Automatic Negative Thoughts Quotes

So remember three crucial steps when you are upset: Zero in on those automatic negative thoughts and write them down. Don't let them buzz around in your head; snare them on paper! Read over the list of ten cognitive distortions. Learn precisely how you are twisting things and blowing them out of proportion. Substitute a more objective thought that puts the lie to the one which made you look down on yourself. As you do this, you'll begin to feel better. You'll be boosting your self-esteem, and your

But what was so great about marriage? I had been married and married. It had its good points, but it also had its bad. The virtues of marriage were mostly negative virtues. Being unmarried in a man's world was such a hassle that anything had to be better. Marriage was better. But not much. Damned clever, I thought, how men had made life so intolerable for single women that most would gladly embrace even bad marriages instead. Almost anything had to be an improvement on hustling for your own keep at some low-paid job and fighting off unattractive men in your spare time while desperately trying to ferret out the attractive ones. Though I've no doubt that being single is just as lonely for a man, it doesn't have the added extra wallop of being downright dangerous, and it doesn't automatically imply poverty and the unquestioned status of a social pariah. Would most women get married if they knew what it meant? I think of young women following their husbands wherever their husbands follow their jobs. I think of them suddenly finding themselves miles away from friends and family, I think of them living in places where they can't work, where they can't speak the language. I think of them making babies out of their loneliness and boredom and not knowing why. I think of their men always harried and exhausted from being on the make. I think of them seeing each other less after marriage than before. I think of them falling into bed too exhausted to screw. I think of them farther apart in the first year of marriage than they ever imagined two people could be when they were courting. And then I think of the fantasies starting. He is eyeing the fourteen-year-old postnymphets in bikinis. She covets the TV repairman. The baby gets sick and she makes it with the pediatrician. He is fucking his masochistic little secretary who reads Cosmopolitan and things herself a swinger. Not: when did it all go wrong? But: when was it ever right? ....... I know some good marriages. Second marriages mostly. Marriages where both people have outgrown the bullshit of me-Tarzan, you-Jane and are just trying to get through their days by helping each other, being good to each other, doing the chores as they come up and not worrying too much about who does what. Some men reach that delightfully relaxed state of affairs about age forty or after a couple of divorces. Maybe marriages are best in middle age. When all the nonsense falls away and you realize you have to love one another because you're going to die anyway.

Thinking may seem automatic and uncontrollable, but many of our thought patterns are habitual and, well, thoughtless.

Nightbitch resolved to demand things- all sorts of things. To ask. To not assume she had to cook the dinner and do the night-nights and clean the house and pay the bills and buy the presents and send the cards and schedule to appointments and keep track of every last thing all by herself. This was, after all, a partnership, wasn’t it? This was, after all, the modern era, empowerment and feminism and all that, and she had not been taking advantage of any of it because, she discovered as she thought further, she did not have a job. Or, rather, she did not have a job that paid any money whatsoever; in fact, it was a drain on money, represented negative money, this mothering job. Because her husband paid for their lives, paid for the privilege she had of staying home each and every day devoting herself completely to motherhood and nothing else, she had felt, ever since she stepped down from her position at the gallery, that she was in no place to demand anything, He worked all week, and she felt it was too much to ask him to lift a finger on the weekend, because she had automatically devalued her work from the start. She had been, she saw now, inculcated by a culture that told her, Look, it’s cute you’re a mom, and go do your thing, but, honestly, it’s not that hard; you’re probably not all that smart or interesting , but good for you for feeling fulfilled by mothering.

The hamster friend said being able to do front rolls didn't make the hamster as good as Bruce Lee, which was not a true statement and not an untrue statement, because the word 'good' is meaningless until defined within a context and a goal, and hamsters when enjoying the company of other hamsters rarely define or think about contexts and goals, because to do so would make them aware of certain things about the universe that would make them feel a kind of emptiness or 'neutrality of emotion' that is usually desirable only in situations where the hamster wants to stop his or her self-perpetuating cycle of negative thinking, in order to fight severe depression or crippling loneliness. In a situation of severe depression or crippling loneliness caused by a period of time of uncontrollable negative thinking this 'kind of emptiness'--effected by an understanding (of the arbitrary nature of the universe) that is attained by thinking comprehensively about context, goals, and meaning--can be used to neutralize the hamster's automatic and self-perpetuating pattern of negative thoughts, at which point the hamster can form new thoughts, that will cause new behaviors, that will cause new patterns of thought, with which the hamster can better function in life and in relationships with other hamsters.

The next time you’re feeling or experiencing any sort of negative or diminishing thought that disempowers you, move on immediately. Act independently of that thought. More specifically, act in a way that’s in your best interests rather than in a way that is dominated by how you automatically think and feel.

will only intensify the procrastination and laziness. The place to put the mental energy is into releasing the old and creating a new thought pattern. Say: “I am willing to release the need to be unworthy. I am worthy of the very best in life, and I now lovingly allow myself to accept it. “As I spend a few days doing this affirmation over and over, my outer effect pattern of procrastination will automatically begin to fade. “As I internally create a pattern of self-worth, then I no longer have the need to delay my good.” Do you see how this could apply to some of the negative patterns or outer effects in your life? Let’s stop wasting time and energy putting ourselves down for something we can’t help doing if we have certain inner beliefs. Change the beliefs.

through the wonders of consumer culture and hey-look-my-life-is-cooler-than-yours social media, has bred a whole generation of people who believe that having these negative experiences—anxiety, fear, guilt, etc.—is totally not okay. I mean, if you look at your Facebook feed, everybody there is having a fucking grand old time. Look, eight people got married this week! And some sixteen-year-old on TV got a Ferrari for her birthday. And another kid just made two billion dollars inventing an app that automatically delivers you more toilet paper when you run out. Meanwhile, you’re stuck at home flossing your cat. And you can’t help but think your life sucks even more than you thought. The Feedback Loop from Hell has become a borderline epidemic, making many of us overly stressed, overly neurotic, and overly self-loathing.

