8 Cognitive Distortions (and 6 Ways to Retrain Your Brain)
Before I go to sleep, I write down what made me smile, what filled my cup, and the skills I used to handle a difficult situation. I also leave space for any problem I'm looking to resolve.
I don't write down what I did wrong, or what I need to prove to others. This list is how I express gratitude, by identifying my strengths, my abilities, and the resources I need to pull toward myself so I can grow.
I am always eager to learn and grow, but long gone are the days of talking to myself in a way that feels defeated and less than. I will not spend my energy criticizing myself, because that doesn't motivate or inspire me. Criticism just creates distance from problem-solving.
Even with this practice, old patterns of thinking can still creep in quietly, shaping how I see myself without my noticing. These patterns often show up as familiar thought traps, worth naming so I can catch them before they take hold. Here are eight I've learned to recognize:
1. Should Statements Holding yourself to rigid rules about what you "should" or "must" do. This mindset breeds guilt and anxiety, and makes it feel like you're constantly falling short of an invisible standard.
2. All-or-Nothing Thinking Seeing situations in extremes, either a total success or a complete failure, with no middle ground. Missing one question on a test becomes proof that you "did poorly," even if you got everything else right.
3. Jumping to Conclusions Assuming you know what someone thinks or how a situation will turn out, without any real evidence. A coworker's blank expression becomes "she must be upset with me," even though nothing confirms that.
4. Catastrophizing Blowing a setback out of proportion until it feels like the worst-case scenario. One low grade turns into "I'm going to fail out of school entirely."
5. Emotional Reasoning Treating your feelings as facts. If you feel guilty, you assume you must have done something wrong, even without evidence that you did.
6. Overgeneralizing Taking one negative experience and deciding it defines everything going forward. One hard test becomes "this whole semester is going to be a disaster."
7. Discounting the Positive Brushing off your own accomplishments instead of owning them, chalking success up to luck or circumstance rather than your effort or skill.
8. Labeling Reducing yourself to a single word based on one action or mistake, like calling yourself "a failure" instead of recognizing a moment of struggle as separate from who you are.
Naming these patterns is powerful, but naming alone doesn't loosen their grip. The real work happens in what you do the moment you catch one running the show. That's where these next few practices come in, small, repeatable ways to interrupt the pattern before it takes hold.
How to Retrain Your Brain From Negative Thinking
1. Identify Your Triggers Certain people, places, or moments tend to set off the same spiral every time: a big presentation, a specific conversation, a person you clash with. The more clearly you can name what sets you off, the more prepared you are to handle it differently next time.
Adjust your surroundings when you can. If a setting consistently stirs up stress, change what's in your control: step outside for a minute, shift the lighting, put on something that settles your nervous system.
Catch the rise before it takes over. The moment you feel that familiar tightness or spike in emotion, pause and breathe before responding. It's far easier to redirect a thought early than to untangle it once it's spiraled.
2. Practice Mindful Awareness Awareness comes before change. When you slow down enough to notice a thought as it arises, rather than getting swept into it, you start to see your own patterns clearly, and you can separate "this is a thought passing through" from "this is the truth."
Spend a few quiet minutes with your breath. Morning or night, let thoughts surface and pass without chasing them or arguing back.
Check in mid-day. Pause between tasks and ask what's actually going on in your mind right now. Is an old story replaying? Is worry creeping in uninvited?
This is the essence of mindfulness: observing your inner world without immediately reacting to it.
3. Challenge Negative Thoughts (Cognitive Reframing) A negative thought only has power if you accept it as fact. Left alone, "this is going to fail" can quietly grow into a whole belief system. Once you notice it, though, you can respond instead of absorbing it.
Question it directly. Ask yourself: Does the evidence actually support this thought, or am I assuming the worst? What would I say to a friend having this exact thought?
Name the pattern. Psychiatrist Dr. Daniel Siegel calls this "name it to tame it." When you can identify what's happening, "this is catastrophizing," "this is a should statement," the thought loses some of its weight. It becomes something you're observing, not something you are.
4. Create a Personal Mantra Old self-talk often sounds like criticism or self-doubt dressed up as caution. A short phrase, repeated often enough, can start to replace that inner voice with something steadier.
A few to borrow or make your own: "I can handle what comes." "I'm doing enough." "This moment doesn't define me." "I get to choose my next move."
5. Practice Daily Gratitude It's easy to lose sight of how much good is actually present in a day, especially when your mind is busy scanning for what's wrong. But shifting even a little attention toward what's going right can change how you feel: people who build a regular gratitude practice tend to report more optimism and a steadier sense of joy over time.
Write it down somewhere consistent. A journal, a notes app, even the margins of a planner. If you're stuck, ask yourself something specific: What made today easier? Who showed up for me? What did I almost overlook?
Say it out loud to someone. Gratitude tends to grow when it's shared. Tell someone directly what they meant to you, or make it a habit at the dinner table or before bed to name one good thing from the day.
6. Try Vagus Nerve Stimulation (Humming) Sometimes the fastest way to calm a spiraling thought isn't mental, it's physical. Humming gently vibrates the vagus nerve, the same nerve pathway tied to your body's rest-and-recover response, which can help take the edge off stress in real time.
Hum for a minute when you feel wound up. Low, steady, and slow works best. You're not aiming for a tune, just a vibration you can feel in your chest or throat.
Pair it with a long exhale. Hum out as you breathe out, letting the sound trail with your breath. It's a small, private reset you can do anywhere, no one has to know you're doing it.
None of this means the old patterns disappear overnight. They'll still show up sometimes, quiet, familiar, convincing. But now there's a difference: you have a way to notice them, name them, and choose something else. That's not about being perfect. It's about building a relationship with yourself that doesn't depend on getting it right every time, one grounded in curiosity instead of criticism, in practice instead of pressure.
Some nights the list will be long. Some nights it'll just be one line. Either way, it's yours, and it's proof you're paying attention.
This reflects my personal practice and general education on mindfulness and self-awareness. It isn't therapy or a substitute for professional mental health care. If you're struggling, please reach out to a licensed therapist or counselor.
About Me
I've spent the last 15 years training in somatic practices, mindfulness, meditation, and NLP.
I was a special needs teacher for years, and I kept noticing the same thing: parents would come to me overwhelmed, not always about their kid, but about themselves. Their own nervous systems were maxed out, and that stress had nowhere to go but into the room, into their kid, into everything. So I started coaching them, one parent at a time, just trying to help them find a little more calm.
That's really where all of this comes from. Everything I now offer through somatic coaching and mindfulness coaching, I first taught in hallway conversations and parent meetings, long before I had a name for it.
If you're navigating stress, overwhelm, or looking for grounded, body-based tools to feel more like yourself, that's the work I do.
