You start your day well, but suddenly something unexpected or untoward happens, and you are entirely out of your funk. One bad thought leads to another like a dominoes effect, and before you know it, you feel like sh*t and find yourself wondering how it all transpired. It could be something as trivial as looking at something/someone on social media to a showdown between you and your manager on Teams.
This is not entirely in our control. Our minds are wired with an ingrained negativity bias – an inclination to focus on all things negative that pose a threat to our survival—the bias geared to ensure the survival of the physical body at all costs. So, no matter how much we try, negative thoughts will have the power to completely hijack our minds.
As the saying goes, “your brain is like Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive ones.” Frankly, I was tired of the energy drain that happened every time a negative thought spiral occurred and have experimented over the years on how I can pull myself out of this quicksand faster. I wrote about this in LifeHack a couple of months earlier.
Here are a few ways I deal with this negative spiral:
- Pull the Handbrake: Catch yourself going down the spiral and consciously break the chain of one negative thought leading to another
- Redirect your attention: Consciously distract yourself from your current chain of thoughts and try to immerse yourself in something different
- Observe without judgment: Try and rise above the negative thoughts about yourself and observe from a distance. This will help us to see and perceive the things we were blinded to when we were in the thick of things.
- Identify the triggers: Dig deeper to identify the triggers and the underlying emotions behind them
- Validate Before Accepting: The next time you catch yourself going down the loop, pause to validate your thoughts before you accept them as facts
- Actively Reframe: Identify your negative thoughts and actively reframe them to be more positive and empowering
- Act, Don’t Ruminate: The secret of getting ahead is getting started—instead of repeatedly ruminating on what happened or what should have happened, or what will happen, start taking action
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