An essential part of overcoming anxiety is to address negative thinking patterns that drive it. This might seem easy in theory, but if you’ve lain awake at night trying to stop worrying or replaying a situation over and over again, you know it’s not an easy task. But it can be done. The first step is to identify the type of unhelpful thoughts that you have. There are eight types of dysfunctional thinking patterns or cognitive distortions as they are called – that have been found to relate directly to anxiety. Catastrophizing – This is probably the most common form of unhelpful thinking that fuels anxiety. It involves always imagining the worst case scenario and often starts with “what if…..?” What if the plane crashes? What if I make a fool of myself? What if I lose my job? [Read more…]