Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT)

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy uses a simple but powerful set of ideas to help change the unhelpful patterns we can get caught up in.

An important idea in CBT is that it’s not the events that happen to us that make us feel the way we do, but the beliefs we form about those events. Sometimes those beliefs can be unrealistically negative, leading to higher levels of emotional distress. The therapy really illuminates how these and other elements of our experience can be involved in our problems. Alongside our thoughts and feelings, the focus of our attention, our behaviour and body sensations can reinforce each other to keep a problem going. 

Looking at problems in this way, we often find that ‘the solution is the problem’ - the thing that we do to cope with our problem can be the very thing that keeps it in place. An example might be how we often withdraw when we’re feeling low, which provides relief in the short term but quickly worsens our mood over time as we miss out on what would otherwise make us feel better. Another example might be that having the expectation 'I will be rejected' might make us look out for and zoom in on what seems like signs of this from other people, overlooking evidence of acceptance.

Understanding what keeps a problem going empowers us to think of possible ways to break the cycle. We then work together to do this by testing the truthfulness of thoughts and experimenting in changing behaviours.

Once these techniques are learned it’s possible to apply them to other problems and so to become your own therapist. 

CBT is often suitable for shorter term work of between eight and twenty sessions.

It works best for problems in the ‘here and now’ that show up in distressing symptoms. It’s often a great approach for anxiety issues and some forms of depression. 

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