feel that such obvious age-old “truisms” simply must be real. They think that if they don’t continue to believe these thoughts, they are lying to themselves. Once again, remember that to know what is true and what is not, you have to be conscious of the thoughts and have an intelligent perspective on them. Most negative thinking is automatic and goes unnoticed. You’re not really choosing how to respond to your situation, it’s being chosen for you by bad brain habits. To find out what is really true and what is not, you need to question it. Don’t believe everything you hear—even in your own mind! I often ask my patients about their ANT population. Is it high? Low? Dwindling? Or increasing? Keep control over the ANTs in order to maintain a healthy deep limbic environment. Whenever you notice an ANT entering your mind, train yourself to recognize it and write it down. When you write down automatic negative

You need more than just "positive thinking" to harness control of your body and your life. It is important for our health and well-being to shift our mind's energy toward positive, life generating thoughts and eliminate ever-present, energy-draining and debilitating negative thoughts. But, and I mean that in the biggest sense of "BUT", the mere thinking of positive thoughts will not necessarily have any impact on our lives at all! In fact, sometimes people who "flunk" positive thinking become more debilitated because now they think their situation is hopeless - they believe they have exhausted all mind and body remedies. What those positive-thinking dropouts haven't understood is that the seemingly "separate" subdivisions of the mind, the conscious and the subconscious, are interdependent. The conscious or spirit - is the creative mind. It can see into the future, review the past, or disconnect from the present moment as it solves problems in our head. In its creative capacity, the conscious mind holds our wishes, desires, and aspirations for our lives. It is the mind that conjures up our "positive thoughts". In contrast, the subconscious mind is primarily a repository of stimulus-response tapes derived from instincts and learned experiences. The subconscious mind is fundamentally habitual; it will play the same behavioral responses to life's signals over and over again, much to our chagrin. How many times have you found yourself going ballistic over something trivial like an open toothpaste tube? You have been trained since childhood to carefully replace the cap. When you find the tube with its cap left off, your "buttons are pushed" and you automatically fly into rage. You've just experienced the simple stimulus-response of a behavior program stored in the subconscious mind.

Catastrophizing. Predicting extremely negative future outcomes, such as “If I don’t do well on this paper, I will flunk out of college and never have a good job.”   All-or-nothing. Viewing things as all-good or all-bad, black or white, as in “If my new colleagues don’t like me, they must hate me.” Personalization. Thinking that negative actions or words of others are related to you, or assuming that you are the cause of a negative event when you actually had no connection with it. Overgeneralizations. Seeing one negative situation as representative of all similar events. Labeling. Attaching negative labels to ourselves or others. Rather than focusing on a particular thing that you didn’t like and want to change, you might label yourself a loser or a failure. Magnification/minimization. Emphasizing bad things and deemphasizing good in a situation, such as making a big deal about making a mistake, and ignoring achievements. Emotional reasoning. Letting your feelings about something guide your conclusions about how things really are, as in “I feel hopeless, so my situation really must be hopeless.” Discounting positives. Disqualifying positive experiences as evidence that your negative beliefs are false—for example, by saying that you got lucky, something good happened accidentally, or someone was lying when giving you a compliment. Negativity bias. Seeing only the bad aspects of a situation and dwelling on them, in the process viewing the situation as completely bad even though there may have been positives. Should/must statements. Setting up expectations for yourself based on what you think you “should” do. These usually come from perceptions of what others think, and may be totally unrealistic. You might feel guilty for failing or not wanting these standards and feel frustration and resentment. Buddhism sets this in context. When the word “should” is used, it leaves no leeway for flexibility of self-acceptance. It is fine to have wise, loving, self-identified guidelines for behavior, but remember that the same response or action to all situations is neither productive nor ideal. One size never fits all.  Jumping to conclusions. Making negative predictions about the outcome of a situation without definite facts or evidence. This includes predicting a bad future event and acting as if it were already fact, or concluding that others reacted negatively to you without asking them. ​Dysfunctional automatic thoughts like these are common. If you think that they are causing suffering in your life, make sure you address them as a part of your CBT focus.

1) We need to take our minds off what we don’t want and onto what we do want, so that the way to manifest your desires is to think about them as often as possible. Thoughts become things; we create our world with our thoughts, and so on. 2) We are told again and again that if we expect things to turn out badly, they will. I have lost count of how many times I have been told not to talk of worst-case scenarios because in doing so I will ‘make them happen’ and so court disaster. ‘Speak of the Devil and he will appear’, so the saying goes. 3) Want is another word for lack. Thoughts of wanting only attracts more wanting and more lack. By continually thinking about your goal, you are continually wanting, continually asking. This will act to ‘freeze’ things, keeping you in a state of constant state of waiting, wanting, anticipation and lack. Wanting = Asking = Lack. 4) Complaining and focusing on the negative at the expense of the positive is prevalent in every society. There is a very clear correlation between those who are very happy and an almost non-existent level of complaining. Those who complain a lot, generally have lives that are poorer in all ways than those who do not complain. Those who do not complain, generally have fuller, richer and happier lives. It is complaining that keeps you in a state of wanting. Complaining just invites more into your life to complain about because complaining means wanting things to be different. 5) What isn’t allowed is complaining for the sake of complaining – talking in a negative way about something for fun, to gossip about someone in a derogatory way, to pass the time of day, or worse, to make you feel better, more important or as a way of connecting with another negative person. 6) The point is not to get the words right, the point is to change your focus to all the good that is in your life. Your energy will rise automatically and naturally just by this one move. 7) A person who notices a lot of good in their life, has a lot of good in their life. A person who is grateful a lot, has a lot to be grateful for. It works that way around. Look at the world and smile, and it will smile back at you. 8) BELIEFS BECOME THINGS Rather than mere thoughts, it is your deeply held beliefs which have the greatest effect on your life. 9) You need to believe in your own power, really believe it; not just wishfully think it. Not just say ‘I believe in myself’ in some sort of self-help sound bite-type way, while inside part of you is disagreeing. 10) This is yet another reason for not working on goals too quickly. Any failure in achieving a particular goal will only dent your belief; we cannot risk that. But, every success, no matter how small, will grow your belief in your own ability. Little tiny successes all build into a wonderful strong belief. 11) Having worked hard for a few days (preferably weeks) to eradicate the bulk of your negativity, you start noticing the effect of doing this. Notice, accept and believe that small changes in you do indeed bring about a positive change in the people, events and situations around you. See the world, not as a separate realm over which you have greater or lesser effect, but as a mirror, reflecting not just your thoughts, but you. 12) Expecting the world to change, without changing you is like looking into a mirror and expecting the reflection to smile first. The world simply will never change, until you change. 13) Begin to realize that your experience of life is nothing but a reflection of the person you are

