It is extremely difficult to get rid of intrusive thoughts with self-control. Disturbing thoughts arise again and again, sometimes changing the angle, but the essence remains the same. All this makes you nervous, and nerves are known to have a bad effect on health.
Why Intrusive Thoughts Creep Into Your Head
Anxiety thoughts – a survival mechanism, which we inherited from our distant ancestors. The brain reacts sensitively to any potentially dangerous information, so that we are able to adapt to the situation by experiencing it in our imagination.
Thus, most fears are merely a defensive reaction of our brain. However, we also worry when there is no cause for alarm. When the constant anticipation of trouble and the constant psychological preparation for it interfere with life, intrusive thoughts become a problem.
How to get rid of them? After all, no one wants his horrible thoughts to become a reality. And the negative thoughts themselves do not mean that all will be bad, but they spoil the mood of the here and now.
Are Intrusive Thoughts Dangerous?
Constant intrusive thoughts are one of the manifestations of anxiety. Anxiety can cause insomnia, interfere with productive work, and communicate with people. Besides, by constantly focusing on the negative, you acquire the habit of thinking pessimistically. For health, this is also not good, because focusing on the negative, any events from the past, hatred, resentment, can provoke a lot of psychosomatic diseases.
Ways to Get Rid of Intrusive Thoughts
Since panic thoughts are a kind of defensive reaction of the body, it is important to figure out if our unconscious is exaggerating the danger.
Distraction
Fear, anger, despair, or any other negative feeling can literally take away the ability to act. Negative thoughts only reinforce this feeling, fanning it like a bonfire. As a result, the person is depressed and unable to focus on solving the problem.
Despite the fact that sometimes it’s impossible to avoid negative feelings because life consists not only of joyful events, everyone understands that reveling in worries is useless. Your depressed mood and sad expression will not help to solve the problem.
Any activity will help – a trip to the gym, cleaning the house, betting on a favorite sport via https://22bet.co.ke/line/, going through the closet, a walk with the dog. The main thing is not to sit still, but to move.
Objective Assessment and Displacement
If distraction doesn’t help, and the intrusive thoughts come back, try breaking them down with an exercise:
- Describe the situation on paper and analyze how likely the situation is to happen at all.
- Write the opposite, happy scenario. And imagine what exactly you can do to make that happy scenario happen.
- Ask yourself a simple but very effective question: “Will this situation be as meaningful to me a year from now? Will it be worth the worry then?”
This little exercise will help you distance yourself from the obsessive scenario and take a sober look at what’s going on.
The Habit of Thinking Negatively
Note that most people’s habit of thinking negatively is the norm of life. Even in a calm, friendly environment they feel that there is a threat, that someone is cheating on them right now or trying to do them harm.
If the habit of always being “toned down” doesn’t interfere with enjoying life and communicating with people, then let it stay that way. If you feel that you are constantly in tension, you are overtaken by intrusive thoughts and already tired of scrolling through the head of negative scenarios, try to look at the situation philosophically.
First, in any situation, there really is a chance of some threat. Many things can happen at any time but is it worth thinking about it?
You should trust yourself more and believe in yourself, and take the world around you as it is. Try to treat all problems as a change in the weather. In any case, with such an outlook, it will be easier for you not to lose control in a stressful situation.
Second, often our minds are based only on negative experiences. This, too, is a defensive reaction. To look at the situation with an open mind, you have to separate past experiences from the present.
Even though the present is a consequence of past actions, your attitude, emotions and feelings about the situation may be completely different. Imagine that the present knows nothing of the past, and let go of all unpleasant thoughts, doubts and experiences related to past experiences.
