CBT and Anxiety

 Change your Thought Patterns and Get Better

Question: “Why is my mind moving backwards instead of moving forwards?”

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Matthew's response:

I would like to begin by providing an endorsement for combining CBT and anxiety is a good strategy.  

Here's why... 

Often after a person has his/her first panic attack he/she thinks about the next one and really begins to worry about it. Unfortunately it is as if a switch gets triggered in the brain and a flow of anxious thoughts are opened up.

Each time one feels anxious it’s - as if things are getting worse and worse. Now I’m not suggesting that they really are getting worse, but I am suggesting that that is how it feels to the anxiety and panic attack sufferer.

Not that I am one who believes in dwelling on the negative aspects of something but I in no way want to brush over this point.

After the first panic attack or two, our brains, in a sense, go the “dark side”; we start to fear the next attack and overall see many things in a much more negative light than we did prior to the onset of our first panic attack.

It’s important to recognize that this “dark side” thinking occurs for most if not all panic attack sufferers on one level or another. The problem is that while our mind is a wonderful and creative instrument, this wonderful and creative instrument unfortunately is capable of having a positive or negative influence on us.   

When I say “negative influence” I’m referring to negative patterns of thought concerning the state of affairs and the impending feeling of worry that keeps sneaking into everyday tasks which makes us more and more anxious.

One of the things I can really recall about after first being stricken with panic attacks is the thought that things were getting worse the more often I became anxious.

The thought in my head would go something like this: “Well if I thought the last panic attack was bad, this one is much worse. It’s getting worse.”

I, like many people suffering from anxiety felt I was losing my mind.  While it was not the case that I was losing my mind, it was the case that I felt more anxious.

However, there is a way for you to move from the “dark side” to the “bright side” because the mind will move in the direction of our focus: using cognitive behavioral therapy for panic attacks.

Now, unfortunately, it’s not as easy as simply flicking a switch like it seemed to be after the onset of the first or second panic attack. It does take time.  This is where cognitive behavioral therapy comes in.

That’s why we need to consistently work on our underlying thoughts as I do with the examples throughout my newsletter (see below to get started for free).

So now: Let’s try to go back to the above question and analyze it for underlying cognitive distortions and then look at some alternative and more realistic thoughts. In order to do this, even if this is not our current question or thought, let’s pretend it is for the moment.

The question was:

“Why is my mind moving backwards instead of moving forward?”

The first step to analyzing thoughts is actually recognizing the underlying thoughts causing our emotions - although they may not be obvious - so we need to become a detective (in a sense) and, like any technique, over time we can improve with practice.

The thought causing the above referenced distress is likely the belief that things are actually getting worse rather than better. So now we have a starting point.

When we analyze what evidence exists for the above thought (that things are actually getting worse rather than better) we will likely state that we feel more and more anxious each time we have an attack.

Now looking at the list of cognitive distortions (for reference purpose this link opens in a seperate window) see if you can pick out the distortions present.

Present is emotional reasoning because what is happening is that we are reasoning the ways things are on the basis of our feeling – our emotions. However our emotions can trick us about reality. Sometimes there is no basis in reality to support our anxious thoughts other than the fact that we feel anxious.

I really liked one of the things that Anne Dranitsaris, Ph.D. states, that is very relevant here:

"Most people are in the habit of getting upset because of automatic thoughts. Recognizing the automatic thoughts are creating emotions and observing what we are doing in our mind helps us to change our reactions and create less drama in our lives. When emotional reasoning rules, feelings are mistaken for facts. Emotional reasoning makes stress worse, depression deeper, anxiety higher, and anger hotter."¹

So we need to look at a more realistic thought.

For starters, we could tell ourselves that just because we feel more and more anxious it does not mean that we are in fact worse or that our mind is really moving backwards instead of forwards. It just means that we are feeling anxious.

The great news is that we are learning to do cognitive behavioral therapy can make one feel better. We begin to carry out positive thought patterns that can make us feel better.

Even better, there is actually evidence from advanced brain imaging technology that by changing our thoughts, such as we are doing through CBT, we are improving our brain function.

Moreover you don’t even need to fully believe your alternative thoughts at first. The process of continuing to generate alternative thoughts will help us over time.  But the first step is to go through the motions.

I’m sure you’ve had the experience many times where you’re in a really bad mood and someone tries joking around with you. You feel so stuck in the current emotional state that you’re not having it. You resist being in a better mood. Well this is what happens on an unconscious level with anxiety. You resist any thoughts that challenge your current emotional state.

But, like the example of someone trying to joke with you when you’re in a bad mood, if you let yourself enjoy the humour, you actually start to laugh and feel better.

You see it’s not really possible to be in a bad mood and a good mood at the same time. Just like it’s not possible to be in the “dark side” and “bright side” at the same time.

In summary, by using cognitive behavioral therapy on a consistent basis, you’ll continue to work on thought patterns that help your anxiety and panic attacks.  To get started now, just enter your email below.