56: How to Stop a Negative Thought Cycle: The 4 Cs
Everyone has negative thoughts, and sometimes these thoughts can even spiral and create negative thought cycles that we have trouble getting out of. In this episode, I outline my 4 step process (The 4 Cs) to help you stop a negative thought cycle in its tracks.
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Timestamps ⏱️
0:00 Intro
1:37 Step 1 - Catch It
3:30 Step 2 - Cue Breathing
5:08 Step 3 - Curious
6:36 Step 4 - Compassion
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This podcast was transcribed by an AI tool called Otter. Please forgive any typos or errors.
Amanda Durocher 0:00
Welcome to New View Advice. I'm your host, Amanda Durocher. And I invite you to join me here each week as I offer advice on how to move through whatever problem or trauma is holding you back from living life to the fullest. Let's get started.Hey there beautiful souls. My name is Amanda Durocher. And this is New View Advice. If you're new here, this is a healing centered advice podcast where I offer guidance for the healing journey. Thank you for joining me for today's episode. Today I'll be outlining a four step process to stop a negative thought cycle in its tracks. This process can help you if you're having negative thoughts about yourself, or if you're having negative thoughts about somebody else. But so many of us get caught in negative thought patterns and have trouble stopping it and don't know what to do. So today I'm going to be outlining a four step process. It is the four C's, the process is one, catch it to cue breathing, three curious for compassion. So today I'm going to outline this process. And I know this is something that I go back to over and over again, I catch myself in negative thought patterns all the time, I can be very self critical. I've talked about that a lot on the podcast that I suffer from being my own biggest critic. So this four step process really helps me to come back to the present. And to reset my thoughts. I also want to mention here up front that so many people struggle with negative thoughts. So many times when we have negative thoughts, we begin to judge our negative thoughts, which is the opposite of what we want to do, we do not want to add more negative thoughts to the negative thought cycle. I think sometimes our negative thoughts are like a circle, and then it can get bigger and bigger. And it can be like a tornado within us that we just can't stop all the negative thoughts. So today I'm going to outline this four step process and let's jump on in.
Amanda Durocher 1:37
Okay, so as I mentioned, this four step process is catch it cue breathing, curious compassion. So the four C's. And the first step of this process is to one catch it. So what you want to do is you want to catch the negative thought, you cannot stop a negative thought pattern, if you don't catch it, that you're in a negative thought. So many of us have 1000s of thoughts every single day. Most of us our brains do not stop unless we intentionally sit in meditation or yoga or a practice that helps us to stop it. But most of us are in thoughts all day. So many of our thoughts go unchecked, unnoticed. And so the first step of this process to stop a negative thought cycle is to catch the thought, you have to become aware of it. And so many of us are critical of ourselves, we're critical of others, we're critical of our bodies, we're critical of those we work with, we're critical all day, or we're judgmental, or we have mean thoughts. And that's okay, that's very human, no need to judge yourself many times, we can continue these thought patterns and fall more into this cycle. Because we begin to judge our negative thoughts, I know that I can do that I can catch myself calling myself not nice words, and then I can judge myself for that. And then I can think I should be farther in my healing journey. I continue the cycle, and how I stop it is catching it. So say my thought is I'm so stupid, I have to catch it, I have to catch myself first. And I have to grab on to the thought or the thought could be Oh, my partner is so annoying, catch it, or the thought could be I hate how I look today. Or the thought could be I should have known better shoulds are great thoughts to catch. Because shoulds are often critical thoughts. And we punish ourselves by telling us all the things we should be doing. So great thoughts to catch are the should thoughts. So the first step is to catch the thought.
Amanda Durocher 3:30
Step two is to que breathing. So when you catch the thought, I want you to just breathe into it.
Breathe in, breathe out and breathe as much as you want to ground yourself. Oftentimes we're in a negative thought cycle, we're starting to spiral outside our bodies is how I view it, we're starting to spiral upwards, and we want to ground into the earth, Your breath will help you to come back into your body come back into the present moment, rather than living in the future or the past. That's also where negative thoughts can often take us is we are worrying too much about the future or we're reliving the past. And what you want to do is start breathing into your body and coming back into right here and right now. And your breath is always going to ground you. The breath is a tool you have in your tool belt all day long. So it's beautiful and wonderful that we can continue to come back to the breath, which will bring us back to the present moment. So you want to catch the thought cue breathing. And you can either take one large breath, multiple breaths, you can box breathe, which is inhaling for for holding for for breathing out for four holding for four. That's a great grounding breath that I talked about a lot here and there's no wrong way to breathe. Just take deep breaths, make sure there are large breaths come back to your breath. Just like we have thoughts all day that we don't pay attention to we also don't notice that we're breathing all day. So it's another thing that we can bring our awareness and our attention to because we're breathing all day in order to live, but so many times we forget that we're breathing. So bringing that awareness to the breath will help to ground you.
Amanda Durocher 5:08
So one, you're going to catch the thought to you're going to cue breathing. Three, curious, become curious about this thought, start asking yourself questions about this thought, is this something you need to take action on? Is this thought assisting you? Is this thought helping you? Is this thought true? Is this even your thoughts? Begin to just bring awareness to it begin to witness the thought from an outside perspective, that's often what we're doing. When we become curious, we're able to take a step back, instead of reacting or living in the thought we're able to witness it, you could just ask yourself, Is this even true? Or is this a thought I want to be having right now. And the more awareness you bring to it, the more distance will be created between you and the thought. And you'll be able to take a step back from that thought, so many thoughts we have just go unchecked and unquestioned. But when we bring awareness to it, to say I was to bring awareness to the thought, I'm so stupid, I'm going to go Am I really stupid. And then I'd look at what I did. So say I sent an email with a typo. And I said, I'm so stupid, I'd be like, Oh, I'm not stupid, I just made a mistake, oh, that's not a big deal. And I'm able to see it, rather than be absorbed in it or living in it, if that makes sense. So that Curiosity will help to create distance. And that breath also helps you to begin to create the distance from living in that cycle, which can feel like that tornado I described.
Amanda Durocher 6:36
So one is to catch it to cue breathing, three, become curious, and four is compassion. So I want you to become compassionate with yourself. Be kind to yourself, if you have a critical thought of yourself or someone else. Be kind to yourself, you're human, you do not need to be perfect. So many of us judge ourselves for the thoughts we have, which again, just creates that cycle, which can make it feel like we're living in a tornado of negative thoughts that will never end. You have to bring in kindness. You have to bring in your own love. You have to be like, it's okay. It's okay. Everything's okay. I am safe. Everything is fine. These are just thoughts. Many times we have very critical thoughts, but many times we don't act on those thoughts. Or many times those thoughts are just bringing awareness to us something that wants to be looked at and healed. So the more compassion you can bring to yourself the more that those thoughts which can feel like knives stabbing at you, they cease when you are kind to yourself when you are kind to others when you send love to yourself and others and you realize you're human and it's all okay and this happens in every human has negative thoughts. Nobody is immune to negative thoughts and you just allow yourself to feel compassion so as I mentioned, that's the four step cycle you one you catch the thought to you Q breathing, three you become curious and four, you become compassionate with yourself. I hope this was helpful. And if you have any questions, please reach out. I am always hoping to break down a lot of these inner world topics in easy step by step processes. So if you have any other topics you'd like to hear, or if you have any questions about this process, please let me know you can email me at newviewadvice@gmail.com And thank you so much for listening today's episode. As always, I hope I was able to offer you a new view on whatever you may be going through. sending you all my love. See you next time.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
