4 tips to stop negative thoughts

Who has never been haunted by a negative thought? Whether it’s because you’ve been impacted by some devastating news or because you’ve had a traumatic or difficult experience, the fact is that most people have been victims of the dark terrain of the mind. But then, how to silence the buzz of harmful ideas?

According to Mindfulness Coaching specialist and pioneer of the technique in Brazil, Rodrigo Siqueira, negative thoughts in general are linked to the person’s inability and lack of training to remain in the present. “Either we are ruminating on negative events from the past or anticipating negative events from a nonexistent future that, most likely, will never exist. First of all, it is necessary that the person perceives himself with negative thoughts. Having the ability to observe and recognize them as mental events rather than reality is critical. This simple attitude is already starting to free us from the clutches of these less healthy thoughts”, guarantees Rodrigo.

Fernando Belatto, martial arts teacher and creator of the method “The Awakening of the Inner Warrior”, is not in favor of trying to interrupt negative thoughts. According to him, the negative buzz of the mind will continue to happen, until the person learns to welcome this avalanche of harmful ideas.

Negative thoughts often bring self-knowledge about our beliefs, fears and shortcomings, so we need to learn to face them.

I believe that if we can live these feelings, but without identifying with them, we will stop fearing them and remove their control over our actions. A good exercise for this is to get in touch with yourself through short periods of silence”, guides Fernando.

In any case, it is important to learn to deal with harmful patterns in the mind. Career counselor Amanda Figueira proposes a reflection: “Don’t we take care of our health, our food, our home, our body, our relationships? So, taking care of our thoughts should also be a permanent exercise. After all, thought is action, and if we think negatively, it is quite possible that we will have harmful actions in our lives as a result. The good side of this is that changing fixed ideas is up to you”, he guarantees.

Check out tips from several experts below to learn how to deal with and stop the negative thoughts that insist on populating your mind.

question the thoughts

“They don’t like me”, “it’s going to be too hard”, “this shouldn’t be happening”, etc. Who never had thoughts like that? For therapist and spiritual educator, Ariana Schlösser, people’s biggest problem is believing everything they think. But, according to her, the secret is to start questioning what the mind offers.

All suffering comes from an unquestioned thought. Those that cause stress cannot be real, as they are not in our nature. In fact, they are a blessing, an alarm – felt by the body – that says: you are believing something that is not true.

Just think that only love is real. So when we are harboring thoughts of fear, which is the opposite of love, we are actually creating illusions. And it is because we believe in them that we suffer”, clarifies Ariana.

The spiritual educator teaches that you first need to identify which thought is behind your negative emotion. Then, to unblock the harmful ideas she found inside herself, Ariana guides her to ask 4 simple questions, but which must be answered through Meditation. “It means that when asking yourself a question, you must be silent and let the answer come. The goal is to realize how much we believe in what we think, without ever questioning ourselves. Not realizing it’s just a thought,” she guides her.

Below, Ariana Schlösser teaches you step-by-step how to start questioning your thoughts, based on Byron Katie’s work “The Work”.

Step 1 – Locate your beliefs. Example: “This shouldn’t be happening”, “All men cheat”, “I won’t be able to pay my bills” or “I will never be loved”.

And now answer:

That is true? (There is no right answer, just let your mind consider the question and answer with “yes” or “no” only) Can you be absolutely sure this is true? (again, answer “yes” or “no”. If your mind has started to question too much, it is a sign that you have left the investigation, that is not the purpose of this work. Consider: can you be 100% sure? Yes or no? Difficult affirm anything with absolute certainty, isn’t it?) How do you react when you believe this thought? What happens when you believe him? (Realize what happens to your body, when you are in your daily life, when you interact with others, how do you treat people? How do you treat yourself? What do you allow yourself? Notice: Have you had peace in believing this thought?) Who would you be without this thought? (In the same situations you visualized in the previous question, what would you do or say differently without this thought? How does your body behave? How does your behavior look?) Invert! That’s the most fun part. Every thought is true if we want to believe in it. It’s our choice. So now reverse your belief and give three reasons why the reversal is as true or more true than the negative thought itself! Let your answers come, give yourself that gift!

Example:

“All men cheat” >> “All men don’t cheat”

List three reasons why this is equally or more true, such as:

All men don’t cheat because I don’t know all the men to say that. All men don’t cheat because I can think of these and these examples. All men don’t cheat, because even if that were true I have no way of knowing if that’s what they’ll do in the future. No one has the power to predict this.

