Thinking Patterns That Shape Mood

People have different experiences or situations in life that lead them to feel depressed, anxious, worried, or angry.  Everyone is unique.  However, people generally have similar ways of processing or interpreting their experiences, which leads to them having negative moods or worsening their negative moods.  Likewise, people who are generally in happier or more pleasant moods have similar ways of processing or interpreting their experiences, regardless of the differences in their experiences or situations.

I use two metaphors to explain the differences in how people process their experiences- “the good cupcake” metaphor and “the catching chocolate candy in the bag” metaphor.  For more details on "the good cupcake" metaphor, see this blog post.

Catching Chocolate Candy in the Bag

To understand this metaphor, one needs to know that I have a bowl filled with a variety of chocolate candy in my counseling office that many of my clients eat during our counseling sessions.  I tell my clients to pretend I gave them a grocery bag to hold, but they don’t know the bag has a hole in the bottom.  I ask my clients, “What happens when I pour chocolate in the bag?”  They respond, “It will fall out.”  I ask, “What if I pour more chocolate into the bag?”  They answer, “It will fall out.”  I then ask, “What if I pour all the chocolate into the bag?”  They state, “It will all fall out and possibly make a bigger hole in the bag.”  I explain to my clients that the thoughts and interpretations that lead to depression, anxiety, worry, and anger are what tear a hole in the bag.     

Thinking patterns that "tear a hole in the bag"

Criticism 

Being one's harshest critic creates low self-esteem and criticism of one-self or others creates depression, anger, worry, and anxiety.  People will often brag about being their own harshest critic or being their harshest judge as if it is a positive but in fact, it is a bad thing.  Perfectionism is simply a clever term for being one’s harshest critic, of never being good enough, no matter how good you are or how much you have accomplished.  It is never okay to beat oneself up when one makes a mistake.  That will always lead to shame and lower self-esteem.  It will lead you to feeling broken, not good enough.   

Many people who provide criticism like to label their criticism as “constructive criticism” if they believe the criticism is correct, accurate, justified, or helpful.  However, the individual on the receiving end of that criticism rarely views it in that same light.  I believe the only constructive criticism is the criticism that is surrounded with gratitude. 

This was taught to me by a supervisor I had before I was a fully licensed psychologist.  She referred to this method as the “reverse oreo cookie” method and demonstrated it on me as she provided constructive criticism on my efforts as a therapist.  While an oreo cookie consists of a wafer, then creme, then another wafer, a reverse oreo cookie would be creme, wafer, creme.  This means expressing gratitude or acknowledgment of the person’s strengths before giving correction, teaching, criticism, or observations, then following up with reminding the person of their strengths and accomplishments. 

Never beat someone else up as that will cause shame and feelings of worthlessness in the other person.  They will feel broken and not good enough.  Punishment is Satan's method and the purpose of it is to decrease our sense of worth or importance and increase the likelihood we will listen to his enticings.  Heavenly Father will do punishment if he has to, but he does not like doing it.  He would just prefer that we grow and improve so we can return to His presence.

Instead of beating yourself up, pretend you have a whip and you get to give yourself one lash.  Just enough to recognize the mistake and then correct it or improve it.  The one-lash method can cause guilt, hurt feelings, or sadness but it should not cause shame.  It allows you to feel bad about what you did (i.e., your conduct or behavior) but never feel bad about yourself (i.e., your character).  You will feel broken-hearted and have a contrite spirit, but you won’t feel broken.  This method leads to being humble and teachable.  That is Heavenly Father's method.  Likewise, if you have a nice teflon-coated pan, you never use steel wool. It will clean the pan but it will damage the pan.  You are to always use a soft cloth or a sponge.  It will clean the pan just as well without damaging the pan.  Criticism tears a hole in the bag. 

Comparisons

All comparisons are bad and they are of the Devil.  That is, when you make a comparison, there are two results and neither one is good.  Comparisons lead you to feeling better than other people, which is pride (pride comes before the fall), or worse than others (feelings of worthlessness).  Those are two negative outcomes.  A person should not even compare himself/herself with how they used to be.  When women don’t like the weight they have put on after giving birth to children and then they put on the refrigerator a picture of what they looked like when they were in high school playing sports to motivate themselves to lose weight, that is just mean-spirited.  It is just nasty, it is not motivating.  It is discouraging. 

