The easiest way to stop ruminating and start living
In small doses, rumination and worry are normal, and it happens to everyone. When you lose a job it’s normal to ruminate about what you may have done wrong. It's normal when your mind pops up those unpleasant memories and thoughts resulting in a kind of flashback where you relive the emotions you felt at the time, especially if the memory is fresh.
What’s not normal is when we start becoming obsessed with those ruminations.
The worst part is that there never seems to be any conclusion to the thought processes involved in rumination.
So, how do you know if you’re experiencing rumination or just reflecting on the past in a healthy way?
Firstly, rumination can feel like it comes out of nowhere (unlike reflection where you make a conscious effort to think about that situation).
It pounces on you and is accompanied with a surge of negative emotions and thoughts that aren’t easy to shake off. In fact sometimes you feel compelled to go deeper into that rumination, like if you just explore it a little more you could figure out why things went so wrong.
But this only makes things worse.
That’s because rumination is a vicious cycle- you ruminate because of something that happened in the past. That rumination brings on all sorts of negative thoughts that start breaking you down and chipping away at your self-esteem and self-confidence. It can make you change the way you see yourself and it can break you down so much that it can even cause the onset of depression.
This breaks your confidence down even more and you give up on goals & doubt yourself.
Which then leads to even more rumination which eventually paralyses you.
It’s like having a bully in your head reminding you of every painful situation in your life, every embarrassing thing you ever did or said, and every inadequacy you have, all day every day.
It’s no wonder that rumination amplifies the feeling of hopelessness and depression, to such an extent that it can lead to suicidal feelings, anxiety, binge eating, binge drinking and self harm.
So, the question becomes, is there a way out of this cycle?
Thankfully yes, there is.
The bad news is that it’s not easy and you’ll have to put in the work. But I promise, from personal experience, that it will be worth it.
It’s like killing off that inner bully once and for all.
So how do you do it?
These are the 5 main steps I followed.
Step 1 - identify your trigger thoughts
Trigger thoughts are the thoughts that set off rumination in the first place.
It could be something that reminded you of a situation you were in where you were hurt.
They reflect our most intense feelings and this is where rumination (good or bad) is born. They are deeply personal, and many different thoughts can trigger us. What might trigger me may not trigger you.
Trigger thoughts can even be factual truths, like you’ve been fired, been ill or gone bankrupt, but this still doesn’t mean that ruminating on them will help your situation.
That’s why the first step in this healing process is figuring out what YOUR personal trigger thoughts are.
Step 2 - detach yourself from those thoughts
The next thing you’re going to need to do is learn how to detach yourself from all the negative emotions that those trigger thoughts bring up in you.
This is much easier said than done, but it’s a game changer when it comes to healing from rumination.
Detaching yourself from the emotion means that you separate yourself from all the emotions you usually feel when ruminating, and just observe those thoughts, without dwelling on them.
Why is this so important?
When we are triggered by a trigger thought, we experience a flood of emotions. Those emotions lead us to start ruminating, which results in another flood of emotions which triggers another bout of rumination, and so on. This is how rumination becomes a cycle that can slowly take over our day, and lives.
But to break that cycle we need to attack the part that causes it all to repeat. And that’s the flood of emotion we feel when we first come across that trigger thought.
We do this by detaching ourselves from the emotions we feel when those trigger thoughts come up. This way rumination doesn't even get a chance to set in in the first place.
Detachment also allows you to step back and see things for what they really are.
Step 3 - analyse those thoughts
The next thing you’ll need to do is actually analyse those negative thoughts that came up when you were ruminating. Those negative thoughts can be extremely damaging so it’s important to give yourself a chance to separate reality from those exaggerated negative thoughts.
Keep in mind though, this is not journaling about the ruminations, we’re looking at where they come from and what they're telling you without getting emotional. This is why detachment came before this step.
Once you are comfortably detached from the emotions that the trigger thoughts bring up, you can start to explore the negative thoughts that came up when you were ruminating.
Step 4 - breaking the habit of rumination
Ruminating on past events when they are triggered, and allowing the pain you feel to come back again and again as you relive that event in your mind, has become a habit, like it or not.
It’s not a good habit. It's a very bad habit, but it’s still a habit, and that means you can break it.
But how do you even begin to break a habit?
Detaching yourself from the emotion was the first step. It stopped the loop from happening.
But this can also be very difficult to achieve especially when the emotions and beliefs that come up as a result of all that negative self-talk, are deeply embedded and have a strong hold on you.
What you need to do now is stop that rumination from taking root. You can’t control the trigger, there will always be things around us that remind us of something that happened in the past, but you can control how far you let the rumination go when it does pop up.
You need to find something that pulls your focus to the here and now, and to something that matters to you.
This will feel difficult at first but each time you do it you’re weakening the habit of rumination.
Step 5 - unravel those harmful beliefs
Rumination and negative thinking have a way of affecting the way we see the world around us, and ourselves in it too. These harmful thoughts or beliefs that are holding you back are called ‘cognitive distortions’ and you may not even know you have them or how bad they really are until you analyse them.
These harmful beliefs are what pop up in your mind when you encounter your trigger thought that sparks off your rumination and negative thinking loop.
What makes them so dangerous is that they affect every decision you make and how you feel about the world and people around you and yourself too.
So now you need to take control of the thought patterns that are making you anxious and replace them with ways of thinking that make you feel calm and in control.
Applying the strategies
Knowing what to do and being able to apply them are 2 completely different things.
That’s why I’ve broken down each of these steps into their core components complete with exercises, journal prompts and worksheets to guide you through the process.
You’ll find all of this in my ebook “How to stop Negative Self-talk” where I share all the strategies I used to stop my rumination for good.
If you or someone you know is battling with rumination and depression then this is where you need to start. I explain how and why rumination happens as well as how to stop it and why those strategies work so well.
You’ll also get worksheets and journal prompts at each step to help you apply those strategies.
At the end of the ebook I’ve also included a list of all the academic articles and books I’ve gone through while doing research for the ebook, so if you want to delve deeper into the topic you can start there.
If you're looking for something more and you're ready to revamp how you deal with stress, find clarity in your life's purpose, boost your self-esteem and shower yourself with self-compassion then my “The Zen of Living” ebook bundle is exactly what you need.
In this collection of powerful strategies and expert insights you’ll learn how to overcome negative self-talk, break the cycle of overthinking, and conquer social anxiety. Free yourself from the clutches of overwhelm.
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