How Does Cognitive Behaviour Therapy Change Your Life?
What is CBT?
CBT is a neuroscience-based therapy that provides you with skills, tools, and strategies to change how you think, feel and behave. Many of these strategies are based on brain research conducted over the last 10-30 years. There’s been much research into brain processes over these decades, but one of the most powerful findings is that brains are adaptable, changeable and that they build new neural pathways.
You have “trillions of new connections that continually form and reform and the distinctive pattern means that no-one like you has ever existed, or will ever exist again” David Eagleman. The Brain
Each of us perceives and interprets the world differently. Your perceptions and interpretations of what is happening in your environment will affect how you think, feel, and behave.
These three factors are interlinked, and therefore you can change any one of these.
For example, changing the way you think will affect your feelings and behaviour. Changing the way you feel will affect your thinking and behaviour. Changing the way you behave will affect your thoughts and feelings.
A fundamental principle in CBT is that the events in the world are important but are not always the source of our disturbing thoughts, feelings, and behaviours.
More than that, it’s our thoughts, feelings, and behaviours and our responses to these events that can keep these problems going.
This is not a new idea. For example:
Epictetus (A Stoic and Ancient Greek Philosopher) said: “What disturbs men’s minds is not events but their judgments on events.”
Shakespeare said: “There is nothing good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”
How does CBT work?
CBT helps you understand the difference between thoughts and feelings and asks you to pay attention to what you are thinking. When your mind is constantly analysing, overthinking, and worrying, this ‘monkey mind’ produces streams of unhelpful thoughts that we call Negative Automatic Thoughts.
Since this thinking is routinely negative and often outside awareness, it can cause you to feel low, anxious, worried, and unhappy.
In CBT, we’ll help you build awareness of your thinking and teach you ways to manage negative thoughts so you can improve your mood and confidence.
You can manage your thinking by doing such activities as:
Writing thought records
Learning visualization and mindfulness
Identifying thinking habits
Undoing Thinking Habits
Rational analysis of thoughts
Awareness of mood shifts
Using coping cards
Uncovering unconscious thinking
CBT is collaborative, and clients and therapists work as a team.
In the session, I’ll help you understand how your brain works and provide you with science-based tools and strategies to change how you think, feel and behave.
CBT is an intensive program that requires your active input. The more effort you put into learning about your brain, the more you will benefit from CBT practices. Even after therapy has ended, you can continue to work on and keep learning about your brain.
What does CBT feel like?
CBT feels like learning things: about your brain, the way it works, how you are thinking and feeling, what you can do to change these, and how to build new neural pathways.
You have learned many of the thoughts, habits, and fears you repeatedly experience and, therefore, you can unlearn them. As you get better at knowing how your brain reacts and responds to difficult situations, you will be able to choose strategies that help you create new ways of thinking and feeling.
Learning occurs in your brain’s neural pathways. When you experience a thought and a feeling simultaneously, related neurons in your brain fire together, and wire together.
Here are examples of learned phrases – see if your brain quickly gives you the answer:
bread and …….,
up and ……..,
Christmas ………
Neural pathways, just like these. become automated over time, so you react instanteously in certain situations. When you remember scary situations, your brain will automatically activate feelings that belong to that situation (because the neurons are connected).
Since this thinking is routinely negative and often outside awareness, it can cause you to feel low, anxious, worried, and unhappy.
In CBT, we’ll help you build awareness of your thinking and teach you ways to manage negative thoughts so you can improve your mood and confidence.
You can manage your thinking by doing such activities as:
Writing thought records
Learning visualization and mindfulness
Identifying thinking habits
Undoing Thinking Habits
Rational analysis of thoughts
Awareness of mood shifts
Using coping cards
Uncovering unconscious thinking
Why would you want to use CBT?
Use CBT to figure out your head, understand the way you think, feel and behave and make changes where you want to.
CBT is also problem-focused and goal-oriented. You might struggle with such problems as:
Feeling sick, stressy, jumpy, nervous, and upset
Overthinking, over analysing, not being able to concentrate
Thinking and feeling negative and disappointed about everything
Crying, feeling down, overwhelmed, and scared
Procrastination and not doing things that are important to you (e.g., studying)
Being a perfectionist and controlling (having to meet impossible standards)
Not being able to sleep, eat or exercise even though you want to
Having messy, stressful, unhappy, or no relationships
Not coping at work with challenging situations
Struggling to communicate and deal with people
You DO have a choice.
You can keep hoping that your thoughts, feelings and behaviour will get better over time. That’s the hard way.
A quicker, more reliable way to do this is to be familiar with how YOUR head works. Then learn the skills and strategies that change problem thoughts and feelings. That’s the easier way.
Practice these new skills so you can navigate the stresses and challenges in life.
Here are some ways I can help you learn about and practice CBT.