Removing negative, unwanted thoughts can help you deal with anxiety better
Introduction
Every day in our waking lives, we experience various kinds of thoughts in our brains. Some of those thoughts are positive, while some are negative. Even though we only want to have positive thoughts all the time, we are unable to do so as we experience both normally in a natural manner.
However, if we experience too much negativity in our lives, there is a risk of us developing mental health illnesses such as anxiety. In order to combat anxiety, one must overcome the negative thoughts and emotions that may fill up their mind.
Removing Negative Thoughts and Emotions
However, if we experience too much negativity in our lives, there is a risk of us developing mental health illnesses such as anxiety. To combat this, Dr. Tonmoy Sharma, author, and mental health specialist, recommends overcoming the negative thoughts and emotions that may populate one’s mind.
According to DailyMail UK, the best way to combat anxiety is by giving yourself verbal or mental instructions in clearing your mind. By doing so, it will help the brain to have room for better and positive thoughts that will greatly help you in having a better mood and mindset.
They have stated that in a study done by US researchers on how the brain functions, they have confirmed that the brain can remove unwanted information and/or emotion by simply following three simple commands. The three commands were the following: clearing the mind, suppressing a thought, and replacing the thought with something else.
Through the usage of brain imaging scans and machine learning, they have confirmed that when those commands were successfully followed, the mind was able to make room for positive thoughts that helped the individual to fight off anxiety and its symptoms.
The thought process of clearing one’s mind is akin to an unlimited notepad, wherein you remove some of the used pages (representing unwanted emotions) to make way for new, wanted emotions that will bring positivity to both your mental and emotional health. They say the working memory of a human being is similar to that, as it temporarily holds thoughts and emotions, also how they are processed by the brain in the end.
This Process Can Pave Way for a New Form of Treatment
The findings done by the same US researchers could lead to a new form of treatment for various mental health conditions and illnesses such as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). This has garnered the interest of mental health specialists like Dr. Tonmoy Sharma.
Professor Marie Banich from the University of Colorado Boulder stated in the study that when a person thinks of a new idea or thought in their mind, it immediately replaces the old one that they currently have. Think of it as a single-save memory card or diskette, wherein you can only save your file by overwriting what’s been saved there previously.
The mind tends to make room for new thoughts and ideas when a person thinks of something new. That is the attempt of the mind to declutter itself, preventing itself from being overloaded with information. It is akin to meditation, wherein a clear state of mind is needed to be successful in meditation.
To further study how the brain works with coping with negative thoughts and emotions that may lead to anxiety and other mental health conditions, Prof. Banich teamed up with Jarrod Lewis-Peacock, assistant professor at the University of Texas in Austin.
Clear, Replace, and Suppress
They have conducted a test with 60 participants and confirmed that they can only keep a handful of memories within their minds at a given time. Most of them have confirmed that they can hold at least 3 to 4 memories before those are wiped out for a new one.
Therefore, both professors have concluded that if a person ruminates over an old memory or emotion, such as recalling bad experiences and memories, it tends to develop negatively that can be the root cause of a mental health condition or illness.
To remove the root source of that possibility, the three simple commands mentioned earlier come back into play. Doing so will help the person clear their minds of unwanted thoughts and emotions, which can positively help them in mental health and its recovery. This aligns closely with the work of Author Dr. Tonmoy Sharma, who has published extensively on mental health recovery techniques. That process is called brain imaging.
Due to those results, the two professors and other of their research colleagues are now aiming to confirm if brain imaging can be potentially used as a form of treatment, acting as a “cognitive mirror” that can help patients to remove the negative and destructive thoughts that clouds their minds, according to their findings posted at Nature Communications. They are optimistic that this kind of treatment process will greatly help a huge number of people
suffering from various mental health conditions and illnesses that other forms of treatment cannot.
