Understanding Rumination

Imagine this…

You had a tough conversation with a friend that didn't go very well. You have been trying to make sense of what went wrong, why they got upset with you, and keep playing the situation over and over again in your head. You want to be able to put it down and not think about it so much, but no matter how you try to come to terms with what happened, you just can't let it go. 

Do any of these sound familiar?

• You find yourself dwelling on a problem over and over again without really getting anywhere.

• You get caught in “What if” thinking, worrying about all the bad things that could happen in the future.

• You constantly judge and evaluate yourself, repeatedly checking up on where you aren’t measuring up.

• You repeatedly look back at past interactions to figure out where you went wrong.

• You keep replaying or trying to figure out things in the past that upset you.

All of these forms of repetitive negative thinking are what we call Rumination. Rumination typically has an automatic, intrusive feel to it; once the looping gets started, it is hard to stop it using deliberate, conscious control.

Rumination - what is it?

When the mind goes round and round on certain thoughts without coming to a conclusion, we call the process “rumination."

Rumination is alluring. It has some short-term “benefits”—verbal chatter can be used to distract the mind from raw, present-moment feelings.  It can make you feel like you’re doing something useful, or figuring something out.

But in the long-term, avoiding the present moment with negative thought loops keeps you stuck, drained, and feeling bad about yourself. In fact, decades of research show that rumination is a key culprit in maintaining and intensifying anxiety and depression.

Not all rumination is bad. The key factor to whether rumination becomes detrimental is lack of choice. Like choosing to be in a conversation with a friend and deciding to discuss a certain topic or change the subject, deliberate rumination is something you actively choose to do to reflect on past experiences or problem solve for the future. But when you feel like you “can’t stop,” you’re distracted and not present, or your mood is worse than when you started, you’re probably engaged in intrusive rumination.

There are three main types of negative thinking prone to looping:

1. Past-Focused Rumination is often focused on finding an explanation for something that has previously happened.

2. Worry involves talking to yourself about negative events that you’re afraid might happen in the future.

3. Post-Event Processing involves reviewing a recent event over and over again, usually in an attempt to review your own performance or choices.

The Function of Rumination

If intrusive rumination is so bad for us, why do we do it so often? Rumination has some potent short-term benefits that make it very difficult to stop, even if we know that in the long-term, it’s dragging us down.

• Rumination has a numbing effect: Research indicates that because rumination uses up a lot of attentional energy, it has the short-term effect of reducing physiological arousal and distress when facing stressful events. Verbal chatter moves emotion away from its raw state into a more palatable, “controllable” verbal channel.

• Rumination feels safe: Rumination is a verbal-linguistic attempt to avoid future aversive events, uncertainty, or a loss of control. When we are going round and round that hamster wheel, our mind experiences the sensation of doing something, a momentary sense of control. This is highly reinforcing and leads to its repetitive nature.

• Rumination = infinite looping: Because rumination exists solely in the mind, it is usually impossible to definitively prove or disprove the feared outcomes about which people worry and ruminate. Therefore, rumination can remain untested indefinitely, adding to its infinite looping nature.

In other words, rumination is a futile but very understandable attempt to address a threat. 

Because the “threat” is actually a past upsetting event or nonexistent future and is frequently about events that cannot be controlled, there is no one to fight and nowhere to flee. The threat still exists in the mind, and therefore the ruminator remains convinced that it must be avoided. Thus, mentally trying to determine how to avoid the threat or to prepare for its recurrence can seem like one of the only coping responses available to the mind.

Tools

Strategies to Address Rumination

The first step in addressing rumination is to understand the function of rumination, i.e., the brain’s attempt to sound alarm buttons and gain control, and where it has gone awry.  Once you can have compassion for why the human mind is so prone to ruminate, and at the same time why it is futile, it becomes a little easier to commit to the practice of letting go of rumination.  

Below are our most recommended strategies for targeting rumination.

• Visualize: You now know that rumination relies on the verbal track of the mind. Exit that track by engaging your visual track.  Visualize your thoughts transforming into clouds floating over you, leaves on a stream, or bullet trains zooming by. Visualize getting your hamster off the rumination wheel and watching the hamster go on a walk someplace else. It’s okay to get weird: imagine that hamster hopping off the wheel to explore the grass, the flowers, the smell of the dirt and the sounds of nearby animals. The more vividly you engage the visualization track, the better. This can include not just sights but also sounds, smells, touch, and taste.

• Defuse: When rumination happens, we are “fused” with our thoughts- totally consumed by them, convinced they are true, that they mean something about us. Practice, over and over, defusing the mind from sticky thoughts  and shifting your attention to the present moment. To separate yourself from the process of rumination, notice and name it.  Say, “Ah, there’s Rumination,” or “Ah ha, I just got on the hamster wheel again.” Over and over, gently build this attentional muscle. Check out the meditation "Balloon Defuse and Focus'" below to help with this:

Ground: Engaging the senses (pleasant smells, sounds, comforting touch, etc.) or getting physically active and outdoors are great ways to take a break from the verbal track. Check out the meditation "Fade" below to help with this:

Contain: Place boundaries around your rumination by containing it to a daily Rumination or Worry Journal time (set a timer for about 15-30 minutes per day, at a set time and place).  Let your mind run wild and then put the thoughts to rest as you physically close the cover of the journal, knowing that you will be able to reopen the thoughts again the next day.

Reduce Rumination Fuel: Reduce rumination-fueling behaviors like reassurance seeking, second guessing, over-thinking, Googling, over-researching, over-preparing, etc.

Compassion: Speak directly to the part that is ruminating—acknowledge and describe the underlying fears and feelings. Speak to it with caring attention, like a loving teacher to a distressed child.

Exposure: Rumination often gets stuck on a repetitive, surface-level track and derives its power from our desire to push away uncomfortable feelings or experiences. Undermine that power by embracing the feared thing (“Bring it on!”) and letting yourself experience and move through this discomfort. Ask yourself, “So what if this might be true?” This is the one of the most powerful tools for rumination, but also one of the more difficult to put into action.  Often, using the guidance of a therapist is recommended.

“You have to train yourself, to learn how to go home to the present moment, to the here and now, and to take care of that moment, to take care of your body and your feelings in this moment. As you learn how to be in the present moment, you’ll gain faith and trust in your ability to handle the situation. You learn how to take care of your feelings and what’s happening around you. That makes you confident; and as your confidence grows, you’re no longer the victim of your worries [and ruminations].” –Thich Nhat Hanh, How to Relax