In reality, no comparisons are ever honest, fair, or accurate.  It can be said that every human being is composed of two halves- a public self/social self (our positives) and a private self/hidden self (our negatives).  The public self/social self is our best foot forward that others see.  We might see some flaws in that person but usually it is the positive aspects of themself that we see.  Each of us also has a private self/hidden self that contains our fears, weaknesses, inadequacies, guilt, mistakes, and sins.  There are also private aspects of ourself that are sacred but for the most part, we think of our private self as our gook or negative aspects.  No matter how well we know another individual, we never get to see their hidden self/private self (i.e., their negatives).  So when we make a comparison with our positive and negative qualities versus the other person’s positive qualities, we have made a decision to feel bad about ourselves from the very beginning.  Comparisons tear a hole in the bag.

Blame

Blame leads to no change.  Blame is the most addictive thing that exists because it feels good knowing that your problems are someone else's fault.  I remember a cartoon I saw posted in the therapist’s lounge in the clinic at the University of North Texas when I was a student in their clinical psychology program.  It was a picture of an attorney speaking to his client and he stated, “We have sued the tobacco industry for your smoking problem, we have sued the alcohol industry for your excessive drinking, and we have sued the gaming industry for your gambling problem.  Is it possible you just have never learned to take responsibility for your own behavior?”  The client responded, “So, let’s sue my parents.”  However, by making your problems someone else’s fault, you are now powerless to change them. 

A good example of blame is Hamarabi’s Code- An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.  This means if you are good to me, I will be good to you.  If you are bad to me, I will be bad to you.  The problem with this type of thinking is that the person is never responsible for their own actions.  It is always the other person’s fault.  The individual is saying the other person is the puppeteer and I am just the puppet reacting to the way the strings are being pulled. I see this frequently when I am counseling couples who are quite disappointed in each other.  By their reports, it is easy to see they are currently acting much differently than they promised they would be at the beginning of their relationship. 

It looks like this-  A husband promises to give 100% to his wife and she promises to also give him 100%.  Somebody screws up and begins to give 90% of their energy to their partner not realizing that is what they are doing.  The partner on the receiving end can’t believe it and is distraught by it so they respond by giving 90% hoping the other person will know what it feels like and will return to giving 100%.  That never happens.  The first person responds by giving 80% and then their partner is more frustrated and lowers their effort to 80%.  By the time they arrive at my office to begin the counseling process, they are both operating at 40% or worse and want me to pronounce their marriage dead.  They just want to experience the momentary relief that comes from escaping the marriage they have created.  Relief or escape feels good but that does not mean it is the correct thing to do.  When I ask the couple why they are giving 40%, or whatever the percentage when they promised to give 100%, they always both state, “Because of my partner”.  What is fascinating is that they want to leave the marriage and find a better partner, someone they believe they are more compatible with.  What they won’t acknowledge is that if you can justify giving less than 100% to this partner, you will likely justify giving less than 100% to any partner.   Blame tears a hole in the bag.

Second Guessing/Self-Doubt

This refers to never being satisfied with a decision no matter what the decision is.  Feeling that you are danged if you do, and danged if you don’t.  For instance, a bishop spending time with a ward member while simultaneously thinking the whole time he should be spending more time with his family.  Then when the bishop is with his family, he is thinking he should be doing more for his ward members.  Hindsight is 20-20 or perfect vision.  This style of thinking never allows a person to be pleased with their decision.  Second-guessing tears a hole in the bag.

Personalizing How Others Treat You 

- This is judging your worth, value, or importance by how others treat you.  This to me is a perfect definition of having “thin skin” or “wearing my heart on my sleeve”.  Personalizing how another person treats you is a major cause of many individual’s lower self-esteem.  Judging your value or importance by how one’s parents, siblings, school peers, roommates, co-workers, teachers, boyfriends/girlfriends, spouses, church leaders, etc., treated you.  This means liking you less as a result of the negative treatment you received from others.  Feelings of worthlessness is a major symptom of depression.  I hope this is not sacrilegious but this would be akin to Jesus not liking himself or thinking less of himself because he was crucified.  Personalizing the actions of others tears a hole in the bag.

Not Being Able To Be Reassured

Not internalizing or believing all the wonderful things said about you by trustworthy people. Not being able to accept compliments and believe them to be true.  Not being able to be uplifted from one’s depression, anxiety, or worry by the words or actions from someone who has appreciation towards you.  Not being able to be comforted or change one’s mind.  These same people who cannot be reassured seem to be excellent at believing all the barbs or negative things that are directed towards them.  This simply does not catch the chocolate candy to fill the bag.