1) We need to take our minds off what we don’t want and onto what we do want, so that the way to manifest your desires is to think about them as often as possible. Thoughts become things; we create our world with our thoughts, and so on. 2) We are told again and again that if we expect things to turn out badly, they will. I have lost count of how many times I have been told not to talk of worst-case scenarios because in doing so I will ‘make them happen’ and so court disaster. ‘Speak of the Devil and he will appear’, so the saying goes. 3) Want is another word for lack. Thoughts of wanting only attracts more wanting and more lack. By continually thinking about your goal, you are continually wanting, continually asking. This will act to ‘freeze’ things, keeping you in a state of constant state of waiting, wanting, anticipation and lack. Wanting = Asking = Lack. 4) Complaining and focusing on the negative at the expense of the positive is prevalent in every society. There is a very clear correlation between those who are very happy and an almost non-existent level of complaining. Those who complain a lot, generally have lives that are poorer in all ways than those who do not complain. Those who do not complain, generally have fuller, richer and happier lives. It is complaining that keeps you in a state of wanting. Complaining just invites more into your life to complain about because complaining means wanting things to be different. 5) What isn’t allowed is complaining for the sake of complaining – talking in a negative way about something for fun, to gossip about someone in a derogatory way, to pass the time of day, or worse, to make you feel better, more important or as a way of connecting with another negative person. 6) The point is not to get the words right, the point is to change your focus to all the good that is in your life. Your energy will rise automatically and naturally just by this one move. 7) A person who notices a lot of good in their life, has a lot of good in their life. A person who is grateful a lot, has a lot to be grateful for. It works that way around. Look at the world and smile, and it will smile back at you. 8) BELIEFS BECOME THINGS Rather than mere thoughts, it is your deeply held beliefs which have the greatest effect on your life. 9) You need to believe in your own power, really believe it; not just wishfully think it. Not just say ‘I believe in myself’ in some sort of self-help sound bite-type way, while inside part of you is disagreeing. 10) This is yet another reason for not working on goals too quickly. Any failure in achieving a particular goal will only dent your belief; we cannot risk that. But, every success, no matter how small, will grow your belief in your own ability. Little tiny successes all build into a wonderful strong belief. 11) Having worked hard for a few days (preferably weeks) to eradicate the bulk of your negativity, you start noticing the effect of doing this. Notice, accept and believe that small changes in you do indeed bring about a positive change in the people, events and situations around you. See the world, not as a separate realm over which you have greater or lesser effect, but as a mirror, reflecting not just your thoughts, but you. 12) Expecting the world to change, without changing you is like looking into a mirror and expecting the reflection to smile first. The world simply will never change, until you change. 13) Begin to realize that your experience of life is nothing but a reflection of the person you are ~~Becoming Magic: A Course in Manifesting an Exceptional Life (Book 1) by Genevieve Davis

core beliefs are foundational beliefs about the world that we usually form in childhood. These are reinforced throughout life by our perceptions. They are generalized and absolute, though they can be completely false. People tend to focus on new information that confirms existing beliefs and ignore information that contradicts them, making core beliefs hard to change. Negative and dysfunctional core beliefs can act as drivers for dysfunctional assumptions and negative thoughts. For example, a core belief that “I’m unlovable” may lead to assumptions about the success or appearance needed to ensure love from others. Core beliefs often relate to achievement and relationships with others. Assumptions and core beliefs can be challenged and altered with a similar approach to automatic thoughts.

Every day we get to choose our attitudes. We can determine to be happy and look on the bright side--expecting good things, and believing we will accomplish our dreams--or we can elect to be negative by focusing on our problems, dwelling on what didn’t work out, and living worried and discouraged. These are the choices we all can make. Nobody can force you to have a certain attitude. Life will go so much better if you simply decide to be positive. When you wake up, choose to be happy. That is the fourth undeniable quality of a winner. Choose to be grateful for the day. Choose to look on the bright side. Choose to focus on the possibilities. A good attitude does not automatically come. If you don’t choose it, then more than likely you’ll default to a negative mind-set, thinking: “I don’t feel like going to work. I’ve got so many obstacles. Nothing good is in my future.” A negative attitude will limit your life. We all face difficulties. We all have tough times, but the right attitude is, “This is not permanent, it’s only temporary. In the meantime I’m going to enjoy my life.” Maybe you didn’t get the promotion you worked hard for, or you didn’t qualify for that house you wanted. You could easily live with a sour attitude. Instead, you should think: “That’s all right. I know something better is coming.” If you become caught in traffic, think positively: “I’m not going to be stressed. I know I’m at the right place at the right time.” If your medical report wasn’t good, you can choose to think: “I’m not worried. This too shall pass.” If your dream is taking longer than you thought, you can choose to think: “I’m not discouraged. I know the right people, and the right opportunities are already in my future, and at the right time it will come to pass.

