Challenging our thought patterns
The bad often plays louder than the good - how can we change that?
When chatting with my friend Krysten last week (pod ep02 - listen here!) she recounted a few not-so-great stories about coworker interactions BUT then shared a great story about a supportive coworker. It’s incredibly important to recall the good stories, but so often the negative ones are those that stick with us the most. Can we change that?
YES. WE. CAN.
Many of you know I'm a big fan of therapy for mental wellness. The most beneficial thing I've learned from therapy (so far) is how to challenge negative thought patterns. You can literally rewire your brain by adjusting the thoughts you think.
The scientific term for rewiring your brain is cognitive restructuring (and you can read a lot about it here). The basics: your brain consists of 86 billion neurons which are connected to 1000 to 10000 neurons each via synapses. These synaptic connections can be very strong or very weak and can change over time. When we reinforce a particular pathway (i.e. repeatedly think of or respond to something in a specific way and therefore specific neurons fire in sequence), our synapses become stronger along that pathway and that response becomes our default. This means that if we regularly think about something in a way that is defeating or destructive, our brain defaults to that way of distorted thinking. The good news is that this also means if we shift to considering the facts that counter this negative way of thinking, we can adjust our synaptic weights to choose a new, more positive and factual default response!
Before we really dive in, I want to articulate that this is not positive toxicity. I’m not here to put on rose-colored glasses and be overly positive without any sense of reality. Cognitive restructuring is using evidence to contradict the conclusion we’ve made about ourselves or our environments. Bad things happen, and our brains can settle into faulty thought patterns. In the thick of it, it’s easier for the brain to process destructive and defeating thoughts until we eventually see the world through an entirely defeated lens. However, many good and encouraging things happen too, and we can intentionally take facts from the good experiences to reframe how we view things and rewire our brain so we stop drowning in the bad.
Please also note that I am not a therapist or an expert! I’m sharing my experiences and what has worked for me. If you think this would be a beneficial exercise for something you’re dealing with, speaking with a mental health professional is most definitely the way to go.
Okay, time for some real examples. Let's go!
Scenario One
You're chatting with a male coworker. You both applied to a workshop. You got in, your male coworker did not. Your male coworker then proceeds to tell you that you only got into the workshop because the workshop organizers are trying to increase the number of women in attendance.
From this interaction (and others like it), I could easily conclude that I get accepted into conferences and workshops not because of my technical capabilities and work, but instead because they need to up their numbers of women in these spaces. I could also conclude that I am a “diversity hire” - whatever group I’m working in needs better female representation and so I’m only there based on my gender and not my qualifications or expertise. If I began to believe these things (which would be easy to do), I honestly think I would leave my profession. So why haven’t I??
Solution: I immediately counter these defeating thoughts with a clear memory of my mom reacting to my coworker’s comment about the workshop. I called her immediately after this conversation on my way out the building filled with a mixture of anger and doubt, and then had to quickly ask her to stop raging for 2 minutes because my coworker could very likely hear her yelling about him through the phone 🤣
My mom uninhibitedly had my back, and she wasn’t wrong - that coworker was out of line and incorrect. Some men will make an arrogant assumption about my credentials (because there's obviously no way a man would be turned down over a woman 🙄) BUT the thing that sits louder in my mind these days is the fact that I have more people in my corner that know I’m qualified and will always lift me back up when I start to spiral (thanks Mom!).
Scenario Two (a non-work one if the first doesn’t resonate with you)
You grab coffee with a friend and overshare everything. You get home and think through your chat and come to the conclusion that your friend is mad at you.
Does this seem like a leap? That's because it is! It's also how my brain works. I overanalyze what I said then read into expressions and tone and body language and responses during interactions until I’ve convinced myself that my friend now thinks I'm terrible and doesn't want to hang with me again. The thing about this situation is that there are exactly zero facts to back it up.
Solution: okay, full cred to therapy here. Anytime my brain decides my friend thinks I’m the worst, I recall the fact that every time I’ve thought this in the past, I’ve been wrong. My friend(s) have given me no reason to jump to this conclusion and they still invite me out for another coffee or say yes to my next invitation. Since learning this technique, anytime my brain has started going down that self-defeating path, I’ve reminded myself of the truth and over time, my brain has stopped freaking the eff out quite as often!
So… now what?
We become more aware of our emotional responses - specifically those that negatively impact our moods and make us feel defeated. Then, we decide on a related, positive fact that we can recall every. single. time that crappy response occurs. Each time we do this, we change the synaptic weights that connect our neurons and eventually, whatever it is that triggered a negative response starts triggering the good replacement - I kid you not! Science - it’s wild. Our brains are SO cool, and we have the power to tune in and get intentional with our thoughts to ensure they’re working on our side 🧠
Let me know if you try or have tried cognitive restructuring by leaving a comment below! We can all learn from one another’s experiences, and I cannot wait to hear yours.
It’s so dang hard to keep those negative thoughts from taking the lead! It gives me great hope that continual imperfect practice at challenging the negative with the real and positive equivalent thoughts can rewire the brain pathways. 🤩
Never doubt your intellect or compassion. You have all the good stuff!💗