SPRING CLEAN
YOUR
NEGATIVE THINKING
Spring is the time of year for early blossoms
and green buds. We plant tulips in the
wintertime and wait for spring to see their
colorful petals decorating our garden. It takes
time for the growth to happen, but if you
appreciate their beauty, it is well worth the
wait.
Now imagine that your mind is that tulip bulb.
It needs to be in supportive, nutrient rich soil
to absorb the necessities needed for its
development.
on this scale, you are unlikely to prioritize this
change. If you score in between 4 and 6 on the
scale, ask yourself what it would take to
increase your score. Your goal is to consider
this change important enough, as reflected by a
score of at least a 7, that you will feel
energized.
Motion. If you have reached this final step, you
have decided that changing your thinking is a
worthwhile exercise and you are willing to
invest time and effort into it. To really capture
the pattern that you are stuck in, get into the
If you are finding yourself stuck in a pattern of habit of using a thought log. You can find
negative thinking, the kind that leads you to be templates online or make your own. Jot down
judgmental, self-critical, thinking in extremes,
what happened, what your interpretation of the
or predicting the future, you need some spring event was, how it made your feel, and what you
cleaning.
did as a consequence. This simple pattern will
show you the correlation between your
The soil in which your mind can get enriched is thinking or interpretation and your feeling. You
your mindset. You don't have to stay stuck. You can easily see if your thinking is unhelpful if it
just need three important ingredients to make leads to feelings of sadness, anxiety, anger,
your mindset nutrient rich:
disappointment, guilt, or frustration. In those
cases, ask yourself: what is a more balanced
Mindfulness. You need to be mindful of your
way to look at this situation? Once you come
thinking pattern. So often, we are on autopilot up with some alternatives, ask yourself for each
in the way that we think about events around
one how these thoughts make you feel. You
us. We don't give our thinking a second
will know when a thought is helpful by how
thought. The act of mindfulness is actually an
you feel when you think it.
exercise of metacognition, or thinking about
your thinking. Be on the lookout for your
Follow the three steps above and be patient
unhelpful thinking pattern and you will be on
with the process. It takes 30 days to break a
your way to change.
habit. Tulips don't grow in a day and mindsets
don't change overnight. Get started now and
Motivation. Now that you are aware of your
your mind will blossom before you know it.
pattern, you need to actually want a change
badly enough to put in the effort. Ask yourself, Written by Dr. Sharon Grossman, Psychologist
how important is this change to me on a scale
and Life Coach helping people live the lifestyle
of 1 to 10 (1 = not at all important; 10 =
they desire by reverse engineering their
extremely important). If you score 3 or lower
thinking.