Something amazing happens when we learn a new skill. Our brain starts to form new neural pathways so that something you first had to consciously focus on can become automated. That’s pretty powerful stuff. Now let’s use this principle on your anxiety. If you’ve suffered from any anxiety-related issue for some time, that anxious or at least negative way of thinking has now become an automatism. That’s why you probably seem to get way more negative thoughts than positive ones. For the moment, it’s still just a habit of your brain, one that we can change.

What else can cause or activate a depression? Many tomes have been written on this subject, and I shall only mention the two theories backed, in my judgment, by the most scientific evidence. The first is Aaron Beck’s cognitive theory of depression, which forms the basis for the most commonly used psychotherapy for this illness, cognitive-behavioral therapy. Beck is a psychiatrist who argues that some people have dysfunctional attitudes that make them vulnerable to becoming depressed in the face of a negative event. These maladaptive attitudes often involve the notion that our happiness and self-worth depend on our being perfect or hinge on other people’s approval. For example, we might think, “My teacher’s critical comment means that I’m a total failure” or “If my girlfriend doesn’t love me, then I am nothing.” If we share these beliefs, then when something truly bad happens, we tend to have automatic negative thoughts about (1) ourselves (e.g., “I’m not lovable”), (2) our present experiences (e.g., “My boss always prefers my coworkers”), and (3) our futures (e.g., “I’ll never outgrow my shyness”). Beck calls these types of thought a negative cognitive triad.

The healthiest carbohydrates come from whole grains, legumes, vegetables and whole fruits. The least healthy carbohydrates come from white bread, white rice, past and other refined grains, sugary foods and drinks and potatoes. There is an easy way to tell healthy fats from unhealthy fats. Most of the healthy fats - the monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats - come from plants and are liquid at room temperature. Rich green olive oil, golden sunflower oil, the oil that rises to the top of a jar of natural nut butter and the oils that come from fatty fish and all examples of healthy unsaturated fats. The unhealthy fats ( saturated fats ) and the very unhealthy fats ( trans fats ) tend to be solid at room temperature, such as the fat that marbles a steak or that is found in a stick of butter. Meat and full fat dairy products are the biggest sources of saturated fat in the western diet. So for good health, enjoy healthy fats, limit saturated fat and avoid trans fat. Mindfulness practice touches the stillness in ourselves. It allows us to calm down and reflect so that we can reconnect with our true self. When we are free from our automatic responses, we can see more clearly things as they are, from moment to moment, without judgment, preconceived notions or bias. We get to know ourselves better. We become more more in tune with our own feelings, actions and thoughts as well as with the feelings, actions and thoughts of others. You need to ask yourself what is it that you really want. Often our habit energy and fear prevent us from identifying what we want and from living healthily. The essential point is that we do not try to repress our afflictions, our negative energies, because the more we resist or fight them, the stronger they will grow in us. We need only to learn to recognize them, embrace them and bathe them in the energy of mindfulness. Once you can be in the present, you will recognize that your fears, anger and despair are all projections from the past. They are not the present reality. Don't just sit there and wait for your negative feelings to pass. Complaining will not change your life. Change your thinking and you can let go of limitations you imposed on yourself. Explore and be proactive. I am aware that happiness depends on my mental attitude and not on external conditions and that I can live happily in the present moment simply by remembering that I already have more than enough conditions to be happy. Aware of the suffering caused by unmindful speech and the inability to listen to others, I am committed to cultivating loving speech and compassionate listening in order to relieve suffering and to promote reconciliation and peace in myself and among other people. I am determined not to try to cover up loneliness, anxiety or other suffering by losing myself in consumption.

Overcome Irritation “He whose spirit is without restraint, is like a city that is broken down and without walls.” “He that ruleth his spirit is greater than he that taketh a city.” In order that you might lead a full and happy life, control of the emotion is essential. To govern and control your emotions and temper tantrums, it is essential to maintain control over your thoughts. As a matter of fact, you cannot find peace any other way. Willpower or mental coercion will not do it. Forcing yourself to suppress your anger is not the way. The answer is to enthrone God-like thoughts in your mind; busy yourself mentally with the concepts of peace, harmony, and goodwill. Keep firm control over your thoughts. Learn to substitute love for fear, and peace for discord. You can direct your thoughts along harmonious lines. For example, if you see or hear of sometimes that disturbs or angers you instead, of giving way to anger or irritation, say automatically, “The peace of God that passeth all understanding is now flooding my mind, my body, and my whole being.” Repeat this phrase several times during the period of stress; you will find that all tension and anger disappear. Fill your mind with Love, and the negative, thoughts cannot enter. When someone says something sharp or critical to you, think on a single statement of Truth, such as, “God is Love. He leadeth me beside the still waters.” Peace steals over you; you will radiate this peace. Three Steps in Overcoming Irritation The first step: As you awaken in the morning, say to yourself; “This is God’s day; it is a new day for me, a new beginning. The restoring, healing, soothing, loving power of God is flowing through me, bringing peace to my mind and body now and forevermore.” The second step: Should some business problem or some person upset or irritate you, think immediately about His Holy Presence. Say, “God is with me all day. His peace, His Guidance, and His Love enable me to meet all problems calmly and peacefully.” The third step: Radiate Love to all of your associate. Claim that they are doing their best. Say, “I wish them peace, harmony, and joy. I salute the God in them.” And lo and behold, God and His Love come forth!

