feel sad and dejected and even, from time to time, to have thoughts such as: “All couples are happy and I have not been able to be” or “Others are doing better than me.” However, when these ideas become persistent and are accepted as absolute truths, they generate much greater discomfort than the emotional breakdown that caused them.

The key is to rationalize ideas that stray from reality.

It is these types of irrational ideas that lead to interpret any fact in a negative way. In these cases, advice is usually understood as a criticism and a compliment tends to be confused with a search for interest or an attempt at manipulation by the other.

Specific questions

Handling these distorted and unrealistic ideas is not difficult. The key is to rationalize and de-dramatize these extreme messages.

So, following the previous example of someone who has ended a relationship and thinks that everyone has a partner and is happy except himself, the first
thing he should do is stop for a moment to think and focus on the realistic and verified information that he has at the time. respect. For this, it is convenient that you ask yourself the following questions: Is having a partner really a guarantee of happiness? Does the fact that you see people on the street with a smile imply that these people never have problems? May I know exactly what is going on in your head?

Realistic responses

Answering these types of specific questions leads us to clear and realistic conclusions : “You can be happy both with and without your partner”, “I cannot know, by mere observation, how others feel” and “If there are couples that work and mine was not one of them, in the future I have the possibility of being happy with another person “.

The key to overcoming negative thoughts is to analyze them in depth and bring them back to reality. In this way, not only is the situation de-dramatized, but we will also substitute negative ideas for more realistic ones.