Dump Unwanted Thoughts

What can you do to stop thinking unpleasant thoughts? According to Richard Petty PhD, professor of  psychology at Ohio state and coauthor of a recent study, you can simply throw them away. For example, in this series of experiments, people who had unwanted and unpleasant thoughts, wrote these thoughts down on a piece of paper. Then they promptly tore the paper in pieces and threw it away. As the brain observed them discarding the paper, it discarded the unwanted thoughts mentally, as well. The people who did not tear up and discard the paper but stuck it in a pocket instead, were more likely to refer back to the thoughts. And if you've written down the unwanted thought and shredded it and it comes back, write it down and dump it again . . .