This exercise builds new “memories” or stored data into your mid-brain and central nervous system. It builds a new image of self. After practicing it for a time, you will be surprised to find yourself “acting differently,” more or less automatically and spontaneously—“without trying.” This is as it should be. You do not need to “take thought” or “try” or make an effort now in order to feel ineffective and act inadequately. Your present inadequate feeling and doing is automatic and spontaneous, because of the memories, real and imagined, you have built into your automatic mechanism. You will find it will work just as automatically upon positive thoughts and experiences as upon negative ones.

Whenever you notice these automatic negative thoughts (ANTs), you need to crush them or they’ll begin to ruin your whole day. One way to crush these ANTs is to write down the negative thought and talk back to it. For example, if you think, Other kids will laugh at me when I give my speech, write it down and then write down a positive response—something like The other kids will like my speech and find it interesting. When you write down negative thoughts and talk back to them, you take away their power and help yourself feel better.

When I have negative automatic thoughts, I use a two-step process to achieve a calmer, more rational state of mind and make better business decisions. First, I acknowledge the negativity as my natural, self-critical psychology kicking in. Then I challenge the validity of that perspective because, millions of years ago, our human psyche was programmed to default to anxiety and fear as a survival mechanism. We’ve been slow to evolve. Automatic negative thoughts are a knee-jerk mental reaction to a situation that almost always can be reframed in a positive light.

To begin changing their attitudes, these individuals began to pay constant attention to their thoughts. In particular, they made a conscious effort to observe their automatic thought processes, especially the harmful ones. To their surprise, they found that most of their persistent, negative inner statements were not true. In other words, just because we have a thought does not necessarily mean that we have to believe it is true. As

If you want to be a certain way, you must practice being that way consistently until it become a habit and an automatic, natural way of being.

Every time you do this, that habitual thought pattern becomes weakened, and thus becomes less habitual, less automatic. Do this enough and the brain will give up firing in this way, and the negative thoughts won’t occur at all.

self-awareness. Learn to recognize your negative inner dialogue, or what leading psychiatrist Dr. Daniel Amen calls ANTs (automatic negative thoughts), and to let them pass over like a rain cloud. 10. Take time for self-care. When you nurture your well-being, you become a source of energy and light for yourself and others. We live in a culture where productivity is valued over things that fill up our hearts and souls. Take time to develop simple practices that bring you back to yourself and support the health of your body and mind and heart.

Chapter Seven The Franciscan Genius: The Integration of the Negative You can show your love to others by not wishing that they should be better Christians.88 —Francis of Assisi We must bear patiently not being good…and not being thought good.89 —Francis of Assisi Yes, you read the quotes above correctly. The first quote was considered so untrue, so impossible that Francis would write such a thing, that for centuries we deleted the “not” in the text! In the second quote, the point seems to have largely been ignored or denied until the very same thing was taught by a later female doctor of the Church, St. Thérèse of Lisieux, in the nineteenth century. Maybe you would have automatically deleted the “nots” yourself, as I would have, which is why I italicized them.

On the other hand, if the individual were in Self, he might just say, "Hmmm, that person seems very distracted today and didn't even notice me." This verbal dimension of a part is a favorite area for cognitive behavioral therapists to explore. They look for automatic irrational thoughts that arise when we interpret situations in ways that cause us to have negative emotional reactions; the cognitive behavioral therapist challenges them with rational thought.

The first step in dealing with negative automatic thoughts about a task or plan is to catch them by asking, “What am I thinking right now?” These thoughts often do not occur in the form of grammatically correct sentences, but may be expressed in brief phrases (e.g., “Oh no,” “I hate this stuff,” a string of expletives, etc.). In fact, sometimes procrastination starts with an accurate statement (e.g., “The gym is crowded after work.”), but that can kick off a string of assumptions that result in procrastination (e.g., “I won’t be able to find any open machines. It will either take me 3 hours to finish my workout or I won’t be able to do my full workout. I’m tired and I’m not up to dealing with crowds tonight. There is no use in going to the gym.”). The subsequent evening spent watching lousy television shows while eating way too many cheese puffs leads to self-critical thoughts and frustration with the missed workout (e.g., “I could have gone to the gym. I would have been done by now. Now I have to find time to make up this workout.”). At the outset, it is vital to be aware of how your thoughts make you prone to procrastinate. Automatic thoughts are often distorted and impact your feelings about tasks. Hence, you start to psych yourself out of doing something without having a chance to get started on it, which increases the likelihood of resorting to avoiding the task through an escape behavior. In Chapter 7, we will discuss in greater detail some of the distorted thoughts and strategies for modifying them, particularly with regard to the emotions they trigger, including pure and simple discomfort about a task (i.e., “Ugh”). When dealing with procrastination, however, the most common distortion we encounter is magnification/minimization. That is, you pull out and embellish all the negative elements about performing a task and you overlook or play down the positive elements and your ability to handle the task in question.

The monster of these ideas takes on a life of its own, popping into consciousness, criticizing and harassing you. Many of the messages are personal criticisms, such as, “You’re so weak, you can’t succeed without God’s help,” “You don’t matter to anybody,” and “You’re stupid.” Other negative thoughts can be about other people, life, the world, and the future. They also tend to be over-generalized and extreme, for example: “Life has no meaning anymore without God,” “There’s no such thing as real love; people are too selfish,” and “The world is dangerous.” Research has shown that this kind of negative thinking can have a devastating effect on mental health. A variety of terms have been used to describe it, such as “irrational beliefs,” “automatic thoughts,” “dysfunctional thinking,” and labels like “the judge” and “the critic.” The term I like to use for this negative voice is “idea monster,” because it implies a dangerous creature that is not you and that must be rejected.

