Unhelpful thinking styles—where your brain basically plays the role of an overly dramatic commentator in the movie of your life. 

If you’ve ever wondered why your mind fixates on negative outcomes, you’re in the right place. 

In this article, we’ll break down these unhelpful mental habits, how they affect your nervous system, give you some simple strategies to help you get back on track, and turn down the volume on your brain’s negativity.

What Are Unhelpful Thinking Styles?

Unhelpful thinking styles, or cognitive distortions, are the mental habits that turn small issues into full-blown catastrophes. It’s like your brain is stuck on a “bad news” channel, where everything gets blown out of proportion. Instead of a balanced view, you get a skewed version of reality that’s heavy on the drama. Like an episode of the Kardashians.

In short, unhelpful thinking styles make life seem more difficult than it actually is.

Examples of Unhelpful Thinking Styles

So, what do unhelpful thoughts—or “cognitive distortions”—actually look like? Here’s a quick guide to some of the most common offenders, complete with practical examples you might recognize:

1. All-or-Nothing Thinking: Seeing everything as black or white with no shades of gray. Example: “If I don’t nail this exam, I’m a total disaster.” (Because life is either perfect or it’s a train wreck, right?)
2. Overgeneralization: Drawing sweeping conclusions from a single event. Example: “I didn’t get this job; I’ll never get hired anywhere.” (One setback and it’s game over.)
3. Catastrophizing: Expecting the absolute worst. Example: “If I make a tiny mistake in this report, the entire company will collapse.” (Might as well start looking for a new job now.)
4. Mind Reading: Assuming you know what others are thinking. Example: “She didn’t say hi; she must be mad at me.” (Because of course, you’re a mind reader.)
5. Emotional Reasoning: Believing your feelings are indisputable facts. Example: “I feel like a failure, so I must be one.” (Feelings are facts, and facts are feelings.)
6. Labeling, Judging, and Mislabeling: Slapping negative labels on yourself or others. Example: “I’m such an idiot” or “He’s always lazy.” (Because labeling is way easier than understanding.)
7. Personalization: Taking the blame for things that are out of your control. Example: “The team’s project failure is all my fault.” (Because clearly, it’s all about you.)
8. Should Statements: Setting rigid rules for yourself. Example: “I should always be successful.” (Because “should” is a great way to stress yourself out.)
9. Filtering: Zooming in on the negatives while ignoring the positives. Example: “I got mostly positive feedback, but that one piece of criticism means I’m awful.” (One bad apple spoils the whole bunch, right?)
10. Discounting the Positive: Dismissing compliments and achievements. Example: “That compliment doesn’t count; they were just being nice.” (Because who wants to acknowledge their awesomeness anyway?)
11. Jumping to Conclusions: Making assumptions without any evidence. Example: “I didn’t get a party invite from the neighbors this year; they must hate me.” (Is the party even going ahead?)
12. Blaming: Pointing fingers at others for your problems. Example: “My friend is always late; it ruins my day.” (It’s always someone else’s fault)
13. Magnification and Minimization: Blowing negatives out of proportion or downplaying positives. Example: “My mistake was catastrophic” vs. “The project’s success was just luck.” (Because perspective is overrated.)
14. Fortune Telling: Predicting negative outcomes. Example: “I’ll definitely mess up this presentation.” (Because you’re basically a psychic, but only for bad news.)
15. Regret: Ruminating over past mistakes. Example: “If only I had done that differently, everything would be perfect.” (Because endlessly replaying past failures is super productive.)
16. Perfectionism: Setting impossibly high standards. Example: “If this isn’t perfect, it’s a disaster.” (Because perfection is the only acceptable outcome.)
17. Worrying: Obsessing over potential problems. Example: “What if I forget my lines during the speech?” (Because worrying about the “what-ifs” is a great use of your time.)
18. Comparing: Measuring yourself against others. Example: “They’re more successful, so I must be failing.” (Because comparing yourself to others is a sure-fire way to feel inadequate.)

As you can see, these patterns turn minor issues into major stressors, leading to a lot of unnecessary suffering.

How Do Unhelpful Thinking Styles Affect Us?

