Body Image Challenge, Day 8

THE CHALLENGE:

SELF TALK

Pay attention to your thoughts today. Ask yourself, how do my thoughts make me feel?

Is what I'm thinking really TRUE? Practice challenging your negative thoughts and replacing them with more positive ones.

Our thoughts determine how we feel and act. If we talked to others the way we talk to ourselves we would be ashamed. The beauty of being human is that we can control our thoughts. Start by recognizing your thoughts, challenging them and then replacing them.

Journal: What was your experience today? Write for at least 10 minutes.

Distorted Thinking/Irrational Beliefs

1. All-or-Nothing thinking: You look at things in absolute, black and white categories.

2. Overgeneralization: You view a negative event as a never-ending pattern or defeat.

3. Mental filter: You dwell on the negatives and ignore the positives

4. Discounting the positives: You insist that your accomplishments or positive qualities don't count

5. Jumping to conclusions: You conclude things are bad without any definite evidence. By either A) mind reading, you assume people are reacting negatively to you. or B) Fortune-telling; you predict that things will turn out badly.

6. Magnification or minimization: You blow things way out of proportion or you shrink their importance

7. Emotional Reasoning: You reason from how you feel: "I feel like an idiot so I must be one"

8 "Should" statements: Having an idea of how things "should" be and deeming yourself a failure or feeling out of control when things turn out differently, Inflexible.

9. Labeling: Instead of saying, "I made a mistake, you tell yourself "I'm a jerk or a loser"

10. Blame: You blame yourself for something you weren't entirely responsible for, or you blame other people and overlook ways that you contributed to a problem.

Oh manny I am so guilty of some of these. Changing our thoughts is hard, but the power of our thoughts is amazing! Being aware of what kind of unhelpful thinking we struggle with is the first step. Try making a list of positive affirmations that combat the negative thoughts you find yourself having often.
For example: (and I have no idea where these thoughts came from, its not like i've ever had them before :)

Thought: That person could do a much better job at this than me
Combat: I have my own strengths and I have a lot to give to others I will not keep my talents and abilities hidden

Thought: That person thinks badly of me
Combat: You are not a mind reader, there is no evidence that they think that and you have done nothing to make them think that.

Thought: I am not doing good enough
Combat: You have done a lot of good! Look at all the positives and all the progress you have made

Thought: Today was a horrible day
Combat: It wasn't ALL bad, there were good moments too, choose to focus on those

You get the picture.