If someone is creating negative energy for you, their negative energy will reach you. Now if you are not consciously choosing your thoughts, and believe that thoughts emerge on their own, you will automatically create similar thoughts for him. This is the law of reciprocity. When your negative energy bounces back to that person, his feelings intensify. With this continuous exchange, a loop of high negative energy is created. This then serves as the foundation of your relationship with him.

Some like the acronym ANTS for automatic negative thoughts, because like ants they seem to creep in from nowhere to spoil the picnic.

Automatic thoughts occur because the subconscious mind stores information that is meant to protect you. However, it also stores negative associations better than positive ones because it acts as a safety mechanism. Although this is effective from an evolutionary standpoint, it unfortunately perpetuates a lot of anxious and hopeless thoughts. Also keep in mind that since the subconscious mind is programmed through repetition and emotion, the more we perpetuate beliefs, the more deeply ingrained they become over time. So, how do we identify automatic thoughts and the core triggers that created them? Well, the brain is always looking for information to support what it believes. This is called supportive evidence. Supportive evidence is the information that the brain picks out of its environment to reinforce its existing thoughts. In the context of reprogramming your subconscious, this is a negative practice. An example of this may occur if Connor were to go to a work party—remember that he believes that he is fundamentally unworthy of emotional connection. When he walks in, his automatic thoughts include “No one likes me, and no one wants me here.” The brain then begins to look for supportive evidence: Someone frowning in conversation while looking in his direction, to Connor, means that they hate him and want him to leave. With Suneel, supportive evidence may occur when Suneel makes grammatical corrections in the project they’re working on together. To Connor, this may again reinforce that Suneel is trying to undermine him. A powerful aspect of supportive evidence to consider is that it occurs every day and everywhere in our lives. Our mind is constantly looking for supportive evidence of what our subconscious believes. When the subconscious stores fundamentally painful beliefs, they become projected onto our reality everywhere we look. Therefore, it is essential to begin looking for contradictory evidence for our core wounds to reprogram our subconscious and heal our everyday perspectives. Contradictory evidence is information that disproves existing beliefs. Since memory is colored by emotion, finding contradictory evidence in our past and present and pairing it with the emotions associated with that experience allows us to begin reprogramming our subconscious. Essentially, finding proof of the opposite helps to equilibrate our subconscious, and from there, it can be taught new and updated beliefs.

The cognitive approach is grounded in thinking about your thinking and acting to change automatic negative thoughts (ANT) that lead to unpleasant emotions and self-defeating behaviors.

What to Do Tonight Spend private time with your child, ideally without electronics. Take turns with each child if you have more than one, so that the ratio is one-on-one. It is remarkably healing for kids and will help you to enjoy them. It also makes them feel like they are your number one priority. If you’re highly anxious, do something about it. Treating anxiety is one of the best things you can do for yourself and your family. Consider participating in cognitive behavioral therapy: you can learn very effective strategies for identifying and “talking back to” the distorted and unproductive thoughts that contribute to high anxiety. Learn to meditate. Take a yoga class. Be very regular in your exercise routine. Spend time in nature. Get more sleep. Socialize more with friends if it helps you feel calm. Avoid making decisions for your child based on fear. If you find yourself thinking, “I’m afraid if I don’t do this now, then—” stop. Do what you feel is right now, not what you feel you have to because of what you’re afraid will happen if you don’t. If your child is struggling, schedule a short time every day for you to worry about his or her problems. Literally write it into your planner. This will let your brain know that it is safe not to worry all day long. Remember who’s responsible for what. It cannot be your responsibility to see that everything goes well for your children at all times. If you are very worried about your teenager and have talked through the issues together many times, write your child a short letter summarizing your concerns and offering any help the child might need. Then promise that you will not bring the issue up again for a month. When you break your promise (because you will) apologize and recommit to it. Get out a piece of paper and draw a vertical line in the middle. In the left-hand column, write statements such as the following: “It’s okay for Jeremy to have a learning disability,” “It’s okay that Sarah doesn’t have any friends right now,” “It’s okay for Ben to be depressed right now.” In the right-hand column, write down the automatic thoughts that come to your mind in response (likely rebuttal) to these statements. Then question these automatic thoughts. Ask questions such as, “Can I be absolutely sure that this thought is true?” “Who would I be if I didn’t believe this?” This kind of self-questioning exercise, developed by author and speaker Byron Katie and others, can serve as a useful tool for discovering the thoughts that trap you into negative judgments.18 Create a stress-reduction plan for yourself. Can you get more exercise? More sleep? What calms you down and how can you do more of it? Don’t make yourself available to your kids at the expense of your own well-being. Wall off some “me” time. Model self-acceptance and tell your kids what you’re doing.

