Cognitive Defusion Against Unwanted Thoughts

Cognitive defusion is a technique that derives from cognitive therapy. The aim is to reduce unwanted thoughts that we feel are taking over our lives. These thoughts can be called in many different ways, such as obsessive or repetitive.

Their main characteristic, and what makes it difficult to eradicate them, is that they run in a circle with no way out. Furthermore, we feed them ourselves. The ingredients that these thoughts like most are worries and fears.

For all these reasons, running away from these kinds of thoughts is not a solution, just as ignoring them is not. Cognitive defusion, then, wants to teach us to relate to intrusive thoughts. How is it possible? Through some exercises that help us separate from them and see them from the right perspective.

How do we merge with unwanted thoughts?

Cognitive defusion tries to prevent us from merging with unwanted thoughts that limit us in our daily life.  We can’t concentrate, we sleep badly, even if we play sports we find ourselves with a mind full of intrusive thoughts… It is essential to know how this reality is constructed. Before analyzing in depth the cognitive defusion, therefore, let’s see how these thoughts are created.

How we merge with unwanted thoughts is based on whether we believe we are those thoughts. We are unable to see them contemplatively (from the outside), as mindfulness teaches. For this reason, we attach great importance to them, which requires our full attention. So much so that no activity helps us to overcome them.

It is equally normal to consider these thoughts as absolute truths. In general they are not thoughts that we like, so they indirectly become a kind of threat. In this way, we become more attached to them through inadequate strategies to get rid of them.

All of this also has an emotional impact. Any such thought that we focus on causes very strong emotions in us. We can experience intense fear, anxiety can make us feel on edge… It’s natural, because there is a threat from which we must defend ourselves.

Cognitive defusion exercises

To put an end to this unpleasant situation and know how to act in case it happens again, the cognitive defusion proposes some exercises. Putting them into practice whenever we need them will help us defuse these thoughts. Over time we will do this in such an automatic way that we will no longer cling to any such thought.

All cognitive defusion exercises have 3 purposes. The first is to enable ourselves to recognize and strip thought; the second is to be able to hear it as much as we can; the third is being able to release it or free it. Let’s discover some exercises that help achieve this goal:

1. “I’m thinking about …”

This first exercise of cognitive defusion consists in inserting the thought that disturbs us in the following sentence: “I am / I am not…”. The goal is to be able to complete it according to your own experience. For example, we enter “I’m worth nothing”. We can write this sentence or say it out loud.

Now let’s get into this sentence. We will feel that we are worthless, we can also think of situations in which we feel this way or phrases of people who have made us feel this way.

Well, when we are aware that we are worthless, we will insert the same thought in a new sentence: “I’m thinking of…”. We need to say the sentence aloud. What thoughts are we having? “I’m thinking I’m worth nothing. “

Perfect! What happened? Suddenly we completely disassociated ourselves from that thought. We see it with a certain perspective, albeit a small one. It’s a big step forward. Repeating this last statement several times will help us get away from our thoughts and move forward with the second exercise.

2. Loss of meaning

We called this exercise this because we think it sums up its goal very well. To do this, let’s take a word we like. For example, “green”. Well, now let’s repeat the word “green” many times. After we repeat it for a while, we will probably realize that it has lost its meaning.

Suddenly we forget the definition of the word and see it only as a series of sounds that come out of our mouth. We could even visualize it with all its letters, but meaningless. It is possible that we feel as if we are seeing a word in a language we do not know.

Well, once we have reached this point, we will take the expression “I am not worth anything”. We will repeat it until its meaning is diluted in the movements of our mouth and in the vibrations of the sounds we utter. The thought, at any moment, will no longer make sense.

These two exercises are very effective in distancing oneself from intrusive thoughts.  However, it is important to ask yourself a few questions when we finish them successfully.

After performing the exercises, we will see everything more clearly, so we will say a firm “no”. This will allow us to release that thought and let it go. The definitive step to get rid of the repetitive ideas that we hadn’t been able to get rid of before.

Cognitive defusion is a very effective technique for dealing with unwanted thoughts.  Thoughts that can lead us not to love life, to remain mired in constant sadness and to see everything as if it had no meaning.

When we see thoughts as they are, simple ideas in the mind, when we move away from them, everything becomes clearer. Before, it looked like we had a thick fog around our heads. Now, thanks to the cognitive defusion, little by little that fog is dissipating.