Cognitive Behavioral Treatment Quotes

Suicide rates have not slumped under the onslaught of antidepressants, mood-stabilizers, anxiolytic and anti-psychotic drugs; the jump in suicide rates suggests that the opposite is true. In some cases, suicide risk skyrockets once treatment begins (the patient may feel not only penalized for a justifiable reaction, but permanently stigmatized as malfunctioning). Studies show that self-loathing sharply decreases only in the course of cognitive-behavioral treatment. ~ Antonella Gambotto-Burke

Buddhists were actually the first cognitive-behavioral therapists. ~ Jack Kornfield

For five years, I have been sick and I have been trying to will myself to be better. To think harder about being better, to improve more. To become a better breather, reactor, meditator, hoping that if I just try hard enough, the symptoms will go away and I'll feel like myself again, like a self I remember as if out of a rearview mirror except with this one, the objects are smaller than they appear. I have tried to force myself to be more clearheaded, energetic, grounded. Tried yoga, acupuncture, cognitive behavioral therapy, talk therapy, and long walks in the woods. And every few months, when I finally felt I'd reached a zenith of my abilities with yoga, CBT, or talk therapy, I would give it another shot: go to another doctor, a Western doctor, one with an M.D. and a white coat, and I would tell him or her my symptoms (for the gender of the doctor does not matter only, it would seem, my gender), and hope that once again, the doctor would pay attention, would take my case, would try to help me so that I didn't have to so deeply and fervently try to help myself. ~ Eva Hagberg

Thus polyvictimization or complex trauma are "developmentally adverse interpersonal traumas" (Ford, 2005) because they place the victim at risk not only for recurrent stress and psychophysiological arousal (e.g., PTSD, other anxiety disorders, depression) but also for interruptions and breakdowns in healthy psychobiological, psychological, and social development. Complex trauma not only involves shock, fear, terror, or powerlessness (either short or long term) but also, more fundamentally, constitutes a violation of the immature self and the challenge to the development of a positive and secure self, as major psychic energy is directed toward survival and defense rather than toward learning and personal development (Ford, 2009b, 2009c). Moreover, it may influence the brain's very development, structure, and functioning in both the short and long term (Lanius et al., 2010; Schore, 2009).

Complex trauma often forces the child victim to substitute automatic survival tactics for adaptive self-regulation, starting at the most basic level of physical reactions (e.g., intense states of hyperarousal/agitation or hypoarousal/immobility) and behavioral (e.g., aggressive or passive/avoidant responses) that can become so automatic and habitual that the child's emotional and cognitive development are derailed or distorted. What is more, self-integrity is profoundly shaken, as the child victim incorporates the "lessons of abuse" into a view of him or herself as bad, inadequate, ~ Christine A. Courtois

Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy

There are almost no pure cognitive or behavioral therapists. Instead, most therapists use a combination of both techniques. This is known as cognitive-behavioral therapy. It is generally recognized as the best therapy for social anxiety.
In cognitive-behavioral therapy, a therapist helps you identity maladaptive thinking patterns and replace them with new ways of thinking. He or she also teaches you relaxation techniques and new behaviors that make you feel more comfortable in social situations.
Cognitive-behavioral therapy uses many of the same techniques that we explored in the previous chapter. Although you might make great strides on your own, sometimes it is easier and faster to have someone guide you. Often it is difficult for people to explore hidden beliefs about themselves. A professional therapist is experienced in working with people who are trying to change. Often a therapist will see connections in your situation that you cannot.

Carlos was terrified of speaking in class. Whenever the teacher called on him, his heart raced, he blushed, and his stomach felt upset.
His therapist first had him focus on his thoughts during class. As an experiment, she had him purposely answer a question incorrectly during biology class. To his surprise, the teacher didn't make a big deal out of it, and the other students didn't laugh. As a result, Carlos realized that his imagined consequences for making errors were gr ~ Heather Moehn

Don't ask why the patient is the way he is, ask for what he would change. ~ Milton H. Erickson

Believe in Your Ability to Cope with Negative Feedback

Just like everyone has a vision blind spot, everyone has cognitive blond spots that can lead to making less than stellar choices. For example, you think an outfit looks good on you, and in reality it doesn't. Or you thought you understood what your boss wanted but later realize you took the instructions in an unintended direction. Since we all have blind spots, making some mistakes and getting some negative feedback is unavoidable. Therefore, unless you plan to go live in a cave, you're going to need a game plan for how you'll cognitively and emotionally cope when negative feedback happens. We'll cover behavioral strategies later in the chapter, but let's work on the thinking and emotional aspects for now.
Experiment: Think about a specific scenario in which you fear negative feedback. If your fears came true:

