Name that distorted cognition (thought/perception)

[ms spock]

Thanks for sharing your breaking down of you cognitive distortions @DharmaGirl it really helps for me to read how other people are breaking down the distorted cognitions.

I am actually being more and more aware of my cognitive distortions and I am really struggling with them. I feel so over responsible for other people's reactions and feelings - or what I anticipate or I fear they will be. I went to a meditation with a friend and was scared she wasn't liking it and felt bad and started to dissociated and go to sleep but I had not basis for this thinking and indeed after the meditation she said she liked it - so it was the fear in my head, which has no basis in reality. It is me being the child trying to head off my destructive parent's emotions. It was me trying to get ready to curtail and manage my parent's abusiveness - but they are not here now - it is a visceral reaction which is hardwired within me. It will take time to grow new neural pathways.

All or nothing thinking -- You see things in black and white categories. If your performance falls short of perfect, you see yourself as a total failure.

yes

Over-generalization -- You see a single negative event as a never-ending pattern of defeat.

yes

Mental filter -- You pick out a single negative detail and dwell on it so exclusively that your vision of all reality becomes darkened, like the drop of ink that colors the entire beaker of water.

yes

Disqualifying the positive -- You reject positive experiences by insisting they "don't count" for some reason or other. In this way you can maintain a negative belief that is contradicted by your everyday experiences.
Yes

Jumping to conclusions -- You make a negative interpretation even though there are no definite facts that convincingly support your conclusion. (Involves mind-reading and fortune-telling.)
Yes - very good at this.

Magnification and minimization -- You exaggerate the importance of things, or you inappropriately shrink things until they appear tiny.
Yes

Emotional reasoning -- You assume that your emotions necessarily reflect the way things really are, as in "I feel it, therefore it must be true."
Yes

Should statements -- You try to motivate yourself with "should" and "should not," as if you have to be whipped and punished before you could be expected to do anything.
Yes

Labeling and mislabeling -- This is an extreme form of overgeneralization. Instead of describing your error, you attach a negative label to yourself.
Yes

Personalization -- You see yourself as the cause of some negative external event which, in fact, you were not primarily responsible for.
Yes

 

[ms spock]

I am still struggling with these ten distorted cognitions. It is pretty hard and I am not really sure how to even be aware of them at times. But I am still trying to be aware of them.

 

[Deleted member 12723]

@Ms Spock I can so relate to what you are going through right now because I am struggling with the same things too. I did not know that by allowing one sad thought, a cascade would follow so I appreciate your sharing this one.

So practice the things I am learning and do my best to go forwards anyway.

 

[DharmaGirl]

1. All or nothing thinking -- You see things in black and white categories. If your performance falls short of perfect, you see yourself as a total failure.
2. Over-generalization -- You see a single negative event as a never-ending pattern of defeat.
3. Mental filter -- You pick out a single negative detail and dwell on it so exclusively that your vision of all reality becomes darkened, like the drop of ink that colors the entire beaker of water.
4. Disqualifying the positive -- You reject positive experiences by insisting they "don't count" for some reason or other. In this way you can maintain a negative belief that is contradicted by your everyday experiences.
5. Jumping to conclusions -- You make a negative interpretation even though there are no definite facts that convincingly support your conclusion. (Involves mind-reading and fortune-telling.)
6. Magnification and minimization -- You exaggerate the importance of things, or you inappropriately shrink things until they appear tiny.
7. Emotional reasoning -- You assume that your emotions necessarily reflect the way things really are, as in "I feel it, therefore it must be true."
8. Should statements -- You try to motivate yourself with "should" and "should not," as if you have to be whipped and punished before you could be expected to do anything.
9. Labeling and mislabeling -- This is an extreme form of overgeneralization. Instead of describing your error, you attach a negative label to yourself.
10. Personalization -- You see yourself as the cause of some negative external event which, in fact, you were not primarily responsible for.

My brother had demons and was addicted to alcohol. That is why he was becoming abusive at the end, and why I asked him to leave. He had planned to suicide for a long time, and it happened here. I was not the cause.

I'm using my thinking brain today, not too emotional.

 

[ms spock]

@gizmo - if you have a history of distorted thinking, feeling and perceiving it does make us vulnerable to thinking, feeling and perceiving distortions. I am still learning about this, and I am pleased that you are getting something out of it!

