How to tell the difference
I have always prided myself on being a reflective thinker, constantly considering and reconsidering my life and my choices. But during the first Covid-19 lockdown, I realised that this habit has the potential to be unhelpful and hurtful, especially when uninhibited by the usual constraints of work, study, and social life. For months, as restrictions kept me confined to the home, I fixated most of my attention on one painful and confusing interaction with another person. Rather than ‘moving on’, ‘healing’, or ‘becoming a better person’ like I imagined I was doing, I ended up stewing in my emotions and ingraining negative patterns of thinking which not only made me feel worse but also distracted me from considering the good things in both my present and my future.
Processing negative emotions and difficult past experiences is undoubtedly important. Healthy emotional processing can allow us to understand ourselves better, and to move forward from disappointment, heartbreak, anger, or simply a plain old bad day. We can reflect on our experiences, consider ways to improve outcomes in the future, and foster empathy for others. We’re also allowed to simply experience human emotion without immediately trying to fix it or put a positive spin on it; that approach to life can be exhausting. However, like me, many people who are trying to process their emotions may become immersed in repetitive negative thought patterns. These patterns replay past wrongs without shifting towards a solution or a feeling of resolution. This is what psychologists call rumination.
Rumination differs from healthy forms of problem-solving in the unhelpfully negative focus it involves. It might look like repeatedly running through the details of a situation in your head, or constantly complaining about a problem without looking for a solution. While productive emotional processing can stimulate new behaviours, different possibilities and new, more productive ways of thinking; rumination does not. Ruminative thinkers run over the same information or memories again and again, staying immersed in an unchanging negative mindset. You might have even experienced ‘co-rumination’, when two people keep a negative situation alive in conversation, with little to no shift towards the positive or productive.
One of the signs that you may be ruminating includes a failure to move towards a viable solution, despite focusing much of your attention on the problem. Similarly, fixating on an issue for more than an extended period of time and feeling worse after thinking about the issue, rather than better, is often a key symptom of rumination. Lastly, ruminating can also resemble a lack of movement towards acceptance and productive ways to move on.
There are several strategies recommended by experts to deal with rumination. First, you could decide on a time limit: set a timer and allow yourself to think about – even ruminate about – a situation which is bothering you. Once the timer goes off, you may like to discuss your reflections with a trusted person or write about them in a journal. Next, and most importantly, move on and try to enjoy your day until your next designated rumination time slot. Over time you can reduce the length and frequency of these periods. On a related note, try journaling. Multiple studies have demonstrated that journaling can effectively manage stress and emotional distress. Of course, it is also possible to ruminate in a journal. But if you make a conscious effort to avoid circular negative thinking, focus on the future as well as the past, and incorporate gratitude, you will be more likely to process and heal from your negative emotions instead of being victim to them.
Because other people’s seemingly unfair or hurtful behaviour is often a major cause of rumination, deliberate empathising can help. If you’re struggling to understand or accept what somebody has said or done to you, try experimenting with empathy. How does putting yourself in another person’s situation feel? Are you able to generate compassion? Even if the answer is no (and it sometimes will be), this attempted shift in perspective may help to move away from established and painful ways of thinking.
Finally, you can try to address rumination through Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT). CBT therapists can help you identify the thought processes which lead to unhelpful rumination in the first place, and work towards better modes of thinking and behaving in the future.