ABCDE – Beliefs

ABCDE for Successful Mind Management: Beliefs

Identify the Error/ Irrational thought.

A lot of thinking is so automatic and habitual that it takes a some effort to catch identify and examine them. Persistence for a week or two will teach you that your thinking is much more predictable than you have previously thought. Listen to what people around you say; and try to catch instances of irrational thinking in their speech. You will be surprised to see how often it occurs, and how often it is associated with negative and unpleasant feelings, problems, failures and losses.

To target the error, you might ask yourself the following questions:

“What is the evidence for what I thought?”

How do you know what you think is right?

Do others agree with what you think?

“What’s another interpretation for this?”

Is this the only way of looking at things?

Is my point of view biased or distorted in some way?

EXAMPLES

Thought: “I blew it again! This always happens! I’ll never be able to do it! I’m hopeless.

No. 3 Error: Over generalising (from one mistake to a sweeping condemnation of your whole personality).

Thought: “No-one here is talking to me. They must all think I’m stupid. I must look really nervous.”

No. 4 Error: Mind reading (you cannot tell what others are thinking).

Thought: “Oh no! This is terrible! Awful!’

No. 5 Error: Catastrophising (it is really that bad? Has someone just died, or have you just found out that you have cancer?)

Thought: “I just know that these chest pains mean that I’m going to have a heart attack and die”.

No. 2 Error: Black-and-white thinking (chest pains don’t always mean a heart attack).