Cognitive Restructuring Part 1

Learn how to restructure your thoughts. Let's rework those thoughts that are unhelpful to your life! Learn how the process to change your thought patterns to improve your mood, perspective, relationships, self-image and MORE!

Transcript

Welcome to a course on cognitive restructuring.

This concept or process has many different terms,

But we'll use the term cognitive restructuring.

My name is Sarah Nielsen.

I am an LPC,

Which is a licensed practicing counselor.

I am licensed in the state of Missouri,

Kansas,

And Alabama,

And I reside in Alabama.

I have been a therapist for about 17 years.

I also specialize in eating disorders as well as intuitive eating.

I will be coming out with courses on intuitive eating as well.

If you're interested in a more in-depth course,

You are welcome to contact me.

So that's a little bit about me and kind of my clinical work experience.

I'm a primarily CBT therapist,

Which is cognitive behavioral therapist.

I also specialize in DBT,

Which is dialectical behavioral therapy.

So many acronyms.

And so I wanted to do a course on cognitive restructuring because I feel that changing our thought patterns are so crucial to our emotional wellness,

Relationships,

Perspective,

How we view ourselves,

So on and so forth.

It can be a exhausting task.

It can feel exhausting,

But it will get better.

I promise you.

What I want you to keep in mind as you're going through this process is remember that these old thought patterns have been there for a long time,

Right?

A long time.

And we're not going to get rid of them overnight,

Right?

It's just like the negative stuff.

Did you believe it the first time you thought it or somebody said it to you?

No.

You came to believe it with repetition.

That is the same idea for positive,

Injecting positive thoughts or helpful thoughts or encouraging thoughts.

You'll hear me use lots of different adjectives for that.

It takes time to inject those into our brain.

Our brain can be stubborn and yet it is malleable,

Hence neuropsychology.

So with that being said,

I want you to think about a few things.

One,

When you start bringing in these new thoughts,

You may not believe them at first and that is okay.

Okay?

That is okay to not believe them.

It's all right.

The other thing is you will notice that the other thoughts,

The undesired thoughts,

Are going to come less often and they are going to be less intense,

Meaning you will not believe them as much.

Those factors will go down as you do this work,

But you must,

You must be diligent and consistent,

Okay?

On average,

The human brain generates anywhere from 60 to 85 thousand thoughts in a day.

I've read that from different sources,

Okay?

And I think it's like 65% is repeated the next day.

So we are up against a challenge,

Right?

But I have a feeling you are up for the challenge.

So I might do this in more than one part,

So bear with me.

So let's begin.

Let's start with that kind of introduction,

So to speak.

Let's get into some other things.

So remember,

Thoughts are habitual,

Okay?

Just as anything.

We are going to begin with talking about the process for restructuring our thoughts,

But I want to take a moment and step back and talk about the cycle as humans,

Okay?

And so our cycle is we have thoughts,

Okay?

Those generate feelings.

Those feelings generate behaviors,

Choices,

Decisions,

Which come to outcomes,

Right?

So in my mind,

What makes the most sense is to go to the beginning of the cycle and to work on our thought patterns.

I will share a bit of personal experience.

As a psychotherapist and yoga teacher,

When I am diligent in working on my thought processes,

My thought patterns,

I notice that I have a better mood,

I have a better perspective,

I'm able to relate and interact with people better,

It just improves my relationships,

My perspectives,

My mood,

So on and so forth.

And so it is a very helpful thing to work on.

It's diligent and it's an ongoing process.

I've had people ask me,

Do I have to do this forever?

Yes,

You do.

But,

But,

Here's the caveat,

Do you have to work this hard at it forever?

Absolutely not.

I spent some time in my younger years working on this very diligently and so now I don't have to work on it as hard.

But again,

Remember,

Our brains are stubborn.

Therefore,

I still catch thoughts that are negative,

Self-depreciating,

Judgy of others,

Maybe of their intent,

What I,

You know,

My assumptions really,

Right?

And so I still have to catch those and that's okay.

We will always have to work on replacing our thoughts,

But we don't have to work as hard on them with time.

So I want to open this up with telling you what your three-step process is and then I will create a part two where we will work on it.

So part one,

You must observe your thoughts.

You cannot change what you don't recognize.

That is a phrase that I use personally.

You cannot change what you don't recognize.

So the first step in this process is we must observe our thoughts,

Right?

We must acknowledge I had this thought,

Oh I'm so stupid,

Whatever the thought may be,

Okay?

Then a second step,

Which is optional,

We want to label the thought.

So the labeling of the thought is,

Oh that was a negative thought or that was a depreciating thought.

Notice I didn't say I'm thinking negatively,

I'm depreciating myself.

I removed the I because I want some distance,

Okay?

I'm almost like I'm literally pushing my hands away as I say this to you all.

I want some distance between those thoughts because I can better manage them if I get some distance.

So you then can label the thought and you can say that was irrational,

That was depreciating,

That was unhelpful,

That was untrue,

Whatever it may be.

And then our third step is we replace the thought.

So I want to talk a minute about thought replacement.

So let's say I have a thought,

I'm so ugly.

Our thought replacement doesn't have to be,

I am so pretty.

It does not have to be opposites.

We often think that they do.

It can be,

I am a person of worth,

Because,

Okay?

I like becauses and we're kind of getting into the realm of affirmations a little bit.

So I'm gonna try to not teeter in there just yet because that will be a different course.

But I just want you all to know that your challenge does not have to be a direct opposite.

So I often default to statements like I am so ugly because they're common thoughts and they're easy to challenge for example sake.

So again,

You can come back and say I am pretty,

I am beautiful.

You can come back and say I really like my hair,

I really like the tone of my skin,

I really like my strength,

I really like whatever.

You can come back and say I am a worthwhile person,

Okay?

I'm thinking that,

You know,

I'm getting crystal clear on this,

Right?

And so this is kind of an overview.

If you would,

Follow me to part two and let's get more in depth with this.

Thank you so much.

Reviews

Thank you! Friendly voice of knowledge and direction!

Thank you! It was clear and to the point. Very useful information for people to apply straitgh away, to take action.