These thinking styles don’t just mess with your mind—they spill over into every part of your life:

• Emotional Impact: They can leave you feeling anxious, depressed, and generally down on yourself, like a constant cloud of negativity is following you around. Think Eeyore, but with less charm.
• Behavioral Impact: These patterns can lead you to avoid situations or sabotage your own efforts. When you’re convinced you’ll fail, it’s easy to not even try. 
• Physical Impact: The stress from negative thinking can throw your nervous system off balance, leading to all sorts of fun side effects like headaches, fatigue, muscle tension, and digestive issues. 

How Do You Know If You Are Experiencing Unhelpful Thoughts?

Not sure if you’re trapped in a cycle of unhelpful thinking? Keep an eye out for these telltale signs:

• Frequent Negative Self-Talk: If your inner voice sounds like a relentless critic that never gives you a break, you might be dealing with these thinking styles.
• Excessive Worrying: If your brain is stuck on a loop of “what ifs” and “what could go wrong,” you’re probably deep in a negative thought spiral.
• Difficulty Finding Positives: If you can’t spot the silver lining in even the sunniest of situations, that’s a red flag waving wildly.
• Emotional Extremes: If you find yourself losing it over minor hiccups, your thinking might be off kilter.

If any of this sounds like your daily reality show, you might just be dealing with unhelpful thinking styles.

Why Do We Have Cognitive Distortions?

So, why does our brain love to take these unhelpful detours? Cognitive distortions aren’t just random quirks—they’re deeply rooted in how our minds have evolved to process information and keep us safe.

Evolutionary Survival Mechanism

At their core, cognitive distortions are an evolutionary survival tool. Back when our ancestors were fending off saber-toothed tigers, quick judgments and assumptions could mean the difference between survival and becoming lunch. If you heard a rustling in the bushes, assuming it was a predator (and not just the wind) was a pretty solid strategy. This “better safe than sorry” mindset is still wired into our brains, which is why we tend to overestimate threats even when they’re not life-or-death.[*]

Cognitive Efficiency

Our brains are constantly processing a flood of information, and if we analyzed every little detail, we’d never get anything done. Cognitive distortions act as mental shortcuts, letting us make snap decisions without drowning in the deets. Obviously this can be useful in simple situations, but it can also lead to errors in judgment, particularly when emotions get involved.

Learned Behavior

Cognitive distortions also come from past experiences and learned behaviors. If you’ve faced criticism or trauma before, your brain might start expecting the worst, reinforcing those distorted thinking patterns. So, if you’ve been burned before, it’s easy to start assuming everyone’s out to get you or that things will always go wrong.[*]

Emotional State

Your emotional state plays a big role too. When you’re stressed, anxious, or feeling down, your brain is more likely to default to these distorted patterns. Negative emotions can cloud your thinking, making it easier to fall into all-or-nothing thinking, catastrophizing, or other cognitive traps.

Cultural and Social Influences

The environment you grew up in also shapes how you think. Cultural and societal norms can influence the types of cognitive distortions you’re prone to. For instance, if you’re in a culture that values perfectionism, you might be more likely to engage in all-or-nothing thinking or constantly telling yourself you “should” be doing better.[*]

Self-Protection

Lastly, cognitive distortions can act as a bit of self-defense. Your brain might bend reality to protect your ego or avoid dealing with uncomfortable emotions. For instance, blaming others for a problem can be a way to dodge guilt or feelings of inadequacy. While this might make you feel better in the moment, it often leads to bigger emotional headaches down the line.

How Are Unhelpful Thinking Styles Related to Nervous System Dysregulation?

Unhelpful thinking styles and nervous system dysregulation are like two sides of the same coin—they feed into each other, creating a vicious cycle that’s hard to break. When you’re stuck in a cycle of negative thinking, your body’s stress response can go into overdrive, leaving you feeling anxious, tense, and emotionally overwhelmed.[*] But it doesn’t stop there—the relationship works both ways.

When your nervous system is out of whack, it can cause you to react to situations in ways that seem disproportionate or off-base. You could find yourself blowing minor issues out of proportion or, on the flip side, feeling numb and disconnected from things that should matter. This imbalance often stems from unresolved stress or past experiences that your body never fully processed. These lingering stress responses keep your nervous system either overly alert or shut down.[*]

This dysregulation makes it easier for cognitive distortions to take hold. For example, if your stress levels are through the roof, you might slip into catastrophizing, where minor problems feel like major disasters. Or if you’re feeling emotionally detached, you might focus only on the negatives because your emotional range is so limited. In short, a dysregulated nervous system warps your perception, making those unhelpful thinking styles more frequent and intense.

