Navigating Negative Thoughts and Emotions

Navigating negative thoughts and emotions can be like treading water with an anvil or two in tow. When the negative thoughts start, negative emotions follow, and vice versa. Commonly, one or two negative thoughts can lead to more and avalanche into a full heap of negative emotions.

Overwhelming negative thoughts and emotions can lead to difficulty finding calm, peace, and or rest. They can disrupt marriages and relationships of any kind and can make it hard to go to work or participate in regular activities.

Negative thoughts and emotions can come after a crisis or in the middle of an average day when a memory of a negative experience pops up. They can arise during a conversation gone wrong, or during an activity not quite going your way.

Below are some practical tips to help you when your emotions are overwhelming and your thoughts aren’t leading to peace.

Negative thoughts

Negative thoughts, for the sake of this article, are defined as thoughts that are distorted, unhelpful, extreme, and/or without total truth. The truth is, they just happen. Negative thoughts can come out of nowhere.

Negative thinking can be set on repeat as neuropathways form. Your brain can start to make a habit out of negative thinking whether or not the circumstances are different.

It can become difficult to realize that the negative thoughts are a habit instead of a proper response. Some people find the negative thoughts more trustworthy than the positive thoughts.

Automatic negative thoughts are readily trusted the most and are common among all people. Many people have studied automatic negative thinking (ANT) and they’ve categorized negative thoughts into several common types.

A few of the most common ANTs are:

• Mind reading (“I know what they are thinking!”).
• Fortune telling (“This is what’s going to happen, I just know it”).
• Thinking with emotions (“I am just telling you how I feel, so that’s the way it is”).
• Focusing on the negative (“Everything blows up in my face. I’m never right.”)
• Thinking with emotions (“Things are always how they seem – good or bad.”)

When ANTs take over, it is like a negative thought invasion. We experience a flood of emotions and cycle through the thinking over and over. The negative thoughts just keep coming.

This invasion often drives negative behavior. Because the ANTs are automatic in nature, they can go unnoticed before it’s too late and an invasion occurs. We can help the negative thought invasion from happening if we adopt certain practices.

How to help negative thoughts

The first thing about helping yourself avoid an ANT invasion is to get good at finding the automatic negative thoughts in the first place. When you become aware of the problem you can more easily address it.

The next step is to not let the negative thoughts carry on without a challenge. Stop assuming they are true, and start using discernment. How this works can look different for each individual. Some individuals will be able to navigate the challenge of negative thoughts by themselves. The use of humor, reasoning, or other means will enable them to move past the negative emotions with simple effort.

On the other hand, the individual who has invasions of negative thoughts that have gone unchallenged for years may need help in challenging the negative thoughts and figuring out what is trustworthy and what isn’t. This help can come in the form of a trusted individual, a pastor, or even a therapist. An outside perspective can help you get in touch with present reality and wade through the negative thoughts.

Negative emotions

Negative emotions are slightly different than ANTs, though they naturally come together in most instances. The first thing to know is that we are primed to trust them because emotions help keep us alive and functioning. Negative emotions are often not based on reality and lead to dysfunctional behavior when followed.

Not all negative emotions are untrustworthy, however. Emotions act as alarms, telling us that something is going on. Emotions are an important part of our lives, helping us navigate this world and connect with others. However, emotions cannot always differentiate between what is real or not. Emotions can react in the same way to both a real threat and a perceived threat when no actual threat is there.

Think of it as seeing a shadow through the window. Your fear may prick up and your emotions may alert you to something scary outside. Your thinking may take the alarm and trust it is scary, assuming it has to be a criminal. In all actuality, it is simply a balloon stuck in the tree.

Again, negative emotions are important, but they have no reasoning capabilities to navigate beyond reacting. They cannot develop a complex response, but are instinctual, without logic or reasoning capabilities. They can, however, be trained.

A warning from a mother about the fire can create a healthy fear that keeps the child from getting too close. Training our emotions can happen without really trying. One disappointing experience with a spouse can lead to a feeling of disappointment even if nothing similar happens again.

These are unhealthy emotions, based on faulty thinking and unhelpful assumptions. They still serve the same purpose, to keep us safe from pain, but they do so even when the danger is not really there.

How to help negative emotions

When negative emotions are completely overwhelming, it is important to focus your attention on the simple necessities in life. These include breathing, drinking water, eating food (something simple), movement, and resting. When we focus on the simple it allows for the negative emotions to settle more easily.

Another thing to consider when facing strong negative emotions is waiting. Give time for your emotions to cool off before making decisions. When dealing with anger specifically, the Bible tells us to work it out with Him, instead of reacting toward someone without hesitation (Psalm 44-5 and Ephesians 4:26-27).

For both negative thoughts and negative emotions

As said before, often there’s a mixture of negative thoughts and emotions that can overcome us. In times of facing both of them, it is best to consider a three-pronged approach:

• Connect with wise counsel, therapist, pastor, elder, etc.
• Put it to the test of Scripture.
• Pray (the most powerful tool we have)

Navigating negative thoughts and emotions is a task we all face. You can overcome negative cycles of both by taking steps to change the response. This doesn’t erase the negative thoughts and emotions. Instead, it trains them to be in their place for their best uses.

Simplified and positive uses of emotions:

• Anger is meant to help us respond to right and wrong, good and evil, and help us to stand in righteous ways apart from sin.
• Sadness is meant to help us respond to good and evil, bringing us to long for God, and helping us to turn away from our sin.
• Fear is meant to drive us and keep us from evil and wrong to good and right. Fear brings us to seek God and walk in His ways.
• Happiness/joy is meant to bring us close to God as we know His goodness.

Emotions can be a positive thing, but when they are misused or inordinate, they require support to calm down. Taking these simple mechanisms of care and intention can make a big difference for most people. Connecting with others who can remain calm and help you engage in healthy coping is an important tool to use at any point of being overwhelmed or negative thoughts and emotions.

If you need any help in facing ANTs, the overwhelming force of negative emotions, or both, reach out to us at orangecountychristiancounseling.com today.