Living with a chronic disease means constantly managing recurring symptoms and adapting to a new, often unwelcome, reality. This requires not just physical, but also psychological and emotional adjustment. In fact, coping with this new condition often becomes even more important than coping with the physical symptoms themselves. Research shows that automatic thoughts accompanying chronic…
Many of us want to lose weight from time to time, but when the process does not go as expected, we become frustrated and start believing that we will fail. Focusing on this thought rather than our goal often makes the process more difficult than it already is. Let’s see how someone who thinks, “I…
Many of us are constantly on the go, to the point where we can’t truly rest except when we sleep. Yet, there’s that inner voice saying, “You should be doing more.” But how helpful is the belief that we must do a lot to earn the right to rest? Let’s take a closer look. Here…
When we feel anxious, we have certain automatic thoughts more frequently. If you have noticed, our thoughts during anxiety will usually fit into this formula: Also, when we are anxious, due to intense feelings of fear, we see the world in a biased way, and believe these unhelpful thoughts more easily. This is called cognitive…
Thousands of thoughts pass through the mind during a day. However, only some of these catch our attention while most cannot make their way into our consciousness. Moreover, we stay focused on some thoughts more when compared to others. Then, is it random that some thoughts are more prominent or is there any decision mechanism…
Maladaptive Assumptions in CBT In one of our previous posts, we examined Maladaptive Assumptions in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and Techniques for Identifying Them. In this post, we share CBT techniques for challenging maladaptive assumptions. As you might recall, the ultimate goal of challenging a maladaptive assumption in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is to find a…
Maladaptive Assumptions in CBT Maladaptive assumptions (also called underlying assumptions, intermediate beliefs, dysfunctional beliefs) in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, are, as the names suggest, maladaptive/dysfunctional beliefs underlying automatic thoughts. They are simply the rules behind our automatic thoughts. As you might remember, CBT mentions three levels of cognitive distortions. Automatic thoughts are the most superficial of…
As in all forms of cognitive behavioral therapies, CBT assume that psychological problems might be caused in part by our maladaptive/unhelpful/irrational ways of thinking, or behaviors. In CBT, symptoms are not seen as the signs of “deeper issues” since any interpretation without evidence might be a cognitive distortion and contradict with the principles of cognitive…
Until mid-60s, behaviorism was the dominant approach in both the understanding and the treatment of psychopathologies. Then, however, behavior therapists came to accept that taking classical or operant conditioning as the sole explanation of the development of psychopathologies and working on behavior alone was not enough for progress in many conditions. This was a call…
It is inarguably true that CBT is a very structured form of therapy, and, thus, it must be applied only by professionals who have been trained for it. Especially in clinical conditions, indeed, a professional help is indispensable. However, still, both cognitive and behavioral techniques used in CBT can be suited for helping the self….