Humans tend to focus on negative thoughts, leading us to be unhappy. Find out what the negative voices inside you are and how to stop them.

The Negative Thoughts Inside You + 4 Ways to Stop Them

One of the traits that set human beings apart from others is our exceptional capacity to think, feel, and decide. We are able to separate our fundamental values from our thoughts and our feelings. We have the potential to think positive thoughts, and to think negative thoughts.

However, we have a natural disposition to lean towards the negative of things, ultimately causing us to be unhappy and troubled. This is normal, and actually also played a part in our survival as a species. By immediately assuming the worst, our ancestors were able to avoid potentially disastrous situations.

These days, however, an excess of negative thoughts only hampers our growth and ties us down. So how do we stop them?

The 6 Types of Negative Thoughts

Before we can work on managing these negative thoughts, we must learn to know what they are saying, requiring us to be conscious of unpleasant feelings. Here are a few instances of negative thoughts that ought to be noted, and what they say:

Catastrophizing

“If I don’t get this task done, I’ll be fired from the job and I will never get any other one.”

This pattern of negative thinking is one that always assumes that situations will always spiral down into the worst possible outcome there is without ever considering the more likely and realistic possibilities. Being prepared is always good, but not to the point that it is irrational and ends up paralyzing us.

Personalization and self-blaming

“That was all my fault.”

This line of thinking involves taking things personally. This is normally a good thing when we own up to our own mistakes. However, self-blaming makes us blame ourselves for things that are outside of our control.

“Should” statements

“I should be doing better at life.”

“Should” statements contribute to a negative perspective with less confidence by enforcing the idea of what we “ought” to be, which is often unrealistic expectations we set upon ourselves. This contributes to feeling defeated and just overall pessimistic about ourselves.

Jumping to conclusions

“You really are the type of person who wants to hurt others.”

This thought pattern is characterized by making negative assessments of situations, and also includes assuming what others are thinking and feeling.

Overgeneralizing

“I tried this once and failed, so I will always fail to accomplish this task.”

This pattern is characterized by the tendency to apply what happened in past experiences to all future situations. This line of thinking can make any situation undesirable because it would seem like negative experiences are inevitable due to just one negative experience, and this contributes to feelings of anxiety.

Emotional reasoning

“I’m feeling nervous about this. Let’s not do this.”

This thought process involves believing that something is true based on how we feel about it. As an example, feeling nervous about a situation can make you believe that you really are in danger, which ultimately escalates negative feelings and increases anxiety.

These negative thoughts are present in each of us one way or another, and it is normal for this to be the case. However, there are times when they are overpowering and will end up crippling us.

Fortunately, it is possible to fight against these negative thoughts. Now that you've learned how to identify them, you can now work towards stopping them.

4 ways you can put a stop to the negativity

Changing how your mind works is not an easy task, and trying to move from a negative mindset to a positive mindset is arduous. It is, however, possible. We recommend taking it slow and moving from a negative mindset to a neutral mindset first, then eventually moving to a positive one.

Here are some steps you can follow to stop the negative thoughts:

Set limits to the external negativity

One of the ways you can move away from a negative mindset is to put boundaries on those internal and external influences that could have an effect on the way you think, behave, and act.

Three significant areas on which limitations must be set to achieve your maximum potential are:

     1. Negative environment: Avoid staying in a depressing environment for long periods of time. Don’t lock yourself up in a messy dark room. Instead, try to clean up, open the windows and shades, or turn on the lights.

     2. Negative people around you: Set a limit to the negative people in your surroundings so that they wouldn't be able to distract you from achieving your goals and make you miss your target.

     3. Negative events of the past: Set limits to the negative events that happened in your past to avoid destroying your efforts in the present.

Practice mindfulness and self-awareness

Mindfulness is an evidence-based practice that is rooted from meditation and is proven to help with focus and concentration. It is the act of detaching oneself from your thoughts and emotions and viewing them as a 3rd party observer, which in turn helps us become more conscious of our thoughts and build greater self-awareness.

 Mindfulness can help change our relationship with our thoughts by becoming more aware of them. There is no need to forcibly stop them, but to just be aware and know that while your thoughts are negative, you yourself are not necessarily so.

Avoid thought stopping

Opposite of mindfulness, thought stopping involves being on the constant lookout for negative thoughts then insisting that they be eliminated.

While it seems to be a good thing, the problem is that thought rebounding can happen where the negative thoughts will try to surface more as we spend more effort trying to stop them from surfacing. Thought rebounding is actually much more damaging.

Replace negative thoughts

This process helps people identify and change negative thoughts into more positive and helpful responses.

One of the recommended ways to do this is to examine the situation for evidence that may either support or deny the thought. This helps us challenge negative thinking and explore more helpful and realistic alternatives.

This may require a bit of effort at first, but over time and with constant practice, positive and rational thoughts will come more naturally. Here are some of the ways you can try replacing negative thoughts:

     1. Ask yourself whether the thought is realistic or not

     2. Compare the current situation with a past experience and evaluate whether or not your thoughts align with what previously happened.

     3. Actively challenge the thought and look for alternative explanations

     4. Recognize if the thought is a result of a negative voice like self-blaming and overgeneralizing

    5. Consider what you would tell to a friend having the same thought

However, we must be careful to not be overly positive, as unrealistic positivity is not helpful and can even be harmful.

Overcoming the negative thoughts is not an easy thing to do, however, the first step of the journey to positivity is actually trying to be neutral first. This way, it’s easier to avoid the pitfall of toxic positivity that many deal with. Once you are in a neutral place, it makes it easier to move on to a more positive place.

It is important to know when your struggle is too great and it’s already having major impacts in your life. In these cases, it’s time to consider asking for help from others or from a professional. No matter what anyone says, this is not in any way a sign of weakness.

Changing your thoughts from a negative to neutral, and then from neutral to positive, is not going to happen in a short period of time. It certainly isn’t going to be a breeze, either. It will take time and practice, and it gets easier along the way.