Thinking Traps Part One
Sarah signed up for a new camp tomorrow, she spends all night worried that she isn't going to make any friends and that it will be boring
Fortune Telling
Katie has a younger sibling who needs a lot of attention from her parents. Katie believes that since her parents don’t spend all their time with her, they like her sibling better.
Black and White Thinking
How can you get out of this thinking trap:
"I just know I'm going to fail my test."
Ideas:
"If I work hard I may be able to improve my score"
"If I ask for help, I may understand it better"
"I can't predict how I'm going to do on the test, all I can do is work hard"
racing heart, sweating, breathing faster, tense muscles
Chloe gets into a fight with her friend, after the fight she feels really badly and tells herself she is "such a bad friend"
Labelling
Liv and her friends all have the same amount of homework to do as she does. Liv tells herself that she should be able to keep up, and she shouldn’t get stressed with homework so easily.
Should thinking
Name a calming strategy you can use to calm body anxiety
yoga, movement breaks, tense and release exercises
What might you be thinking if you are experiencing brain anxiety?
I’m going to mess up
People are going to laugh at me
I can’t do it
I’m not good enough
I don’t know what to do
They’re going to be mad at me
John was doing a presentation today at school. Most of his classmates were watching and saying great job, but two students were at the back on their phones. After the presentation, he feels that he did horribly.
Filtering
Alice's friends are going rock climbing for a school trip, Alice says she doesn't want to join in because she is scared she is going to make a mistake. Is this a real or false alarm?
Name a calming strategy you can use to calm brain anxiety
meditation, positive self talk, yoga
You go to the bathroom right before a presentation to get out of it
FLIGHT
Camila's friends didn't answer her text message, she thinks that they must not want to be her friend anymore.
Mind reading
Jenn is screaming at her mom saying that she never lets her do anything she wants to do, because she said she had to turn off his video game
always or never trap
Laura is really nervous to present in front of a class, what can she try to help herself feel more confident
ANY CALMING STRATEGY
Difficulty concentrating because your mind is on a loop (i.e. asking the same questions over and over again)- is this FIGHT, FLIGHT, FREEZE
FREEZE
We find ourselves using unkind words when anxious- fight, flight, freeze
FIGHT