Positive Thoughts Ease Path to Recovery

RENEW Positive Thoughts Ease Path to Recovery

The mind-body connection goes both ways. Having to cope with chronic illness, pain and other medical issues can lead to stress, anxiety and depression, while those coping with mental illnesses have been shown to have a higher risk of being diagnosed with chronic illness.

What we’ve learned about how our thoughts can affect our health hasn’t been able to tease out whether it’s a cause and effect relationship — people who are depressed are less likely to stay on top of their physical health — or our brains being able to have a direct effect on how our bodies fight infections and toxins and heal from injuries.

It’s likely a combination.

But there is lots of evidence that a pessimistic outlook or negative thinking can make it more difficult to deal with stressful events, including health conditions. One 2009 analysis of 84 studies found optimistic people fared better across a spectrum of health conditions including cardiovascular outcomes, physiological markers, immune function, cancer outcomes, pregnancy outcomes, physical symptoms or pain.

While this may not sound like good news to the pessimist, there are several ways those who tend toward a negative outlook can track the tenor of their thinking and train it to move in a more positive direction.

This can take time, but the results can be life-altering.

KNOW YOUR WEAK SPOTS

Forms of negative thinking include catastrophizing (jumping to the most negative possible conclusion), personalizing (assuming everything negative is your fault or a commentary about you), polarizing (viewing everything as either great or terrible, often associated with perfectionism) or filtering (only paying attention to negative aspects or feedback and ignoring anything positive). Start being aware of any tendency toward one or more of these patterns.

CHANGE ONE THING AT A TIME

If you tend to be especially negative about one aspect of your job, for instance, think about where the negativity is coming from and whether it would help to think more positively or try to address the situation.

CHECK IN WITH YOURSELF

Choose an interval during the day to check on your thought patterns, such as every three hours. If your self-talk has been mostly negative, work on turning it around.