Brief Summary
This podcast episode by Doc Snipes focuses on understanding and combating cognitive distortions, which are inaccurate thought patterns that can lead to unnecessary misery, including feelings of anger, fear, and depression. It identifies ten common cognitive distortions and provides examples of how these distortions manifest in everyday situations, offering practical advice on how to recognize and challenge them to improve mood and quality of life.
- Identifies ten common cognitive distortions.
- Provides examples of how these distortions manifest in everyday situations.
- Offers practical advice on how to recognize and challenge them to improve mood and quality of life.
Intro
Doc Snipes introduces the podcast "Happiness Isn't Brain Surgery," which aims to provide practical tools for improving mood and quality of life. The episode will focus on cognitive distortions, specifically the ten most common ones, and how they can lead to feelings of anger, fear, and depression. These emotions are signals that there might be a problem, but it's important to verify if the perceived threat or loss is real.
Understanding Cognitive Distortions
Cognitive distortions are inaccurate or "out of whack" thought patterns that can significantly affect our perception of reality. Reality is 90% how we perceive what's going on and 10% what actually happened. The first distortion is all-or-nothing thinking, characterized by using extreme words like "always" or "never." To combat this, one should look for exceptions and avoid extreme language. Personalization involves taking things personally, assuming actions or remarks are directed at you. It's important to consider other possible explanations for people's behavior. Magnification and catastrophizing is when you blow things out of proportion and assume the worst-case scenario. It's important to look at the factual evidence for and against your thought. The fallacy of fairness is the belief that everything should be fair, while heaven's reward is the expectation that doing good should always result in good things happening to you. It's important to accept what you did get. Filtering involves disqualifying the positive, focusing only on the negative aspects of situations or oneself. It's important to look at both sides. Overgeneralization is taking one instance and assuming it will apply to everything. Jumping to conclusions or mind-reading involves assuming you know what someone is thinking or what their intent is. Emotional reasoning is when you assume that because you feel a certain way, it must be true. Blaming involves holding others entirely responsible for your feelings or actions without acknowledging your own part. Finally, always being right is the need to be correct and getting angry when others don't agree with your point of view.
Cognitive Restructuring
Doc Snipes provides examples of cognitive distortions in common scenarios. In the first scenario, John becomes enraged because his wife frequently calls his best friend, assuming infidelity. However, she was planning a surprise birthday party. John was jumping to conclusions, using emotional reasoning, and overgeneralizing. In the second scenario, Sally is terrified of giving a presentation, assuming people will judge her harshly. She is jumping to conclusions, using emotional reasoning, personalizing, and magnifying the situation. In the third scenario, Heather is devastated after breaking up with her boyfriend, using filtering, emotional reasoning, all-or-nothing thinking, and personalization. To combat these distortions, it's important to look at the facts, consider other explanations, and avoid making assumptions. A helpful exercise is to write down each cognitive distortion and review it throughout the day to identify when you are using them.
