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Cognitive Distortions...with some critique (by me).

1. All or nothing thinking: You look at things in absolute, black and white cate
gories.
2. Overgeneralization: You view a negative event as a never-ending pattern of de
feat.
3. Mental Filter: You dwell on the negative and ignore the positives.
1,2 and 3 become more complex in an overwhelmingly negative life. One has to foc
us on the "not so negatives", perhaps.
4. Discounting the positives: You insist that your accomplishments or positive q
ualities "don't count."
I don't really have this problem.
5. Jumping to conclusions: (a) Mind reading - you assume that people are reactin
g negatively to you when there's no definite evident for this; (<>b</>) Fortune
telling - you arbitrarily predict things will turn out badly.
I definitely suffer from A, to the extreme. Probably B, as well.
6. Magnification or minimization: You blow things way out of proportion or shrin
k their imporance inappropriately.
I hate that this is somewhat true, but I don't know how to stop doing it. For in
stance, when I visit my family I know it won't be as bad as I think it will be,
and yet I've let it totally destroy my life for the last few years. Hmm, or mayb
e it will be as bad, lol.
7. Emotional reasoning: You reason from how you feel: "I feel like an idiot, so
I must really be one." Or "I don't feel like doing this, so I'll put it off."
I don't know, I don't think I do this.
8. Should Statements": You criticize yourself or other people with "Shoulds" or
"Shouldn't." "Musts," "Oughts," "Have tos" are similar offenders.
Not sure how much I do this either.
9. Labeling: You identify with your shortcomings. Instead of saying, "I made a m
istake," you tell yourself, "I'm a jerk," or "a fool," or "a loser."
I do this because don't have good self talk at the moment. I though small writin
gs and sayings was enough, it wasn't.
10. Personalization and Blame: You blame yourself for something you weren't enti
rely responsible for, or you blame other people and overlook ways that your own
attitudes and behaviour might contribute to a problem.
This one is fairly useless.
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