--How would you go about making the required changes?
--How could you be self-accepting of your sensitivity to criticism? How could you talk to yourself gently about the emotions you're feeling instead of criticizing yourself for feeling upset? How could you be patient with yourself while you're having those feelings?
--What self-care would you do while you wait for your heart and upset feelings to pass? (Yes, rewatching episodes of '90s TV is a totally acceptable answer.)
--What personal support would you access to cope with your emotions? For example, you'd talk to a frie ~ Alice Boyes

Everybody has their reasons. ~ Pierre-Auguste Renoir

Increased physical activity during the school day can help children's attention, classroom behavior, and achievement test scores. Meanwhile, the decline of play is closely linked to ADHD; behavioral problems; and stunted social, cognitive, and creative development. ~ Darell Hammond

As technology increasingly takes over knowledge-based work, the cognitive skills that are central to today's education systems will remain important; but behavioral and non-cognitive skills necessary for collaboration, innovation, and problem solving will become essential as well. ~ Klaus Schwab

Man is the artificer of his own happiness. ~ Henry David Thoreau

The ignorance about the importance of cognitive differences and the behavioral dynamics that operate within their Board is contributing to the generally poor performance of Board. ~ Pearl Zhu

When I force myself to utter the awkward phrase, "I am grateful," I actually start to feel a bit more grateful...It's basic cognitive behavioral therapy: Behave in a certain way, and your mind will eventually catch up with your actions. ~ A.J. Jacobs

Whatever a person frequently thinks and reflects on, that will become the inclination of their mind. ~ Gautama Buddha

Conscientiousness

Not every anxious person is conscientious, but because you're reading a CBT-based self-help book, there's a good chance you're at least moderately high in conscientiousness - a personality trait associated with having a strong work ethic and a thorough, orderly approach to tasks. People high in conscientiousness often get particularly great results from learning cognitive behavioral principles and skills. Why? They tend to like the systematic nature of a cognitive behavioral approach. They do well because they work hard to understand themselves and are diligent in applying their learning to their lives. Anxious people sometimes underestimate how conscientious they are, so make sure you give yourself enough credit for your conscientiousness.
It's important to understand that conscientiousness is not the same thing as perfectionism. For example, perfectionists might spend so long trying to make something "just right" that they don't have any willpower left over for other important tasks. Perfectionism and conscientiousness tend to be associated with opposite outcomes. For example, in a study of older adults, perfectionism was associated with an increased risk or mortality. Conscientiousness was associated with a decreased risk. There are big advantages to reducing perfectionism but retaining your conscientiousness! ~ Alice Boyes

If a child stays quiet in the context of extroverted friends, or even prefers time alone, a parent may worry and even send her to therapy. She might be thrilled - she'll finally get to talk about the stuff she cares about, and without interruption! But if the therapist concludes that the child has a social phobia, the treatment of choice is to increasingly expose her to the situations she fears. This behavioral treatment is effective for treating phobias - if that is truly the problem. If it's not the problem, and the child just likes hanging out inside better than chatting, she'll have a problem soon. Her "illness" now will be an internalized self-reproach: "Why don't I enjoy this like everyone else?" The otherwise carefree child learns that something is wrong with her. She not only is pulled away from her home, she is supposed to like it. Now she is anxious and unhappy, confirming the suspicion that she has a problem. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

Eighty two percent of the traumatized children seen in the National Child Traumatic Stress Network do not meet diagnostic criteria for PTSD.15 Because they often are shut down, suspicious, or aggressive they now receive pseudoscientific diagnoses such as "oppositional defiant disorder," meaning "This kid hates my guts and won't do anything I tell him to do," or "disruptive mood dysregulation disorder," meaning he has temper tantrums. Having as many problems as they do, these kids accumulate numerous diagnoses over time. Before they reach their twenties, many patients have been given four, five, six, or more of these impressive but meaningless labels. If they receive treatment at all, they get whatever is being promulgated as the method of management du jour: medications, behavioral modification, or exposure therapy. These rarely work and often cause more damage. ~ Bessel A. Van Der Kolk