Holistic therapist Regina Restelli reinforces the suggestions and states that the first thing to be done to stop negative thoughts is to activate the perception that they exist. “Noticing when thoughts are at work is the only way to really combat them. Afterwards, as the perception increases, the realization of being in a negative intentionality gives you the opportunity to be able to renounce this feeling, be it fear, judgment, envy, revenge or conflict intention. Therefore, we exercise the choice of what we want to live in our life, under the Law of Cause and Effect. And, finally, choose the positive, love, kindness, silence, compassion… The possibilities are endless when we surrender to the joy of the certainty that everything is always right”, reflects Regina.

Breathe and Meditate to Change Thought Patterns

Have you noticed that one of the first things you do when you realize you feel something “negative” is try to mask or resist it? The therapist and spiritual educator, Ariana Schlösser, believes that this is precisely why painful emotions remain inside people and influence their lives.

“All pain wants is to be heard. Just think: if she’s here, it’s because she’s ready to leave! Any emotion is a great healing opportunity,” says Ariana.

The therapist suggests that to start dissolving negative thoughts, you should use breathing to your advantage. According to Ariana, as emotions stay in the body, a great way to dissolve them is to breathe through them.

“First locate the emotion you want to dissolve. Then he sits down and gets in touch with it, not suppressing it, just feeling and breathing deeply. Breathe in through your nose and out through her mouth. Feel the emotion come to the surface and let whatever it is: tears, all the weight of the past… Let them go. The tendency, while doing this exercise, is to want to contract the body, you understand? If we allow ourselves to breathe for 60 seconds (at least) we will be allowing our energetic circuit to rebuild itself and, thus, allowing this emotion to dissolve within us. This will cause our vibration to change. Dedicate yourself to this practice daily, until you feel that you are at peace with this emotion”, teaches Ariana.

The specialist in Mindfulness Coaching, Rodrigo Siqueira, believes that Mindfulness Meditation is of great help to stop negative thoughts. Below, he teaches you how to put it into practice:

Recognize that your thoughts are not reality. They come and go. Let them come and go. Try to observe them from a distance, like watching clouds passing in the sky. Do not identify with them. Calmly focus your attention on your breathing, on all the sensations of the in and out of breath. When realizing that the mind is more peaceful, close the Meditation. Always be aware of your thoughts and their subjective and impermanent nature: they are not reality and will surely pass.

Use tricks to interrupt thoughts

According to psychotherapist Celia Lima, there are some easy tricks to get out of hypnosis, which take effect practically immediately. Below, the expert teaches 3 tactics to interrupt the rumble of the mind:

get out of place. Yes, geographically move out of place. If you are in the living room, go to the kitchen paying attention to the path you are taking. Look at objects with interest, drink a glass of water and try to occupy yourself with something. Leaving where you are forces us to bring our attention to where we are going. Naturally, that unwanted thought goes up in smoke in our minds.
Thermal shock it also works. Wash face with cold water, let wrists receive cold tap water. In addition to taking you out of place, your body will react to the cold and you will lose focus on unwanted thoughts.
Clap hands vigorously is another trick! You will have the sound of the hands and the circulation activated in that region, dispensing with the bad feeling. As if he was scaring away the bad thoughts. You can also speak, while clapping your hands, you can curse your thoughts and your feelings: “Shoo, boring thing!”, “It’s going to disturb someone else!” or, more delicately, send a message to those thoughts: “I am love, I am life, I am joy!”. It doesn’t matter what you say, as long as the intention is to get rid of this feeling or the mind chatter.

“If these tips don’t work right away, repeat the operation. And repeat one more time, until you start to find their attitudes funny and get lost in a resounding laugh! Laughter always disappoints”, guarantees Celia Lima.

Recreate new models for your mind

Career counselor Amanda Figueira believes that negative thoughts are the result of a mental model addicted to an unhealthy pattern. And for you to be able to recreate a new mental model and get rid of this type of thinking, the expert suggests some tips below:

Let go of everything that brings you down, stay away from “toxic” situations, things, places or people (that are bad for you). Invest in what brings you well-being. Evaluate your social networks and the sites you usually access and clean up everything that does not bring you well-being. This applies to movies and TV shows. Watch only what’s good and lifts you up. Do…