Unhealthy Emotion Processing Activity​

By Tchiki Davis, MA, PhD
Do you have a hard time moving past negative emotions? You may using unhealthy emotional processes. Try this exercise to begin to shift your habits.
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On this website, you can practice a bunch of activities to increase your happiness. But what about the negative emotions that you experience. Does increasing happiness just make negative emotions go away?

Sometimes, but not always.
 
Unfortunately, for many of us, our brains are already wired in ways that make it easier to generate negative emotions. So, in addition to creating new neural pathways that strengthen experience of positive emotion, you likely also need to work on stopping the unhealthy processes that generate negative emotions. By doing so, you make our attempts to increase happiness more successful.

Activity: Unhealthy emotional processing

In this activity, you'll learn about emotional processes that generate negative emotions. For each process, rate how often you engage in it. Then try to recall a time when you engaged in it. Finally, come up with an action plan for how to stop the process.

You could have a word you say when you notice you are having unhealthy thoughts that reminds you to change your thinking. Or, you could have an activity you engage in. For example, when I find myself feeling emotionally overwhelmed, I go for a run. If I am not able to go for a run, I excuse myself to go the restroom and take a few deep breaths.

​Everyone is different. So, try to think of what might work for you, and be willing to try different approaches until you find one that works.

Unhealthy emotional processes:

    Rumination. Rumination is when we think about something distressing over and over again. We think about what we could have done differently or how it could have turned out better even though there is no way to go back and change the event. 
    Catastrophizing. Catastrophizing is when we expect the worst possible outcome for every situation. For example, a child may fail a test and think that he/she will never do well in school again and everyone will hate him/her.
    Minimization. Minimizing is when we downplay our positive attributes, experiences, or strengths. For example, people may put themselves down saying things like, “Everyone is good at math. I am not special”.
    ​Suppression. Suppression involves trying not to show or express negative emotions. For example, a person may be upset with his/her boss, but will try not to show his/her emotions on the face or in words. 
    ​Experiential avoidance. Experiential avoidance involves trying not to feel negative emotions. For example, a person may try to push away negative emotions or engage in drug/alcohol use so as not to feel negative emotions.
    ​All-or-nothing thinking. All-or-nothing thinking is when a person views a situation as all good or all bad. For example, a person may fail a test and then suddenly view the self as all bad. When he/she does well on a test, the self may be seen as all good.
    ​Distraction. Distraction is when we avoid experiencing our emotions by doing something else. Distraction is not always bad, but it is ineffective when we use it to avoid emotions. For example, a woman may get in a fight with her husband, but instead of talking to him to resolve the emotions, she distracts herself by going shopping. This approach leaves the negative emotions unresolved.
    Note. Submitting your responses enables us to better understand people's emotional processing. If you want to keep your responses, you'll have to save to PDF or print this page. Thanks!

What did you say?

Thank you to everyone who submitted your responses to this activity! We can now share what our community does to stop negative emotional processes.

Here are some examples of things you can try:

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About Dr. Tchiki Davis
Dr. Davis is founder of The Berkeley Well-Being Institute. After getting her PhD in psychology at Berkeley, she started creating online content & programs to boost well-being—some of these have reached more than a million people. As author of Outsmart Your Smartphone, and contributor to Psychology Today, The Greater Good Science Center, and Shine Text, Dr. Davis aims to share her insights on happiness & health with people all across the world. Learn more about Dr. Davis.
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