What you know about them cognitive distortions? I bet you know more than you think you know. How so? Because chances are you’ve dabbled with one or two in your lifetime.
Cognitive Distortions are unhealthy thinking habits that reinforces negative thinking and emotions. Some common distortions are filtering, black and white thinking, overgeneralizing, jumping to conclusions, catastrophizing, personalizaton, and blaming. Feel free to look these all up on your own, but i’ll share the two that I have experiences in unfortunately. My “stinking thinking” can include black and white thinking and jumping to conclusions. If it wasn’t for my decision to seek therapy, I would have never learned about these types of thinking. Thank the heavens for CBT!
Black and White thinking is all in the name – some may say either this or that or its all of nothing. That is totally me, I am an all of nothing person, but I am actively working to change that. It’s so difficult to see the gray areas in situations and I can take them to the extreme. For example, I may think that either I am gonna be good or bad at a specific thing. This sort of thinking cancels out my ability to work with the middle where I can improve instead of having to shift from one side or the other. I will say with therapy and receptiveness to CBT I’ve been able to see the gray and be more open (that’s a big deal for me, its alright to clap it up for a sista!)
Jumping to conclusions, whew! This right here is CHALLENGING because it making conclusions about things that may not be true. Not only that, being an intuitive person can be hard when it comes to things because we rely on the hunch feeling often that we tend to BELIEVE the conclusion wholeheartedly. I am not a factual person, more into concepts, ideas, possibilities you know (INFJ) things, so I don’t really care often to find out if the conclusion is true or not … Oops! But, I am aware that this is a negative thinking habit that I want to break and I have to work at it day by day because sister girl is not breaking a habit in a day or week, but will strive to be a healthy thinker.
If you are aware of your cognitive distortions and want to share please comment below.
As always,
Leave Inspired.
Great post! I live in the gray! My challenge is bring more definitive. My take away is balance. Kudos to you! Have you read “the four agreements? “ Great read
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I haven’t read it yet, looks like I need to add it to my book list 🤗
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I co-sign. The Four Agreements is one of my favorite books! I’m actually due for a re-read.
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I really enjoyed reading this post! It was a great reminder to really reflect on the way we tend to think about things. Happy for you & your progress! if there is a will there’s a way 🙂
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Lindsey, thank you so much for reading my post. I am so happy you enjoyed it! Comments like this inspires me to keep going. Much love ✨
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Intuition is tricky too, because we’re always told to trust it from occult science (e.g. astrology, numerology, etc.) religion (e.g. the Holy Spirit inside of us), the internet and just conversations with regular people such as our friends, family members and co-workers. From those conversations, we can easily get the impression that our intuition is always right. I’m not suggesting that it is or isn’t always right. I’m not sure myself, but we get the impression that it always is.
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