@DharmaGirl Way to go with busting down those very suicide based distorted cognitions. They are a cultural thing as well as a personal thing.

 

[ms spock]

I wrote this for another member, but this is another thing to do to help stop those distorted cognitions - might be of interest to someone. Rewrite the statements to suit your trauma.

With self compassion (yeah I have done it for a couple of days so I will share it with you - I really suck at it but I am working on it.)

1. You notice it is a moment of suffering. "This is hard going." "This is a moment of suffering." "I am falling apart from extreme self doubt and might explode from self hatred and feeling so wrong in the world."

2. You reassure yourself that you are not alone in your suffering. "People who suffer severe childhood trauma feel like this - I am so not alone in these terrible overwhelming feelings that make me feel like crawling out of skin with my feelings of badness, alieness and wrongness". Suffering is part of life of all humans but particularly trauma sufferers.

You show a gesture to your self of kindness - hold your own hand, gently rub your own arm or put your hands over your heart gently.

3. Say to yourself: "May I be kind to myself in this moment".

May I give myself the compassion,that I need right now, that early childhood trauma has left me with a legacy of self hatred and extreme self doubt.
May I learn to accept myself as I am - nameless dread and all.
May I not judge myself by unreasonable and unfair standards against people who didn't suffer such torture in their childhoods.
I give myself full permission to get from myself what I need right now.
Is there anything that I need right now? What do I need to say to reassure myself?

You can probably come up with a good one that works for you - those are just examples.

Based on Kristin Neff's website on Self Compassion.

 

[DharmaGirl]

Beautiful, I love it. I will have to try that.

 

[Lionheart]

I would have to say I suffer from all of the cognitive distortions at some time or another

And when I am ill, I tend to do emotional reasoning and reason out how I feel.

Such as; "I feel bad therefore I am bad."

I don't know what cognitive distortions this includes but it can be very damaging I think.

 

[ms spock]

So I have been doing rumination today, I have been jumping to conclusions, I have been doing all or nothing thinking. I have been doing personalisation. I have been engaging in mental filtering and over generalisation. I gave minimisation and magnification a run for their money as well. There have been a few should statements in there as well. I have been labelling and mislabelling. I have been doing some personalisation and emotional reasoning as well. I have been taking responsibility for things that are not my responsibility and to be consistent I have been disqualifying the positive. So I am a lot more aware of my ruminations and my distorted thinking, feeling and perceiving. The day hasn't been too bad or too good. There has been a lot of intrusive thinking and feeling, that has been challenging to manage.

 

[ms spock]

Struggling with serious ruminations, intrusive thoughts and feeling.

 

[PreciousChild]

I've been lurking a while, but wanted to post that I relate to all 11. I'm still not 100% sure what magical thinking does though.

Thanks so much for this thread. It reminds me that ptsd leaves pitfalls. I have an ex with the same issues, but simply accepts them as true. He is so difficult to deal with. He won't even consider that any of his distorted thinking is wrong. I

 

[ms spock]

1. All or nothing thinking -- You see things in black and white categories. If your performance falls short of perfect, you see yourself as a total failure.
2. Over-generalization -- You see a single negative event as a never-ending pattern of defeat.
3. Mental filter -- You pick out a single negative detail and dwell on it so exclusively that your vision of all reality becomes darkened, like the drop of ink that colors the entire beaker of water.
4. Disqualifying the positive -- You reject positive experiences by insisting they "don't count" for some reason or other. In this way you can maintain a negative belief that is contradicted by your everyday experiences.
5. Jumping to conclusions -- You make a negative interpretation even though there are no definite facts that convincingly support your conclusion. (Involves mind-reading and fortune-telling.)
6. Magnification and minimization -- You exaggerate the importance of things, or you inappropriately shrink things until they appear tiny.
7. Emotional reasoning -- You assume that your emotions necessarily reflect the way things really are, as in "I feel it, therefore it must be true."
8. Should statements -- You try to motivate yourself with "should" and "should not," as if you have to be whipped and punished before you could be expected to do anything.
9. Labeling and mislabeling -- This is an extreme form of overgeneralization. Instead of describing your error, you attach a negative label to yourself.
10. Personalization -- You see yourself as the cause of some negative external event which, in fact, you were not primarily responsible for.

I am still really struggling with all of these.