Evidence Based treatments/approaches for behavior change (self change)?

Hey, how's it going. So life is going pretty well for me, where it wasn't a few years ago. I actually scored a TEN on the Sanity Score, and most of those points were due to the fact that I'm a smoker. A couple years ago I would have scored so ridiculously high, I probably would have broken your guys' server. Anyway, point is: if you're having a problem, hang in there. The answers are out there. The book that REALLY helped me do a 180 was this book called "The Mood Cure" by an author named Julia Ross. If you're interested, you can type it into Google and find it number of places. Listen, if you have ANY type of emotional problems, check that book. It has a solution for basically everything in there.

Anyway, life is good. My emotional world is great. But there are still a FEW issues I want to take care of, and they were all behavioral things. For example I want to start eating more vegetables, I want to grow my business, I want to start walking up to more girls that I find attractive, and a few other things. Some people are just gonna say "oh just do it!," but those of us who are familiar with psychology know that there tends to be stuff that holds us back fro the way we sometimes want to act.

Anyway, what are the evidence based methodologies for behavior change. I'm really looking for something that's been empirically tested and proven though. There's so much stuff out there that only works for some people that I'm really only interested in approaches that are evidence based and empirical. I've had luck with ACT, but I wasn't able to find any books that specifically pertained to behavior change. I found some that helped me with some unhelpful thought processes, but there I don't feel like I am where I want to be behaviorally.

Anyway, thanks for the help.

Um... How did smoking raise your sanity score?

It's good to hear that your life has improved so much - it's always inspiring to know that it is possible to change and get better.

About your question: you are aware of the fact that "evidence based" and "empirical" does not mean that those methods will work with all people, right? I definitely agree with you that methods have to have some basis in scientific thought, but that's true for most of the major psychotherapy modes or schools. Nobody denies that both relational, behavioural, and psychodynamic modalities have a solid foundation in research and have been clinically proven to be effective, although most major research studies seem to indicate very strongly that the modality matters less than the rapport between therapist and client.

If you are looking for changes in behavioural patterns, I suspect that one of the behavioural modalities, CBT or DBT (the latter being a specialised form of the former, if I understand it correctly) is probably most useful for you.

Smoking was one of the categories they asked questions about. Quite a few questions actually.

Drugs 0
Physical Issues 0
Smoking Issues 38
Gambling Issues 0
Technology Issues 0



Of course... but okay, I've been reading Self-Help type materials for about 10 years now. And if you've ever gotten involved with them, you know there are a lot of dead ends, stuff that doesn't work, theoretical philosophies. In those 10 years of trying to figure out how to solve my own very serious issues, I've seen a lot of stuff that works and a lot of stuff that doesn't work. For the first 8 years or so, I would just pick up anything that made sense to me.

I used to have the mentality "I'll try it if it makes sense to me," and honestly it led me down a lot of disappointing paths. A lot of suffering, and a lot of crap I don't wish on anybody. Somewhere along the line I switched my mentality to "I'll only try it if it passes the most stringent empirical testing," and after I took that mentality, it was like night and day. I was able to systematically destroy each and everyone of my problems.

So now my questions when I'm looking for a new approach for a problem my questions are: "Is it proven," "does it actually get results," "what percentage of people did it work for," "How many times has it been tested," "what was the sample size," and that's what works for me.

There's a lot of really well-meaning staff out there that makes SO much sense, but it just simply doesn't get results. One example being Tony Robbins and his Positive Thinking type materials. Theoretically, they're awesome. But medically someone who has negative thoughts probably has way more complex issues than just "hey you gotta think positively!" can solve.

Anyway, I've never tried actual CBT, but I've tried ACT. ACT is based on CBT but it's a littler different. It's kind of a newer version

Check it out if you've never heard of it:

Wikipedia has a good article if you look up "Acceptance and Commitment Therapy" showing some of the research behind it

A book on ACT called "The Happiness Trap" really helped me get rid of some seriously unhelpful thought patterns that I've had for literally decades.

CBT, I'll definitely willing to try it. Especially since it's "tried and true" and there are 1000 different topics it covers.

As far as DBT, I've actually never heard of it. I'm gonna look into it right now. Thanks!

Now my next question is going to be... does anyone have any books they'd recommend? I'm a Do-It-Yourselfer, so if I want to change myself using CBT or DBT or any other effective self-change system, I just pick up a book on CBT behavior change.

I really would like to know how to change behaviors, that way if an unhelpful one arises in the future, I'll be able to tackle it whenever I need to:

Here's what I'd like to accomplish right now. The sound simple enough, but it really feels like something's holding me back. I want to:

Eat vegetables 3 times a day
My diet is pretty decent, but I really have a hard time motivating myself to eat veges for a full 3 meals.
Grow my business
I know what I have to do, but sometimes I kinda get in a slump where I'm like "tomorrow, tomorrow"
Talk to more girls I find attractive.
I'm a single guy, and girls like me. I'm flirty with them and 90% of the time they're flirty back to me. I just... have speed bumps. Like maybe I'll be flirting with a cashier that's checking out my items, but I'll just say goodbye and leave. All my friends will be like "dude, why didnt you take that chicks number? she was totally into you!".. and I just don't. It's a bad habit because a lot of these girls if I really got to know them, I'd probably really like them. Another thing is, I'd like to be able to just see a girl I find attractive, walk up to her and introduce myself. Whenever I talk to girls I feel like there has to be a reason. Like the only reason I'm flirty with cashiers is because I have to talk to them anyway. I find it hard to just walk up to a chick, introduce myself and communicate interest in them. Like I mentally know that women a lot of times would like for me to ask for their number, but a lot of times it's just easier to walk away. Nothing risked, nothing gained, right? I've probably walked away from so many great women and great opportunities, just because it was "easier" that way. It's stupid, I know, but that's why I wanna fix it.

Anyway, I just feel like I don't have as much control over my own behavior as I'd like to. So a method to correct that would be more than welcome.