I’d been in therapy for a few years when I first heard the phrase automatic negative thoughts for the first time. It wasn’t nonflexible to deduce the meaning of the phrase, but I found it interesting nonetheless. Like everyone else, I deal with negative thoughts every single day. They might be well-nigh myself or other things, but one thing is certain: they’re negative. It’s the will-less part that I find interesting, and I wanted to learn increasingly well-nigh this concept. That’s why today, I’ll be breaking lanugo what will-less negative thoughts are, what they squint like, and what we can do well-nigh them.

What Are Will-less Negative Thoughts?

From my own research, the term ‘automatic negative thoughts’ (ANTs) goes when to the late 1970’s, when Aaron Beck coined a term in a typesetting tabbed “Cognitive Therapy and Emotional Disorders.” And while Beck referred to these at Negative Will-less Thoughts (NATs), the theory is the same. The main thing to grasp from this is the idea of will-less thoughts, a term that describes “thoughts individuals are often unaware of, that strongly influence feelings and behaviors.”

I’d like to think I’m in tenancy of every single thought I have but the truth is, I’m not. Human beings are complex, and all sorts of things can pop into our smart-ass that we don’t unchangingly understand. Will-less thoughts can influence our feelings and behaviors, which isn’t unchangingly a bad thing. However, when those those wilt increasingly negative, we have a rencontre to overcome.

What Do ANTs Squint Like?

Okay, I’m not going to make you read a few hundred words well-nigh what a negative thought looks like. That’s not what this space is for. But that doesn’t midpoint it’s easy to recognize when ANTs are getting increasingly and increasingly prevalent in your life.

As I wrote earlier, we have negative thoughts every day. But when my peepers or uneasiness brings well-nigh feelings of sadness or hopelessness, I entertain those ANTs far increasingly than I should. This quickly becomes a habit, and those negative thoughts feed on themselves.

What Can We Do Well-nigh It?

To be clear, the solution here is much easier said than washed-up (stay tuned for my next post for increasingly touchable tips!). The way a person thinks is something that’s evolved for years. When I first learned well-nigh ANTs, there were decades of thoughts that were going unchecked. Years of peepers can make you increasingly well-appointed with negative thoughts, but there are things we can do.

Changing how we tideway negative thinking and possible solutions is possible. But it does not (and will not) happen overnight. As with many things, sensation is the first step, and a step that can last a long time. Once we learn increasingly well-nigh ourselves and our own propensities for negative thoughts, we can start working to transpiration them. It’s one increasingly step to living a mentally healthier life.