Social media loves to popularize therapy and psychology terms, but often mixes up meanings. Depending on what you’ve read and watched, you might have the wrong impression about different important mental health concepts. Today we’ll look at the term “intrusive thoughts” and what it actually means!
Social media trends incorrectly call random socially inappropriate thoughts, “intrusive thoughts.”
“Socially inappropriate” thoughts are literally just any thought or idea that would not be socially acceptable to actually carry out. Maybe they would interrupt the topic of what people are talking about right now. They might be rude or absurd ideas that someone would find unhelpful or even upsetting. They could even be about committing crimes. You might even have random and sudden thoughts about harming yourself or others that seem to come out of nowhere, even though you’re not upset or struggling in that moment.
Examples of socially inappropriate thoughts can be like how any time someone says “bare hands” out loud, my brain thinks “haha, bear hands” and imagines a person with bear’s hands instead of human hands. If I said this out loud in a serious conversation, it would likely be an unwanted and unhelpful interruption. It can also be like a video I saw where a woman and her kid were on cliffs near water and, looking at someone on an opposite cliff, the kid said something like “someone could push that person off right now.” This, of course, would be a dangerous thing to do. And, of course, don’t do those things. Having thoughts like this randomly, however, is common and usually brushed off as an inappropriate idea.
The thing is, everyone will have socially inappropriate thoughts from time to time. This is just how the brain works. Also, social norms can be different from one group to another. Neurons don’t care about social conventions when making thoughts. Our brains just make connections and “say” things based on that data, and it’s up to us to determine whether or not we pay attention or agree with what we’ve thought. Overall, we should not be ashamed of socially inappropriate thoughts because we are not our thoughts, we are what we do. Rather than shaming and stressing about these thoughts, it’s important to recognize that these are normal and, instead of putting pressure on them, we can let them go and refocus on what we’re doing in the moment.
Intrusive thoughts are distressing thoughts people have that they cannot seem to control, and tend to come back repeatedly. They are disruptive to people’s lives.
Intrusive thoughts can develop when people or strong experiences put too much shame and stress on our thoughts. Instead of letting the thought go, someone starts to question why they are thinking that way and what it means about them as a person. The answer is: nothing. Everyone has all kinds of thoughts from time to time, whether they are about knocking over glasses of water on purpose or jumping from a tall height. But when you start to question and pressure the thoughts you are having, your brain gets the signal that what you are thinking about is dangerous. What do our brains do about dangerous topics? They bring up those topics up more often and in more stressful ways in order to keep us alert and “safe.”
So we end up in a mental loop of having a distressing thought, trying to push those thoughts away and forcibly not think about them, which results in us having those thoughts more often and feeling even more upset about them. The next thing we know, someone is struggling with self-policing their thinking and feeling trapped in their own heads, full of distress and shame about they’re experiencing. For people who experience clinical distress from intrusive thoughts, talking about the thoughts they are having and finding ways to feel calmer about them is the appropriate approach. Now, for all of my talk about how the two are different, I will share that the best approach for both kinds of thoughts is kind of the same: We work on letting go of shame over intrusive thoughts, because we are not our thoughts. We work on letting go of the thoughts and refocusing. The difference here is that someone may need clinical help depowering and letting go of intrusive thoughts.
Now, am I just being picky here when the difference doesn’t matter?
Wording matters because it’s about accurate information for people who need specific help.
Look, I’m against a lot of pickiness about how people express themselves. Language is a living thing that changes over time. I think people can be too harsh about language. In my own perspective, as long as you understood what someone meant, it was effective communication and we should move on. I don’t believe in policing things like grammar and technical definitions.
The problem with mixing up mental health terminology is that these terms are used to help people who are struggling understand what they are experiencing and find appropriate support. By mixing up terminology, people might start internet searching and believe their everyday random thoughts are a problem they need treatment for. People who have intrusive thoughts might not discover they can get help and support for their struggle. Treatment is different when something is clinically distressing. A good response for random socially inappropriate thoughts is to let it go, and you probably don’t need to talk about it. A good response for intrusive thoughts is to talk about them in a clinical setting or with trusted adults and friends who have space for it in that moment, so you can work on normalizing having those thoughts and depower them over time.
I hope this is helpful for someone out there who is trying to figure out if their experience is normal or if they need extra help. If you’re realizing your experiences are distressing and taking over your life, therapy can be a great way to get back in charge. Also, if you are having repeated thoughts about harming yourself or others, it’s important to find a supportive clinician who can help you work through it. If you think we might be a good therapeutic match and you’re interested in getting started, send me a message!
Dr. Stephanie Bloodworth, PsyD, LMFT