Behavioral Shifts to Overcome Excessive Hesitancy

Important: So far we've been focusing on how tweaking your thinking can help shift your behavior. This is important, but it's only half the story. People are usually quite good at identifying how changes in thoughts or feelings may lead to changes in behavior, such as "When I have more energy, I'll do more exercise" or "When I have more ideas, I'll take more action." However, people tend to underestimate the impact of changing their behavior on their thoughts and feelings, such as "When I exercise more, l'll have more energy" or "When I take more actions, I'll have more ideas." Don't make the mistake of thinking you need to wait for your thoughts to change before you try behavioral shifts. Mental and behavioral shifts go hand in hand. When you start making changes in your behavior (even subtle ones), you'll notice that all kinds of thoughts, including your view of yourself, start to shift. Changing your behavior, without waiting for you thoughts to always shift first, is one of the best and fastest ways you can reduce your anxiety. That's why a cognitive behavioral approach focuses on both thoughts and behaviors. ~ Alice Boyes

We can see that there are many ways in which we actively contribute to our own experience of mental unrest and suffering. Although, in general, mental and emotional afflictions themselves can come naturally, often it is our own reinforcement of those negative emotions that makes them so much worse. For instance when we have anger or hatred towards a person, there is less likelihood of its developing to a very intense degree if we leave it unattended.


However, if we think about the projected injustices done to us, the ways in which we have been unfairly treated, and we keep on thinking about them over and over, then that feeds the hatred. It makes the hatred very powerful and intense. Of course, the same can apply to when we have an attachment towards a particular person; we can feed that by thinking about how beautiful he or she is, and as we keep thinking about the projected qualities that we see in the person, the attachment becomes more and more intense. But this shows how through constant familiarity and thinking, we ourselves can make our emotions more intense and powerful. ~ Dalai Lama XIV

Things can never touch the soul, but stand inert outside it, so that disquiet can arise only from fancies within. ~ Marcus Aurelius

The word dialectic (in dialectical behavior therapy) means to balance and compare two things that appear very different or even contradictory. In dialectical behavior therapy, the balance is between change and acceptance (Linehan, 1993a). You need to change the behaviors in your life that are creating more suffering for yourself and others while simultaneously also accepting yourself the way you are. This might sound contradictory, but it's a key part of this treatment. Dialectical behavior therapy depends on acceptance and change, not acceptance or change. ~ Matthew McKay

Many of the benefits of CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy) can be obtained without going into therapy. There are a number of self-help books, CDs and computer programs that have been used to treat depression and some of these have been tested in clinical trials with positive results. I can particularly recommend these two books. One is 'Control Your Depression', the lead author of which is Peter Lewinsohn, a Professor of Psychology at the University of Oregon ... The other book that I can recommend with confidence is 'Feeling Good' by the psychiatrist David Burns. 'Control Your Depression' emphasizes behavioral techniques like increasing pleasant activities, improving social skills and learning to relax. 'Feeling Good' puts greater emphasis on changing the way people think about themselves. But both books include both cognitive and behavioral techniques. ~ Irving Kirsch

Consumption is a universal phenomenon. All humans consume varieties of products, many of which beyond actual necessity, because it activates the brain's reward center. And the more a certain product activates the reward center with its unique characteristics or its predominant social stature, the more that product gets chiseled into the long-term memory of the consumer, making it a fundamental part of the individual's psychological well being. Thus the human mind grows a deep psychological bond with a product. And this bond can grow so strong in time that it would defend itself from all sorts of criticisms. It is the brain's way to maintain its internal purely individualistic well being. Hence, a strong psychological bond between the mind and a product slowly not only becomes invincible to criticisms, but also, develops its own cognitive immune system against such criticisms. ~ Abhijit Naskar

Everyone in a complex system has a slightly different interpretation. The more interpretations we gather, the easier it becomes to gain a sense of the whole. ~ Margaret J. Wheatley

We must take care of our minds because we cannot benefit from beauty when our brains are missing. ~ Euripides

There are a variety of techniques to help people change the kind of thinking that leads them to become depressed. These techniques are called cognitive behavioral therapy. ~ Irving Kirsch

Two Awesome Hours in the Morning After identifying your MIT, you need to turn it into a calendar item and book it as early in your day as possible. Dan Ariely, a Duke University professor of psychology and behavioral economics, suggests that most people are most productive and have the highest cognitive functioning in the first two hours after they're fully awake. In a Reditt Ask Me Anything, Ariely wrote: One of the saddest mistakes in time management is the propensity of people to spend the two most productive hours of their day on things that don't require high cognitive capacity (like social media). If we could salvage those precious hours, most of us would be much more successful in accomplishing what we truly want. ~ Kevin Kruse

