THAT'S MEN: Taking action is better than wasting time, writes PADRAIG O'MORAIN
THERE IS nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so. So said the Prince of Denmark in William Shakespeare's Hamlet. The character gives us a perfect example of the uselessness of rumination, a mental habit that does more harm than good.
To set his mind at ease, all he has to do is bump off the uncle who bumped off his father so that he could marry Hamlet’s mother. But does he get on with it? Most certainly not, as any Leaving Cert English student could tell you. Why can’t he get it all over with in the first act, they moan?
But Hamletis a ruminator and such people think on and on about things in a largely negative way, instead of taking action.
Most of the ruminators I’ve known are men, but women are afflicted by this unhelpful behaviour too.
For instance, a woman who finds a lump in her breast and who agonises about it is likely to put off seeking medical help compared with a woman who doesn’t, according to Matthew Coxon of York St John University, writing in The Psychologist.
And cancer patients who dwell on their illness are not as good at complying with their prescribed treatment as those who don’t.
It makes sense that this is so. Ruminators wonder why things happen and what it all means. They are not at all focused on how to solve their problems. They are also more likely to be depressed. Not only does it make it more likely a person will become depressed in the first place, but after the depression lifts, continued brooding seems to increase the chances that it will return.
Over-thinking also increases worry, anxiety and other unpleasant states.
It’s hardly surprising, then, that a ruminator sees his or her problems as bigger than would be the case if they did not keep turning them over in their minds. And they are less likely to believe that they themselves can solve their problems.
So what can one do? Simply saying “stop ruminating” is pointless. If you tell someone not to think about something, they are likely to think about it more than before.
After all, if you go around saying to yourself, “I must not think about the ghost, I must not think about the ghost”, you are focusing on the very thing you want to forget.
Here are a few measures that can help break the hold of such a thinking pattern.
The first is to notice the thoughts you are having and to let them go by without getting caught up in them. Notice sounds around you, your breathing, whatever you happen to be doing at the time.
The second is to interrupt the act of rumination by doing things you find absorbing and uplifting, such as listening to music, gardening or whatever does it for you.
The third, which I find works for me, is to replace rumination with thinking about how to solve the problem.
So, for instance, instead of recycling the same old thoughts about some task you find daunting, think about how you might get the task done.
This means that you are still thinking, but at least you are engaged in potentially useful thinking.
Finally, an apparition.
When the snow was falling very thickly on my street and people were making their way home gingerly in the dark for fear of falling, I spotted a shadow moving quickly along the footpath.
The shadow turned out to be a man out for his evening run. The atrocious conditions had not put him off. He had not even surrendered to the weather enough to wear long trousers. He was in his shorts as he ran to the end of the road and then back past crawling and astonished motorists.
There’s the difference between men and women. Women don’t do that sort of thing. When it’s snowing and the world is frozen, they are at home (very sensibly, I might add) with a bottle of cabernet sauvignon.
Oh, and his adventure in the snow didn’t kill him. I spotted him again recently in mild weather when even the women had abandoned the bottle and were out for a run.
Padraig O’Morain (pomorain@ireland.com) is a counsellor accredited by the Irish Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy. His book, Light Mind - Mindfulness for Daily Living, is published by Veritas. His mindfulness newsletter is free by e-mail