For those who can't stop thinking...

Do you ever get trapped in negative day dreams? Like situations/events that play out in your mind & it seems they go on forever...

When I was able to see a counselor a trick he suggested was giving myself a short time frame (5 or 10 min?) to indulge the thoughts & at the end of that to force myself to think of something else. The reason I post this is because I was told that I 'Romanticize' my thoughts. And it really can be a serious problem because the longer you thing about/indulge in thoughts like that it becomes really hard to stop your brain. I still DO it... but thoughts that might seriously upset me I definitely use the trick & it helps divert my attention. As a method of re attaining control.

Now if only I could become motivated & social

Hope it helps someone.

Thanks for the advice. I have that problem too.

that's really good advice, thanks ..it is pretty difficult to apply, but it's just one of those many little things we should try to do to make things a little easier, eh? welcome to SPW, by the way

I romanticise my negative thoughts too, it's like emotional masochism or something, and once I start I don't feel like stopping until I'm at my wit's end. On occasion I've brooded over everything and nothing until I became physically strained. Emotions are physical sensations so meditating or going for a walk helps clear the ephemeral yet perpetually pressed "noise trying to resolve itself", thus diffusing thoughts more objectively. The weird thing is I'd rather distract myself when I'm not as upset... For me the best time to get trapped in negative dreams is before going to sleep (unless you're insomniac, which I used to be, but I just couldn't cope with the tiredness anymore). It's a peaceful suicide of your illusory troubles.

Reading this made me realize that I do that little trick without realizing it. I'll give myself a moment of time to think about the stuff that I obsess over and then switch it to hockey or something that I can replace it with, something healthier to think about. I hope it's not possible to do that *too* much, because I've noticed I do that with hockey a lot. I start getting horribly negative ad I switch it over, so I'm sure I spend an unhealthy amount of time thinking about hockey, yet, that has to be better than the self-defeating thoughts, right? :S

I think I might be a bit like this, I spend a lot of time day dreaming about how I wish I was. Now it seems be be confined to when Im listening to my ipod or before I go to sleep.

PunkRotten said:

Yeah you can do this with worry too. You can create a time in whcih you worry or think about things. Its like when the thughts come in you postpone it until that time you are allowed to think about it.

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I find writing a list of things that are worrying me or things that I have to do which are playing on my mind is really helpful. It helps me work out how and when im going to deal with them.