How to actually change your thought patterns and reduce distorted beliefs

Habits aren’t just about flossing and exercising. Habits of thought can be far more impactful on your life, yet most people don’t think deliberately about how to change them. CBT does try to do this, but I have found its meta-approaches for replacing distorted thoughts with healthier thoughts to be sub-optimal. It’s easy to forget the idea you thought of in therapy or while thinking about how to have a more realistic and happy outlook. You do it for a few days, then life gets in the way, it slips your mind, and you’re back to your default patterns. 

A trick I have found useful for this is to use Habitica, a gamified habit forming system, to help retrain your neural pathways. The quick explanation of Habitica is that when you do a behaviour you would like to do, you get coins which you can spend on various things in the game. To make this work with CBT, you simply input the desired replacement thought pattern, then you get rewarded every time you remember to do so. This sets up a system to remember and has helped me with an enormous number of patterns that led to unwarranted feelings of guilt and anxiety, and I hope it can help you too.