Bid farewell to negative thoughts by writing them down

Bid farewell to negative thoughts by writing them down

    Here’s how you can get rid of unwanted, negative thoughts — just pen them down and toss them away. “However, you tag your thoughts — as trash or as worthy of protection — seems to make a difference in how you use those thoughts,” said Richard Petty, psychology professor at Ohio State University and co-author of a recent study on the subject. Some types of psychological therapy use variations of this concept by trying to get patients to discard their negative thoughts.
    Petty said the study is the first to validate the approach that people can treat their thoughts as material, concrete objects. That is evident in the language we use, added Petty. “We talk about our thoughts as if we can visualise them. We hold our thoughts. We take stances on issues, we lean this way or that way. This all makes our thoughts more real to us,” said Petty.
Petty based these findings on three related experiments. Results showed that for those who kept their thoughts and checked them for mistakes, it mattered whether they generated positive or negative thoughts about their bodies.

Time to put your pen to the paper