For example, in order to identify these schemas or clarify faulty relational expectations, therapists working from an object relations, attachment, or cognitive behavioral framework often ask themselves (and their clients) questions like these: 1. What does the client tend to want from me or others? (For example, clients who repeatedly were ignored, dismissed, or even rejected might wish to be responded to emotionally, reached out to when they have a problem, or to be taken seriously when they express a concern.) 2. What does the client usually expect from others? (Different clients might expect others to diminish or compete with them, to take advantage and try to exploit them, or to admire and idealize them as special.) 3. What is the client's experience of self in relationship to others? (For example, they might think of themselves as being unimportant or unwanted, burdensome to others, or responsible for handling everything.) 4. What are the emotional reactions that keep recurring? (In relationships, the client may repeatedly find himself feeling insecure or worried, self-conscious or ashamed, or - for those who have enjoyed better developmental experiences - perhaps confident and appreciated.) 5. As a result of these core beliefs, what are the client's interpersonal strategies for coping with his relational problems? (Common strategies include seeking approval or trying to please others, complying and going along with what others want them to do, emotionally disengaging o ~ Edward Teyber

He who neglects what is done for what ought to be done, sooner effects his ruin than his preservation. ~ Niccolo Machiavelli

In my own field, I know that solid science can easily be done with ethics and compassion. There's nothing wrong with compassionate or sentimental science or scientists. Studies of animal thought, emotions, and self-awareness, as well as behavioral ecology and conservation biology, can all be compassionate as well as scientifically rigorous. Science and the ethical treatment of animals aren't incompatible. We can do solid science with an open mind and a big heart.
I encourage everyone to go where their hearts take them, with love, not fear. If we all travel this road, the world will be a better place for all beings. Kinder and more humane choices will be made when we let our hearts lead the way. Compassion begets compassion and caring for and loving animals spills over into compassion and caring for humans. The umbrella of compassion is very important to share freely and widely. ~ Marc Bekoff

[There will be movement toward] behavioral economics ... [which] involves study of those aspects of men's images, or cognitive and affective structures that are more relevant to economic decisions. ~ Kenneth E. Boulding

Because of my bipolar disorder, I tend to these mixed states, which are depressed but loud and agitated. So I can be terribly irritable. I go to cognitive behavioral therapy in order not to yell at my children. ~ Ayelet Waldman

Great leaders don't lead others with bitterness or resentfulness of past mistakes, they lead with hope and knowledge of the past to inform greater decision making in the future. ~ Spencer Fraseur

The psychologist Mark Schaller has shown that disgust is part of what he calls the "behavioral immune system" - a set of cognitive modules that are triggered by signs of infection or disease in other people and that make you want to get away from those people.40 ~ Jonathan Haidt

The present non-aristotelian system is based on fundamental negative premises; namely, the complete denial of 'identity.' ~ Alfred Korzybski

It has been demonstrated that a species of penicillium produces in culture a very powerful antibacterial substance which affects different bacteria in different degrees. Generally speaking it may be said that the least sensitive bacteria are the Gram-negative bacilli, and the most susceptible are the pyogenic cocci ... In addition to its possible use in the treatment of bacterial infections penicillin is certainly useful ... for its power of inhibiting unwanted microbes in bacterial cultures so that penicillin insensitive bacteria can readily be isolated. ~ Alexander Fleming

We shall see that the mathematical treatment of the subject [of electricity] has been greatly developed by writers who express themselves in terms of the 'Two Fluids' theory. Their results, however, have been deduced entirely from data which can be proved by experiment, and which must therefore be true, whether we adopt the theory of two fluids or not. The experimental verification of the mathematical results therefore is no evidence for or against the peculiar doctrines of this theory. ~ James Clerk Maxwell

The assumption that animals are without rights and the illusion that our treatment of them has no moral significance is a positively outrageous example of Western crudity and barbarity. Universal compassion is the only guarantee of morality. ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

Lear's daughters and their loathsome husbands are all deservedly slaughtered for their ill treatment of an aged ruler (one of the reasons that tragedy remains so huge in Asia) ~ Boris Johnson

For theater, the fashion had to have a certain grandeur that would read on the stage while also flattering the actress. The same thing applies when doing a wedding dress, but the treatments can be more delicate and there can be much more detail. ~ Austin Scarlett