CBT - Introduction
What is CBT?
CBT is an abbreviation for a type of therapy or coaching known as Cognitive Behavioural Therapy.
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy involves analysing thoughts (cognitions) and feelings and seeking to understand when thought patterns are contributing to negative emotions or to repeat or problematic behaviour. A life coach or counsellor trained in CBT will then help clients to reframe problematic or negative thoughts or create alternative more realistic thoughts and behaviours in ways which help to give greater balance and less stress to the client.
What Problems Can CBT Help With?
CBT is often used effectively to help people who are experiencing
stress, anxiety or depression or other low mental states. Research
suggests it can also be effective in helping people suffering from
bipolar disorder or manic depression.
A person who commonly thinks self critical thoughts or judges
themself harshly and experiences low self esteem may also find that
CBT can help to give them a more balanced and constructive
perspective.
CBT and Distorted Thinking
Practitioners of CBT may adopt classifications of types of distorted thinking which may create stress for the person who is susceptible to them. Some of these classifications are given below by way of example:
- Mind Reading – If someone tends to imagine that other people are thinking critically about them without objective evidence to justify this assumption then they may be said to be 'mind reading' in a negative gloomy way and CBT may help to address this by encouraging them to evaluate the evidence for their negative imaginings and reassure themselves in a balanced way recognising that the mind reading is not justified.
- All or Nothing Thinking – All or nothing thinking involves seeing everything in extreme terms when in fact there may be some positive and some negative aspects to the situation. This is an example of lack of a balanced perspective and CBT can help people to identify when they are susceptible to this way of thinking and then begin to balance it out with more rational thoughts.
- Fortune Telling – Fortune telling involves expecting the worst to happen. Sometimes this can be a self fulfilling prophecy as a person who does this may then begin to act in ways which make the negative prophecy more likely to become true. Again CBT helps clients to restore a more balanced perspective by techniques such as thinking up more positive, rational substitute thoughts or encouraging clients to think up sensible ways of focusing on something else or on the here and now.
A coach trained in cognitive behavioural techniques will help clients to identify these thought patterns and find ways of substituting more realistic and constructive ways of thinking.
One technique that a coach trained in CBT may encourage clients to use to counter negative thoughts is to make a note of what is going through their mind and then create a balancing statement. Thus for example the client might note the following thought and then create a balancing statement such as that listed:
Negative Thought |
Balancing Statement |
I arrived 10 minutes late. I am hopeless. I can never get to work on time. |
On this occasion you arrived 10 minutes late. Punctuality is not your strong point but you can work on it to try to improve, by practical measures such as setting your alarm clock 10 minutes earlier in the morning. |
In the example given, the balancing statement created by the client
does not seek to pretend that there is no difficulty or that the
client is perfect – after all, who is – but it helps the client to put
things in perspective and come up with positive realistic actions to
try out to improve their situation.
Negative self critical thoughts quite often contain words such as
“never” or “should” which are either extreme or else moralistic in
their self condemnation. Balancing statements aim to moderate these
elements in a realistic way to help people achieve a more balanced
approach to themselves, to others and to life.
CBT is a practical and very useful model for helping people to change
their mindset in practical and constructive ways. It is a model
frequently used with very positive results with clients and research
evidence demonstrates that it is effective.
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