Because, in and of itself, this automatic thought would not lead to this severity of depression. So when you have identified an emotion, refer to the above discription of cognitive themes. This technique will make your thought records efficient. The more monitoring the better, as this is the data for scientific scrutiny, which comes next. It is in this space that you subject your beliefs to the rules of science.
Scientists are particularly interested in experimental control and evidence.
They are always conducting experiments to determine whether their hypotheses are supported. Therefore, in cognitive therapy, your automatic thoughts and beliefs are hypotheses to be tested. One way to modify biased thoughts is to know how thoughts become distorted. You take the negative details and magnify them while filtering out all positive aspects of a situation. There is no middle ground.