There are many interpretations of the word “mindfulness.” Its most common interpretation involves the use of meditation. But mindfulness includes many other aspects. One is contemplation. Being mindfully aware may sound difficult at first, but it’s not. Nor is it something we have to work hard to achieve. Mindful awareness is simply paying attention to what is happening now. In doing nothing other than living in the moment for a few minutes, we can let thoughts and feelings come and go without holding on to them or judging them. In doing so, we build the muscles of concentration, observation, and relaxation all at the same time. This is different from thinking, in which we often judge each moment on what has been or what could be. I sometimes call it mind-full awareness because the mind is full of nothing but a gentle focus on the breath. It is the direct opposite to being mind-less. Mindlessness is when we are on autopilot and not paying attention to the present moment. We’ve all been there. We sometimes feel as though we are sleepwalking through our lives. Minutes, hours, even days can go by that we don’t fully recall because we don’t feel aware of what is happening. By sitting and mindfully breathing for ten minutes a day, in as little as eight weeks you strengthen the part of the prefrontal cortex involved in generating positive feelings and diminish the part that generates negative ones. —Richard Davidson, PhD Sometimes in mindlessness we find ourselves reacting automatically in negative ways—lashing out or saying things we later regret. We ask ourselves, “Why did I do that?” or “Who was in charge of my mouth?” It doesn’t have to be this way. We all have the ability to become more present. First we have to truly believe it is possible. Then we create the intention. The more we tune in to our own thoughts and feelings, the more choices we give ourselves in terms of our responses. The key to all these mindful practices is to keep going and not be overcritical of ourselves. Whenever we become aware that our minds have wandered from our practice, we just gently refocus. Learning expert Tim Gallwey calls this “awareness without judgment” and claims that it is one of the greatest tools for learning in what he describes as the “inner game.” The more we reinforce this message, the more we improve our own focus—and the more we help our children accept that they can make mistakes without being overcritical of themselves. One

ANTs,” which stands for “Automatic Negative Thoughts.

Natural Ways to Help Anxiety Don’t start something you may not be able to stop. After the pandemic, anxiety disorders more than doubled in children and teenagers.[1] Prescriptions for antianxiety medications, such as benzodiazepines like alprazolam (Xanax) and clonazepam (Klonopin) dramatically increased. The problem is that they are addictive, and once you start them they are often very hard to stop. Here are 11 strategies to consider before going on antianxiety medications. 1. Check for hypoglycemia, anemia, and hyperthyroidism. 2. Try an elimination diet for three weeks. (See day 257 for more detail.) 3. Practice meditation and hypnosis daily (research shows they can both calm stress and anxiety). 4. Try heart rate variability (HRV) training (anxiety is linked to low levels of HRV, but you can hack your way to a healthier HRV with biofeedback apps such as Welltory). See day 202 for more information. 5. Practice diaphragmatic breathing—deep breathing from your belly—when you feel anxious. 6. Eliminate the ANTs (automatic negative thoughts). See days 22, 116–117. 7. Incorporate a calming exercise, such as yoga or qi gong, into your week. 8. Take 200–400 mg of L-Theanine per day. 9. Take 500–1,500 mg of GABA per day. 10. Take 100–500 mg of magnesium glycinate, citrate, or malate with 30 mg of vitamin B6 per day. 11. Schedule neurofeedback to help retrain your brain. Anxiety disorders are very painful, but too often people reach for marijuana, alcohol, or prescribed benzodiazepines, which can be of short-term benefit but cause long-term problems with addiction and memory issues. If the above interventions are ineffective or only partly effective with my patients, I’ll try other nutraceuticals or medications targeted to a specific type of anxiety (take the test at brainhealthassessment.com).

Natural Ways to Help Depression Depression is not one illness. Like anxiety, the pandemic spawned a whole new level of people being diagnosed with depression and placed on antidepressant medication, without ever getting a proper evaluation or trying simple fixes. Here are nine common things I do for patients before prescribing antidepressant medication. 1. Check for and (if necessary) correct thyroid hormone abnormalities. 2. Work with a nutritionally informed physician to optimize your folate, vitamin B12, vitamin D, homocysteine, and omega-3 fatty acids. I’m convinced that without doing these nutritional fixes, patients are less likely to respond to the medications. 3. Try an elimination diet for three weeks. 4. Add colorful fruits and vegetables into your diet. 5. Eliminate the ANTs (automatic negative thoughts). See days 22, 116–117. 6. Exercise—walk like you are late for 45 minutes four times a week. This has been found to be as effective as antidepressant medication.[1] 7. Add one of the following supplements to your daily routine: Saffron 30 mg/day; curcumin, not as turmeric root but as Longvida, which is much more efficiently absorbed; zinc as citrate or glycinate 30 mg (tolerable upper level is 40 mg/day for adults, 34 mg/day for adolescents, less for younger kids); or magnesium glycinate, citrate, or malate, 100–500 mg with 30 mg of vitamin B6. 8. Consume probiotics daily. 9. Try morning bright light therapy with a therapeutic lamp of 10,000 lux for 20–30 minutes. If someone comes to me with depression, I order screening labs, teach them not to believe every negative thought they have, give them basic supplements (saffron, zinc, curcumins, and omega-3s), and encourage them to exercise. Many people never need medication if they follow through with the program. If the above interventions are ineffective, I’ll try other nutraceuticals or medications targeted to their specific type of depression (take the test at brainhealthassessment.com).

When we create on the conscious level, we are able to make choices. When we create on the unconscious level we cannot make choices. We often hear about how we have the “power of choice”, but that is not entirely accurate. It is misleading to say someone chooses a dysfunctional relationship, money problems, or any other negative situation in his or her life. Most of the time we are operating in the “default mode” which is based on our past conditioning. Choice implies being conscious. However, when you are unconscious, you cannot make conscious choices. You are operating in the “default mode” or on “automatic pilot.” The default mode is the survival mode. This is where the mind takes control without us even being aware of what is happening. Choice begins when you stop identifying with your conditioned patterns of the past. Until you reach that point, you are unconscious. This means you are compelled to think, feel and act in certain ways according to the conditioning of your mind. When we can make choices, we’re no longer the victim of our unconscious reactions. If our unconscious negative thinking does not support what we want, rather than trying to eliminate it, all we have to do is center on “right thinking.” “Right thinking” is a thought pattern that is based on truth. Truth by its very nature must always be “right.

Start paying attention to your daily thoughts It’s easy to just live your life on automatic, without paying attention to what’s going on inside your head. In order to break free from codependency, you have to start listening to your inner voices, or, the thoughts that follow you throughout the day. Are your thoughts mostly negative and telling you that you aren’t lovable? Are they fearful? By paying closer attention to your thoughts  throughout the day, you are gaining insight into what makes you tick and why you act the way you do. Once you identify the tone of the thoughts that make up your day, you can start to unravel their effect on your actions.

