How do you manage negative automatic thoughts?

What do negative thoughts feel like to you?

Let’s start with the basics. We all have automatic thoughts that form through lived experiences. My appearance as a cis white middle-aged man will have automatic thoughts around identity, gender, cultural awareness and age.

The challenge in our society in 2025 is how we use an interpretation of these thoughts to benefit our life harmony. The factors which support me are values and beliefs which exist consciously in the ‘here and now’, and those which manifest in the unconscious, like daydreaming or whilst dreaming. If we are safe and balanced enough, we can learn how the negative automatic thoughts are being directed. And sadly, it may feel confusing and overwhelming when we cannot make sense of the undirected automatic thoughts.

As an example, those people who date and experience unhealthy, abusive relationships may feel conflicted with automatic thoughts. The desire to find safety while surviving for small ones in a family happens too frequently in reliable news sources. This highlights how confusing it can be to interpret our negative automatic thoughts. Our beliefs and values are often challenged when emotions of love and loyalty are a factor. It is here that counselling and psychotherapy can provide a safe and devoted space for a person to open up and learn more. The role of a professional talk therapist is to support the client in self-discovery of what may be causing the emotional block.

I am a keen advocate for sitting with anger management as a learning tool. It is a personal and professional belief that anger has been blurred into a ‘dangerous’ space in our society for all genders. And while I never advocate for physical violence, words are equally hurtful, whether internally directed at our thoughts or towards others. As a teacher, anger opens frustration in communication, or rather, the lack of it, in relation to ourselves or in relation to others. Within the therapeutic space, it should be safe enough for a person to open up about the frustration and confusion which arises. There should be a lack of judgment from the professional, so the individual or couple has space to look at the negative and positive automatic thoughts.

It is here that my integrative modality supports the analytical skills needed to guide the session, as well as a practitioner who believes in gender, sexuality and identity being a part of each session is structured. Furthermore, the need to be fully present in client work means that my ‘tools in the toolbox’ to help neurodivergent people are adapted. If you are a person who is ready to reach out to a talk therapist, why not read ‘What does it mean to trust a counsellor or psychotherapist’?