Everyone knows what it's like to wake up on the wrong side of the bed. Some days, you might feel like nothing is going your way, and this can impact your mood and motivation. But people who struggle with catastrophizing tend to have an overly negative outlook on life most of the time. Instead of being hopeful about the future, they often expect the worst-case scenario to happen.
While everyone can occasionally get stuck in a cycle of negativity, frequent catastrophizing can impact your ability to live a full, balanced life. But fortunately, it's something that you can manage with the right support, as Rula explains.
Catastrophizing is a negative, hypervigilant mental state that can affect how you view yourself, the world around you, and your emotional response to everyday situations. While it can vary from person to person, it typically shows up in three main ways:
For some, it might be easy to brush off this sort of thinking as something that's "just in your head." But research shows that catastrophizing can have a significant impact on a person's well-being. For example, one study found that people who have catastrophic thoughts about pain are more likely to experience severe pain.
Catastrophizing is a distressing experience that can take a toll on your mental health. But you can learn to interrupt your negative thoughts using the following steps.
Catastrophizing can take many forms, depending on the person. But there are some common examples of the ways it can show up.
We don't have a full understanding of what leads people to catastrophize. For some, it could be a coping behavior they learned from their family of origin. Or it could be the result of experiencing a life-changing or traumatic event. For others, it could be related to a mental health condition like an anxiety disorder.
Catastrophizing may also be the result of a person's unique brain chemistry. Specifically, it may be related to changes in the areas of the brain that control your fight-or-flight response, memory and recall, and complex thinking. Thankfully, there are many treatments that can help you address your catastrophizing, no matter the underlying cause.
This story was produced by Rula and reviewed and distributed by Stacker Media.