Examples Of Negative Thoughts In Depression
Research shows that having negative thoughts repeatedly when suffering from depression and anxiety causes significant emotional and physical problems. Our feelings follow what we are thinking, and dwelling on negative thoughts can lead us to spiral down into depression. When negative thoughts accumulate and accumulate, it often leads to anxiety or depression.
These negative thoughts fuel depression, which feeds them, which then fuels our minds spiraling fear, anxiety, worry, stress, despair, and anger. The stream of sad thoughts that run through your head can be depressing, as you cannot know for sure whether the depression is making you think negatively, or whether thinking negatively is making you depressed. A common cold, exhaustion, stress, hunger, lack of sleep, or even allergies can all cause depression, leading to negative thoughts.
Sometimes, we can become so beaten down with these feelings that we can get depressed and even suicidal. Having our heads filled with these thoughts and feelings is much more than being moody, or pessimistic, or the glass-half-empty type. We do not need to talk about what we are feeling or thinking (although it may also help--see below)--talking is just another way to distract ourselves from the negative thoughts.
If you are reluctant to talk about your thoughts, writing them down may be helpful. Keeping a journal of your thoughts is one of the best ways to practice stopping, asking, and choosing your thoughts. Thought diaries, also called thinking logs, can be used as part of any process for changing negative thoughts.
We can use thought diaries to determine our patterns of negative thinking, and to better understand how our thoughts trigger our emotional responses. A thought journal can be used to journal about daily thoughts regarding social anxiety. Our Three Emotional Intelligence Exercises can help people to become aware of negative automatic thoughts and replace them with positive thoughts.
Positive automatic thoughts can counteract the negative effects of both negative automatic thoughts and stress in general. Negative automatic thoughts do not just cause bad mental health outcomes, they can cause negative cycles A certain mental health problem may cause more negative thoughts, or vice versa. For instance, negative automatic thoughts are associated with symptoms of depression and vice versa for individuals who have both depression and HIV/AIDS (Riley et al., 2017).
More specifically, repeated thoughts that are characterized by a negatively salient content of the thoughts (e.g., thoughts of depressive or anxious feelings), negative intrapersonal contexts (e.g., negative emotions or negative beliefs), and abstract levels of construal (i.e., thoughts about meaning and implications) are considered to promote states of negative emotions. Fortunately, models used in cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) have been shown to be helpful for overriding many examples of negative thoughts, especially for individuals suffering from psychiatric disorders. The CBT model works from the principle that the thoughts that come to the surface are not the culprits for negative thoughts -- our emotional responses are what make us anxious or stressed.