Your automatic mechanism, or what the Freudians call the “unconscious,” is absolutely impersonal. It operates as a machine and has no “will” of its own. It always tries to react appropriately to your current beliefs and interpretations concerning environment. It always seeks to give you appropriate feelings, and to accomplish the goals that you consciously determine. It works only on the data that you feed it in the form of ideas, beliefs, interpretations, opinions. It is conscious thinking that is the “control knob” of your unconscious machine. It was by conscious thought, though perhaps irrational and unrealistic, that the unconscious machine developed its negative and inappropriate reaction patterns, and it is by conscious rational thought that the automatic reaction patterns can be changed.

Your present negative beliefs were formed by thought plus feelings. Generate enough emotion, or deep feeling, and your new thoughts and ideas will cancel them out. If you will analyze this, you will see that you are using a process you have often used before—worry! The only difference is you change your goals from negative to positive. When you worry, you first of all picture some undesirable future outcome, or goal, very vividly in your imagination. You use no effort or willpower. But you keep dwelling on the “end result.” You keep thinking about it—dwelling on it—picturing it to yourself as a “possibility.” You play with the idea that it “might happen.” This constant repetition, and thinking in terms of “possibilities,” makes the end result appear more and more “real” to you. After time, appropriate emotions are automatically generated—fear, anxiety, discouragement—all these are appropriate to the undesirable end result you are worrying about. Now change the “goal picture”—and you can as easily generate “good emotions.” Constantly picturing to yourself, and dwelling on, a desirable end result will also make the possibility seem more real—and again appropriate emotions of enthusiasm, cheerfulness, encouragement, and happiness will automatically be generated. “In forming good emotional habits, and in breaking bad ones,” said Dr. Knight Dunlap, “we have to deal primarily with thought and thought habits. ‘As a man thinketh in his heart so is he.

Peacefully taking a sword to all those negative, frightening, depressing thoughts that are automatically believed… so that a great, timeless, active day can be created. A day with no time in it unless you want to make some.

ANTs are “automatic negative thoughts” and, if you’re like most people, you place limitations on yourself in the form of these thoughts at least some of the time. Maybe you tell yourself that you aren’t smart enough to learn a skill that you’d really like to have. Or perhaps you repeat on an endless loop how pushing yourself to accomplish something is only going to lead to disappointment. ANTs are everywhere, and there isn’t enough ant spray in the world to get rid of all of them. But eliminating them from your life is an essential part of unlimiting your brain. The reason for this is simple: If you fight for your limitations, you get to keep them. If you regularly tell yourself that you can’t do something, or that you’re too old to do something, or that you don’t have the smarts to do something, you won’t do that thing. Only when you move on from this kind of destructive self-talk can you truly accomplish what you want to accomplish

Learn to identify your problems and issues more concretely Become more aware of your mood and emotions Develop an understanding of negative automatic thoughts Learn to challenge the assumptions that you make in your mind Start to distinguish between what is fact and what is just a thought Make sense of overwhelming problems by breaking them down into smaller, more manageable parts Begin to look at situations from a different and more positive perspective Learn strategies for facing your fears and anxieties Stop hiding behind avoidance techniques Learn to avoid cognitive distortions, generalizations, and “black and white” ways of thinking Stop being so hard on yourself and taking the blame for things that are not your fault nor your responsibility Stop focusing on how you think things should be and learn to appreciate how they actually are Set and achieve goals for better, long-term mental health

Healing our mind is crucial, because otherwise our problems, which are beginningless, become endless. We may use medicine or some other external means to heal a particular disease, but the disease will return unless we heal our mind. If we do nothing to heal our mind, there is always the danger that we will again create the cause of the disease, that we will repeat the actions that caused us to become physically unhealthy. We will then experience the same illness in future lives, or even in this life. Curing disease through external means is not the best solution because the cause of disease is not external. Bacteria, viruses, spirits, and so forth may act as external conditions for disease, but disease itself has no external cause. In the West, however, the external conditions for a particular disease are usually regarded as its cause. The cause of disease is not external; it is in the mind – or we could say, it is the mind. Disease is caused by our self-cherishing, ignorance, anger, attachment, and other delusions and by the negative actions motivated by these negative thoughts. Our negative thoughts and actions leave imprints on our mind, which then manifest as disease or other problems. The imprints also make it possible for disturbing thoughts and negative actions to arise again. A physical sign necessarily has a physical cause, but the physical cause arises because of the inner cause, the imprints left on the mind by negative thoughts and actions. To fully understand disease, we have to understand the inner cause, which is the actual cause of disease and which also creates the physical conditions for disease. As long as we ignore its inner cause, we have no real cure for disease. We must study its development and recognize that its cause is in the mind. Once we recognize this, we will automatically understand that the healing of disease also has to come from the mind. (p. 4-5)

The National Science Foundation has statistics that estimate we have between twelve thousand and sixty thousand thoughts per day, depending on things like our creativity, problem-solving skills, and our career. Other research reveals that as many as 95 to 98 percent of those thoughts are exactly the same thoughts we had the day before and even more significantly, 80 percent of our thoughts are typically negative. These 98 percent, as well as the negative thoughts, are automatic and take place in our subconscious.

Social Anxiety and Your Mind Your most powerful thoughts are often unconscious and are based upon deeply held beliefs. In social anxiety, these thoughts are usually negative and ineffective. Examples of ways in which your mind is affected by social anxiety include faulty core beliefs, inaccurate expectations, negative automatic thoughts, and perfectionism.