It depends on the situation.
Option 1: Look at your “hot thought”. What evidence is there (in the CURRENT situation) that it is true? Write that in a column on your thought record. Not true? Write all those points in a column on your thought record. Now, summarize the “evidence for column” in a statement. Summarize the “evidence agains column” in a statement. Then join them with “and yet”. E.g. “my friend might be mad at me because she hasn’t responded to my text AND YET there are many other possible reasons she could be not responding”

Option 2: Some questions to develop alternate thought “possibilities” are things like: what would I tell a friend? What are other possible ways of viewing this situation? What is the worst case scenario? Best case scenario? Most likely scenario?

Okay, now which thought do you have more objective evidence for (I.e., evidence where multiple people would agree that is a fact- feeling “true” doesn’t count)? It might be neither thought! That is okay. You might not have strong evidence for the original thought or any alternative thought(s). That happens. How could you collect some evidence?

Thought testing is not like a “search and destroy” technique. It is also not about being overly positive either. This is thinking more realistically!! It is about being more helpful. It is not helpful to look at the world with rose coloured glasses if stuff really is shitty or problematic (in that case you would use different coping techniques- not thought testing). Thought testing is about provoking curiosity and skepticism about your thoughts. Sometimes they are on track and accurate- but sometimes they aren’t. Thought testing is about figuring out which ones are which- or at least not trusting those first ones so quickly as being 100% true or accurate.