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Breaking negative thought patterns, once you've gotten good at recognizing the thoughts that are tied

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to negative emotions, it's time to take a closer look at those thoughts.

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George is a graduate student in psychology.

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He told his first class last semester and was very disappointed to read several negative comments about

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his teaching and his course evaluations.

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His impression after reading the evaluations was that most of them were critical.

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However, when he looked through the evaluations a second time, he counted about a 10 to one ratio

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of positive to negative comments.

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He also realized that most of the negative comments were things he was already aware of and could work

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to improve, like being a more dynamic a presenter.

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Maybe there's still hope for my academic career, George thought to himself.

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The main strategy to break negative thought patterns is to compare our thoughts to reality.

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Are we telling ourselves something reasonable or are our thoughts a reflection of the actual situation?

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Don't worry that you will have to put on rose colored glasses and fool yourself into believing things

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are better than they are.

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We are just going to see if our thoughts are aligned with the evidence.