Author: Margaret Olatunbosun / Source: Lifehack
Imagine these scenarios:
You’re sending out applications to several job openings, and every single response you get is a rejection. You’ve tweaked your resume and hired the best career coaches you could afford. You’ve attended networking events and your wallet is bursting full of business cards.
Yet you can’t seem to get a call back for an interview. These rejections keep replaying in your head so you call yourself a failure. You call yourself a loser and quit searching.Maybe you suffered from a bad break up when you were younger. You were so hurt that you vowed to protect your heart, never letting anyone get close to you again. But now? You’re finding it hard to trust people. You can’t seem to hold a conversation because you have several negative thoughts running through your mind. What if I get cheated on again? What if he turns out to be what I’m running away from? I’ll never find love again.
These thoughts are called automatic negative thoughts or better known as ANTs, and this article will show you how to stop them when you’re overwhelmed.
What are automatic negative thoughts (ANTs)?
Automatic negative thoughts refer to beliefs you hold about yourself, inference from previous events, and can be influenced by cognitive bias.
Although research into automatic negative thoughts began as early as the 1960s when its effects on depression were studied by Dr. Aaron Beck, it was later popularized by Dr. Daniel Amen in the last few years.[1]
According to Dr. Amen, when you think negative thoughts, your brain releases chemical and electrical signals that activate your limbic system.
Over time, a surplus of negative thoughts burdens your limbic system which causes these chemical transmissions to establish a neural pathway in the brain. When this happens, you’re bound to experience more moodiness, irritability, anxiety, and depression.Why some experience these negative thoughts more than others
In a way, ANTs can be helpful. Here’s what I mean.
When you experience an emotionally grueling event, your mind develops structures in place to protect you from getting hurt or heartbroken. These automatic negative thoughts are a way of your mind trying to shield you from harm before it actually happens (or lessen its impact when it happens).
The problem, however, is when these thoughts have become so dominant that they overtake your life.
With several stressors in your life, it’s relatively easy to slip into a spiral of anxiety and depression, especially if you aren’t paying attention to the changes going on in your body.
Often times, ANTs manifest when these negatively charged thoughts translate themselves into corresponding emotions, leading to physical changes in the body. An example is the body’s response to the fight or flight response.
Only in the case of ANTs, you are trapped. You experience these symptoms over and over again as several negative thoughts run through your mind and you’re unable to get out of the cycle.
But to stop these ANTs, we need to identify what they are in order to reconstruct a healthy concept of self.
How to spot the different types of ANTs
Here’re the signs of 6 types of ANTs:
1 All or nothing thinking
If your thoughts are always in extreme absolutes, there is a high chance that you are susceptible to automatic negative thoughts.
The all or nothing thinker only reasons in black and white with no middle ground. So, when the first wave of adversity hits, the first inclination would be to figure out what’s wrong or right.
With automatic negative thoughts, you’re unable to see the silver lining in situations.
Examples of “all or nothing” statements include:
- I won’t be able to pass this class. I failed my first test yesterday.
- I’m so weak.
2 Labelling
Remember the opening example of the job seeker who is frustrated about the rejections and gave up? The perfect example of labelling is realized when you call…
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