10) Personalisation

Personalisation is the final one in the list of the 10 most common cognitive distortions (thinking errors). It occurs when you assume excessive responsibility for a negative, even when there is no basis for doing so. For example you may think: "He didn't come to my party, I must be a horrible person."  You arbitrarily conclude that what happened was your fault, or that it reflects your inadequacy. Therefore it makes you feel unnecessarily guilty. You carry the weight for everything that goes wrong - everything is related to some deficiency within yourself. You overlook the fact that others may have played a part, and you blame yourself entirely.

Personalisation causes you to feel extreme guilt. You carry the burden and sense of responsibility that forces you to carry the whole world on your shoulders. You have confused influence with control. Is it really worth feeling this amount of guilt when you don't have to? Why feel this extra burden when you don't need to?

Automatic thoughts: Megan doesn't like me at all. She wouldn't have shouted at me like that if she did.

Possible answers: I am not the only person Megan shouts at. She is always on edge when things are not going well for her, and she shouts at whoever is around. I've seen her do it. She will get over it, and will probably apologise.

Picture source: http://magicreminders.blogspot.com/2010_08_01_archive.html

9) Global Judgements (Labelling and Mislabelling)

This cognitive distortion is when you assume that the value of a person can be equated with a single action; reacting to the label rather than the event.

Personal labelling is an extreme form of over-generalization. It means that you create a completely negative self-image based on your errors. The attitude behind it is "The measure of a man is the mistakes he makes." When you describe your mistakes using sentences that begin with "I'm a..." there is a good chance that you are personal labelling. For example, when you lose a game of tennis, you might say, "I'm a born loser" instead of, "I messed up on that game." Likewise, when you don't get the grade you expected in an exam, you might think, "I'm a failure" instead of, "I made a mistake."

Your self cannot be equated with any one thing you do; your life is a complex, ever-changing flow of thoughts, emotions, and actions. Would you ever describe yourself as an "eater" just because you eat, or a "breather" because you breathe? This is nonsense, so not only is personal labelling self-defeating, it is irrational too.   

When you label other people, you will inevitably create hostility. If you label someone in your class as the "uncooperative idiot", you will resent them and jump at every chance to criticize them. In turn, they may label you, and complain at every opportunity, fuelling this vicious cycle. 

Mislabelling involves describing an event with language that is inaccurate and emotionally heavily loaded. For example, a girl on a diet ate a dish of ice-cream. She thought to herself, "How repulsive of me, I'm a fat pig." This made her feel so bad, that she went on to eat a lot more of the ice-cream.  

Automatic thought: I'm such a failure

Possible answers: I am not a failure, I have done many things right, but I have made one mistake. I can learn from this mistake so that I won't make it again. 

Picture source: http://yaelweinberg.com/517188/Contact

Ideas taken from David D. Burns' book "Feeling Good, The New Mood Therapy"

8) Should Statements (ought, must, always, never)

This is when you use self-commands and duty as prime motivators, saying, "I should do this" or "I must do that".  These statements cause you to feel pressured and paradoxically you end up feeling uninterested and unmotivated. Albert Ellis (an American psychologist) calls this "musturbation", and David D. Burns calls it the "shouldy" approach to life.

When should statements are targeted at yourself, they normally lead to guilt and frustration, on the other hand, when they are targeted at others, they often lead to frustration and anger - "she shouldn't be so argumentative".

The most frequent result of shoulding ourselves is procrastination (putting something off). Whenever I think about doing school work I find "should" thoughts rushing in, making me feel guilty and depressed, I will tend to mentally "change the subject" and redirect my attention to something that isn't so unpleasant. The more you "should" yourself about studying, the harder it becomes to actually spend any time studying. You never feel like it.

Should statements cause a lot of unnecessary emotional disorder in your life. Obviously we do have some obligations, but are you standards and expectations realistic? If you can think of sensible reasons why you should be doing something, or if you are able to weigh the costs and benefits, then this is not an automatic thought, it is a logical conclusion. However, if you make should statements without any thinking behind them, then these are automatic thoughts and they can have negative impacts as outlined above.

Automatic thoughts: That TV programme about old people was very upsetting. Life is so cruel. It shouldn't be like this.

Possible answers: Things are as they are, and to want them to be different is unrealistic. Getting depressed about it is not going to change the situation. Why not see if there is something I can do to help, for example, visiting someone in the old people's home down the road.

Picture source: http://zerotolerancetonegativethinking.com/Should%20statements.htm

7) Emotional Reasoning

Emotional reasoning is using your feelings as a basis for your judgements and ignoring other factors. You take your emotions as evidence for the truth. For example: I feel so depressed, this must be the worst school to go to. This kind of reasoning is misleading as your feelings are determined by your thoughts and beliefs. If they are distorted (which is often the case) then your emotions will not be valid.

I understand that things feel so negative to you so you assume that they truly are, but have you ever thought about challenging the validity of these perceptions that create your feelings? Although you may feel that you will never be able to overcome your emotional reasoning habits, at least by reading this you have become aware of it and now you might start to ask yourself if your feelings are valid.

Automatic thought: If I feel it, it must be true

Possible answers: What are the reasons behind my feelings? Are they valid? Have I challenged them? Am I ignoring other factors?

Picture Source: http://yaelweinberg.com/517188/Contact

Rainbow Cake! Something to cheer you up!

Just thought I would take little break from the "cognitive distortions" posts, to tell you about something special I made last weekend.

The past week had been pretty bad for me and seeing as I was doing absolutely nothing on the weekend I decided that I needed a bit of cheering up! So I set upon the mammoth task of creating a rainbow cake! I baked six layers of sponge cake and coloured them all different colours, making them as bight as possible. Then I stacked them one on top of the other in the order of a rainbow with butter cream icing sandwiched between them. On the top I made the butter cream icing multi-coloured, and hey-presto, I had a rainbow cake!! It did take me around 3 hours, but the end result was so worth it!

Doing something positive with my time took all the bad things off my mind. So next time you are feeling a bit down, I challenge you to make a rainbow cake! It certainly cheered me up, and here are some pictures for you to enjoy :)

Rainbow Cake!