Psychotherapies for anxiety help people address these thoughts in different ways. In psychodynamic psychotherapy, the roots or underlying (sometimes called unconscious) reasons for anxiety are unearthed. In cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT), thoughts are actively challenged or tested by behavioral experiments (for example, doing something that you are anxious about to experientially learn that the outcome will be okay). In acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), as in CBT, there is an emphasis on becoming more aware of the thoughts as thoughts and not truths. However, the next step in ACT is to learn ways to be “less fused” with the thoughts (That is, if cognitive fusion is the baseline, cognitive defusion is the goal).
5 Ways to Defuse Anxious Thoughts
Here are five cognitive defusion exercises to try. Pick the one or two that most appeal to you, and try them repeatedly over the span of a few days. If it works, keep going with it; if it doesn’t, try another exercise on the list instead.
Using Cognitive Defusion Exercises
The purpose of these exercises is not to change the frequency with which you experience anxious thoughts (though if that happens for you, fantastic!). Rather, defusion exercises are effective if they decrease your attachment to a particular belief or set of beliefs that are not currently serving you well. For more mental health resources, see our National Helpline Database.
