Avoid the trap of overgeneralisation

Early into 2025, a 27-year-old female client tells me during a session, “This year has begun on a bad note, my partner and I got into a big fight on 1 January. Overgeneralisation as an unhealthy thinking pattern often involves drawing broad conclusions and generalisations based on a single or few events. One of the definitions, attributed to Dr Aaron Beck, who is regarded as the father of cognitive behavioural therapy, defines overgeneralisation as “the pattern of drawing a general rule or conclusion on the basis of one or more isolated incidents and applying the concept across the board to related and unrelated situations". When it’s a negative overgeneralisation, it often shows up in the language people use to describe the event, for example, statements like "nothing seems to be going my way", or "everything this year is going to be hard". Over the years, I’m slowly making attempts to enter January with a sense of lightness and ease, becoming mindful when I am holding on to something tightly and falling for the trap of overgeneralisation.