I am facing a huge issue at the moment and this has placed me in a state of panic and anxiety for two days.
The mediation meeting finally came and it was heavily emotional and I came out feeling more fearful and sad. The thought I had about the outcome of the meeting were true and it made me realize that I have more to face and think about. My thoughts are already lost on what will happen and what it will cost us. The emotional tension and anxiety have made me lose sleep and have nightmares and have completely placed me on edge and it seemed to be aggravated by my husbands constant mention of the issue.Albert Ellis, the founder of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy said that man has the capacity to think for himself and to change one’s behavior; however, he also said that the main source of problems and anxiety are the irrational thoughts that man has the knack of easily believing (Corey & Corey, 1998). If I went to Ellis with my problem, then he would probably tell me that I should change my mental conversations and self-talk, he would ask me what have made me fear the outcome of the meeting when in fact it is a mediation meeting.
He would not tell me that anticipating the future and fearing the unknown is not wise, instead he would tell me that he is there to listen and to help me get through my fears and anxiety. Moreover, he would let me experience exercises or activities wherein I would examine my thoughts and my emotions and when I get to understand that my emotions can be changed by my thoughts, then I would be given the chance to think positively about the situation. On the other hand, Beck of the cognitive therapy would tell me that because I think negatively of the situation, I also feel negatively about it.According to Beck, the root of depression or anxieties is how we think about our life and our present situations (Corey & Corey, 1998). He would tell me that because I was dreading the mediation meeting, was the reason why I was anxious and emotionally distraught during the meeting. Beck also says that internal dialogues used to monitor and evaluate one’s thoughts cause depression and anxiety, therefore, changing one’s internal dialogues or replacing it with more positive ones would lead to feeling better.
Beck would therefore ask me what happened in the meeting, what made me say it was very emotional and were there observable evidences of my conclusions. In this way, I would be able to evaluate whether my thoughts were real of not and hence restructuring my perception of the issue. Beck and Ellis therapeutic approach is similar in how they attribute the cause of emotional discomfort, depression or anxiety from the internal thought processes of the individual. Both relied on internal dialogues or self-talk as the process by which the mind communicates to the person what to feel and how to act.
Further, the two approaches are similar because they both consider the restructuring of the mind or thoughts of the individual as the key to the therapeutic process. Meanwhile, REBT and CT are different from each other because REBT uses techniques that span from the cognitive, emotional and behavioral aspects of the individual, while CT is solely based on cognitive restructuring. REBT uses homework, disputing false beliefs, modeling, self-management strategies and the like while CT relies on homework focused on self-analysis and monitoring, as well as adopting s Socratic dialogue with the patient.When faced with a client that has irrational thoughts, I would first use the CT method of guided self-discovery, I would ask the client what his thoughts are and then to point out whether his thoughts are based on clear and objective evidence, then I would proceed with REBT’s disputing faulty beliefs, to teach coping statements and to remain open to the client and give unconditional acceptance and maybe a little humor would do well.
