HOW TO STOP INTRUSIVE THOUGHTS

Intrusive thoughts are the inconsequential, random thoughts that pop into our minds, seemingly from nowhere, unbidden, and unwelcome. Once there, they are hard to shift, and can often occupy a large proportion of our waking hours.

Intrusive thoughts can be symptoms of mental illness

They may be a symptom of depression, of anxiety, or obsessive-compulsive disorder. They can be a symptom of a serious mental illness when these intrusive thoughts become threatening or aggressive and when they appear to be a voice from outside.

But for those of us without an underlying mental health condition, intrusive negative thoughts are very common and most of us experience them. They can easily ruin a “moment” and destroy our experience of a happy occasion in the present. Most importantly, they trap us in our past, and cause us to endlessly ruminate on memories that cause us pain, or embarrassment, or humiliate us, memories that we long to forget. We relive, on an endless loop, our most awful memories, our deepest shame.

How to stop having intrusive thoughts

So how do we stop having intrusive thoughts and leave these memories behind, in the past where they belong?

Can solution-focused therapy liberate us from these thoughts?

We need to start by understanding that we cannot change any past event, that there is nothing we can do.

But we can change what we think about the past. It is not by reimagining the past and creating false memories but by prioritising the memories we choose to recall. We can learn to control our thoughts.

Power of photos in determining what we choose to remember

I will try to explain this with an example. It is the end of the summer holidays. Many people have holiday photos in their phone, often a meal in the sunshine, big smiles, sunburnt shoulders, raised glasses.

Or a beach scene with sandy children or a beautiful sunset.

These images may be posted on Instagram, snapshots in time of happy occasions.

By next year these images will be the only memories of the holiday, not the queue at the airport, the lost passport, or the quarrel on the way to the beach. Our memory, prompted by our photos, can be highly selective when we choose.

We do not mind this. We deliberately choose to remember many aspects of lives in a positive way.

Negative "rumination" out of proportion

Many people cannot do this for other aspects of their lives.

Negative events can be remembered out of all proportion to positive. We selectively remember embarrassment, humiliation, trauma, disappointment, regrets, grievances and negative emotions of all kinds.

These memories, when they intrude, overwhelm the positive memories we could have in their place. We endlessly go over these feelings on a never-ending loop.

We choose to have negative thoughts!

Yes, it is our choice! We can learn to keep out intrusive negative thoughts and only allow positive and happy memories to intrude.

How?

When we get a negative intrusion, often they are very familiar thoughts.

The simple steps to resisting intrusive negative thoughts

The first step is to identify intrusive thoughts that have arrived from nowhere and are unwelcome.

Then we ask ourselves the questions -

• Is this useful?

• Are these thoughts prompting us to do something positive?

• What is their effect on us?

• Are these thoughts causing us distress?

If it isn’t useful, and it is doing us no good, then we need to think about something else!

Admittedly, very much easier said than done!

It requires a lot of practice especially to get rid of ruminating thoughts that follow a well-trodden mental path that we have had over a long period of time.

We need to identify the following:-

1. Is there a specific trigger for these thoughts?

2. If so, can this trigger be avoided or mitigated in some way? Is there some positive action that we can take to remove this trigger?

3. Is this thought about a particular moment in time, a memory? Is this thought representative of the overall experience of that time? Or is remembering it, as opposed to other memories, out of all proportion? Has it been allowed to represent the whole experience, ignoring all other memories?

4. So we need to think about that time and identify what was good and made us happy, or proud or content in that same experience, trying to recall as much detail as possible. When, how and where did we feel most at ease, most safe, at our happiest? When did we experience the most fulfilment or contentment?

5. We practice travelling to this imagined safe and happy space, recalling as much detail as possible in this memory.

6. We need to take our time with this. Practice when we are calm, where there is no risk of being disturbed and we are fully relaxed. Each time we visit this memory we will be pleased to notice that we will recall more and more.

7. With practice, when the negative thoughts intrude we can now reject them and move in our minds to the place where we feel safe.

8. Remember, everything is in our minds. We are in control of our thoughts.

Solution-focused hypnotherapy can help you control negative thoughts and forecasting, if you are finding it difficult to banish negativity from your life.

Contact us at the London Road Clinic in Milborne Port info@56LondonRoad.co.uk

or send a message to info@sansomehilltherapy.com