[VeronicaS]

Hello, everyone:

Yesterday, I watched a video on CBT. (Search for "kati morton" + "cbt" on YouTube, and it should be the first vid to come up.) One of the suggestions was to track your thoughts, and then questions the underlying assumptions behind those.

Obviously, I don't expect "results" after a day. But what I'm already having difficulty with is this: When I reach those underlying assumptions, that doesn't change anything.

I don't want to give away too much personal information. But I think the issue, for me, is that even though I can challenge those underlying assumptions, I know that they're still based on parts of me that are out of my control. For instance, I've had experiences with the examples she uses in the video, and I can use the technique to come to terms with similar situations, etc. in my life. But what I'm suffering has little to nothing to do with people wronging me and the like.

Does anyone have any insight here?

Thanks for reading my post.

[Skeezyks]

Well... I've never done CBT therapy myself. So I don't have first-hand experience with it. I did go back & take another look at Kati's CBT video. My thinking on this is that what Kati's video is intended to do is to provide information with regard to what CBT therapy is about. It's not intended to be descriptive of a self-help process a person can use to resolve intrusive thoughts. From my perspective, I'm not sure you can "lift" this particular technique out of the CBT program as a whole & expect to really get a whole lot out of it.

There is an analogy I can draw. I'm a student (so to speak) of the ancient Tibetan Buddhist practice which is referred to as "Lojong" (mind training). One of the techniques that is taught within Lojong is "compassionate abiding". This is a technique where one simply allows such experiences as anxiety or intrusive thoughts to be there with lovingkindness & compassion while one breathes into the feeling or thought, perhaps smiles to it, & allows it to fade at it's own pace. This practice has been "adopted", so to speak, into the mental health arena. And, in fact, there is a mental-health-oriented description of the practice on a website I often link people to if I think it may be of interest. Here's the link, by the way:

https://mindsetdoc.wordpress.com/201...e-abiding-101/

But, as much as I personally value this technique, I also know that it's really one component of a much broader & deeper practice. And I sometimes wonder about how much help it can be when it is isolated from that much broader & deeper practice. I have the same concern with regard to the technique you're trying to use. I'm inclined to say that one probably needs to immerse oneself in the total CBT experience with a trained CBT therapist in order to really benefit. But then that is just my personal prejudice. Perhaps other PC members, who've had personal experience with CBT will have other thoughts on the subject. I wish you well...