Be an ANTeater!

I’ve been listening to the Feel Better Fast and Change Your Brain, Change Your Life audio CDs by Dr. Daniel G. Amen. He offers some very common-sensical “prescriptions” for various brain conditions such as Alzheimer’s, depression, and ADD. The advice I particularly like, which anyone can easily put into practice, regards ANTs: Automatic Negative Thoughts. Negative self-thoughts themselves aren’t an original idea—if you’ve ever read up on cognitive behavior or been to CB therapy, you’ve probably heard these before. But I like the way they’re all packaged up into these pesky critters, metaphorically called “ANTs.”

Dr. Amen recommends that we become ANTeaters and kill the ANTs that destroy our good mental health. Here they are:

1. “Always” or “never” thinking – thinking in absolutes: No one will ever date me again.
2. Focusing on the negative – you only see the bad in a situation: Two people gave me negative feedback (but 25 gave me positive feedback).
3. Fortune telling – predicting the worst, even though you have no evidence: They’re going to think I’m fat and stupid.
4. Mind reading – you arbitrarily believe you know what someone else is thinking: Oh, my boss is in a bad mood (but really, she’s just constipated).
5. Thinking with your feelings – you believe your negative thoughts/feelings without questioning them: I feel like a failure.
6. Guilt beatings – I should… I ought to… I have to…: If I have to read a book, it’s boring, but if I want to, I enjoy it.
7. Labeling – attaching a negative label to yourself or someone else: Jerk… frigid… arrogant… irresponsible… You’re lumping them into a big group and then you can’t deal with them.
8. Personalization – innocuous events are taken to have personal meaning: My friend didn’t talk to me this morning, so she must be mad at me.
9. Blame – blaming someone else for your problems. You blame your partner for the situation so you become powerless (the victim) and can’t participate in fixing it.

How to be an ANTeater: when you’re feeling sad or mad, write out your feelings. Which ones are distorted? You don’t have to believe every thought you have—talk back to them! Someone will date me again! And he is going to see all the great things about me! Because I’m fabulous! And only I am responsible for my own thoughts.

I have a cheap fortune-telling pen at work, and one of the messages on it is “no one can make you feel anything.” It’s so true.