Getting a handle on this connection is crucial for breaking the cycle. By addressing nervous system dysregulation, you can start to ease the grip that cognitive distortions have on your mind.

Ruminations vs. Cognitive Distortions

You might be asking yourself if there’s a difference between ruminating and cognitive distortions. There is, and it’s pretty subtle: cognitive distortions are the bad thoughts themselves—let’s think of them as the broken record. Rumination, on the other hand, is the record player stuck on loop, constantly spinning those negative thoughts (broken records).

Characteristics of Rumination:

• Repetitive Thinking: You keep running the same negative thoughts in circles.
• Focus on the Past or Future: You tend to fixate on past screw-ups or future catastrophes.
• Lack of Resolution: It rarely helps you solve the problem but just makes you feel more stressed.

Example of Rumination: Imagine you made a mistake at work and can’t stop replaying it in your head, imagining all the ways you could have handled it better and stressing about the consequences. That’s rumination—your mind is stuck in a loop of self-blame and anxiety.

Characteristics of Cognitive Distortions:

• Biases in Thinking: Patterns that distort how you perceive and interpret events.
• Specific Faulty Thinking: Distortions like mind reading or emotional reasoning shape how you view situations and yourself.

Example of a Cognitive Distortion: If you fail a test and think, “I’m terrible at everything,” you’re engaging in all-or-nothing thinking. This distortion takes one event and generalizes it to your whole self-worth.

In summary, rumination involves endlessly cycling through negative thoughts, while cognitive distortions are the specific flawed patterns of thought that fuel that cycle. 

How Can You Start to Overcome Unhelpful Thinking Styles?

Looking to ditch those unhelpful thinking patterns? Here’s a selection of strategies to get back on track:

• Safe and Sound Protocol (SSP): SSP is a listening program that resets your nervous system by improving how you respond to social and environmental cues. 
• Dynamic Neural Retraining System (DNRS): This technique helps rewire your brain to replace negative thinking with new, healthy neural pathways.
• Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT): CBT is like having a personal trainer for your brain. It helps you identify and switch out those unhelpful thinking patterns for more helpful ones.
• Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT): ACT helps you accept your thoughts and feelings rather than fighting them off. It’s like learning to coexist peacefully with your brain’s drama club.
• Therapeutic Techniques (EMDR, IFS): Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) and Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy help process and reframe difficult experiences. They can be a great way to sort out the mental clutter.

Simple Techniques for Managing Unhelpful Thinking Styles

While working with an experienced practitioner is beneficial, you may not need a major overhaul to start making changes. Here are some simple techniques that you can start using right now:

• Cultivate Awareness: Begin by noticing when you’re slipping into unhelpful thinking.
• Mindfulness: Stay present in the moment to reduce the impact of negative thoughts.
• Gratitude Journaling: Write down things you’re grateful for to shift focus from what’s wrong to what’s right.
• Nervous System Regulation Techniques: Deep breathing, self-massage and getting out in nature can help manage stress symptoms. 
• Journaling: Writing down your thoughts helps you untangle them and see patterns.
• Positive Affirmations: Swap out negative self-talk with positive affirmations to build a more optimistic mindset. It’s like giving your brain a pep talk, even if it feels a bit cheesy at first.
• Gratitude Practices: Focusing on what you’re grateful for can shift your mindset from “everything is terrible” to “hey, things aren’t so bad.” 
• Reframing: Challenge and change negative thoughts by viewing situations from different perspectives.
• Looking for Evidence: Ask yourself if your thoughts are based on facts or just assumptions. Are they actually true?
• Becoming the Observer: Step back and observe your thoughts without judgment.

If your brain is starting to feel as worn out as Ben Affleck after 24 hours with J.Lo, getting a handle on these thoughts might just give it the break it needs. With a bit of awareness and some simple techniques, you can turn down the negativity dial and find a little more peace in your daily life.