From our community
"That helps me best against the chaos of thoughts"
© NinaMalyna / Shutterstock
Do you sometimes feel trapped in your mind like in a prison? Maybe one of the methods that the users of our community have shared with each other will help you – and that we are kindly allowed to pass on.
Once the thought carousel turns, it can be incredibly difficult to get out of the car. And unfortunately there are soooo many different carousels of thought that we can accidentally get caught in …
"Do I have everything I need for dinner?"
For example, there is the stress carousel. In this carousel, all of our to-dos suddenly circle around us and trigger a feeling of overwhelm and helplessness in us out of the blue. It can start with a harmless everyday question ("Do I have everything I need for dinner?"), From which we can think of dozens of other things that we still have to do and that tear us out of the here and now with a violent jerk (For example: “I have to take the return home too”, “Can I possibly go to the doctor and pick up my prescription beforehand?”, “I wanted to go for an after-work walk with my girlfriend this week, when is that best purely?"). A ride in the stress carousel usually costs time and energy and means that we cannot make progress with what we are currently doing and the stress in our lives increases.
It costs us strength, lightness and often our freedom
Then there is the fear carousel. Fears of the future, fear of failure, fear of decision-making, fears of having missed a chance or having done something wrong – everything that unsettles us and kills courage, motivation and confidence at one stroke can take its place in the fear carousel, so that we hardly feel able to defend ourselves to move. The fear carousel costs us a lot of strength and lightness and often also our freedom.
And another very widespread thought carousel: the "everything-is-bad-gyro". Once we have taken a seat in this ride, we suddenly only see what is missing in our life or what is currently not so satisfactory and we can no longer find anything that gives us strength and hope. As a rule, we pay for the everything-is-bad top with our motivation and love for life.
We do not travel voluntarily
None of these merry-go-rounds is one that anyone who is in it has voluntarily entered – nevertheless, they are all mostly well attended.
In our BYM community, numerous users * have shared strategies and methods that help them personally to stop and get out of thought carousels of any kind. Thank you very much for letting us share it here!
From our community: Tips against the carousel of thought
Audiobooks, household, going out
"Listening to even more undemanding audiobooks than novels help me and doing something around the house, folding laundry or snipping something, for example. That also helps when falling asleep, actually! So only the audiobooks then. Going out and concentrating on someone else and their environment also helps always because the fresh air and the different life ground you anew. " From awkward silence
Mind tricks
"Stop thinking (mentally or say out loud" stop stop stop stop ") and then consciously think of a nice experience.
Safe place: Tell yourself what you are doing / seeing / smelling / hearing.
Breaths count to 10, then all over again.
Choose a word and then for each letter of the word another one that begins with the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc. letter of the first word (e.g. MAGIC -> future, beginning, prudence, willingness, experience, wealth) "
by Kainene
Shake out
"Shaking your whole body out helps very well. So get up and get rid of all the nervousness / anxiety energy (that's mostly what it is with me) by shaking your whole body out. It's like dancing, but you don't have to be able to dance for it." by Kainene
Sport and brooding times
"Sport is always good, of course. But also to shovel free time windows during the day in which you can deliberately think through the problems and then no longer deal with them mentally. Sex also helps." From LaCerise
React smart and early
"A good to-do and calendar app. I sort them out in the evening when I finish work. Then I'm more relaxed because I have the feeling of having an overview of what's going on. If I don't fall asleep halfway quickly , I also often turn on a meditation app or bedtime stories (I like "Calm"). If I wake up at night and don't immediately fall asleep, I quickly turn on a podcast (like something historical or something, more like something Quiet) before the thought carousel really starts. That usually helps quite well. Walks in the fresh air relax me well during the day and sometimes I do a little yoga. " From uupsi
Divert attention without forcing concentration
"During the day I would do something that requires a little attention but no real concentration: knitting a repetitive pattern, kneading dough, cleaning windows, jogging or taking a brisk walk, cycling, … At night it helps me to write down my thoughts, in short take a very warm shower or solve Sudokus. " from hot water bottle