Robin spends a lot of time before each hypnotherapy session using Cognitive and Rational Emotive Behaviour counselling, combined with hypnotherapy the long term results are superb. This counselling approach is modern and effective.
Unlike standard Person Centred Counselling, REBT & CBT are directive and helpful. CBT is the most trialled therapy in the world that consistently yields good results. Standard counselling hopes that the client will attain self-actualization because the counsellor shows positive regard towards him/her. This in my view is conditional!
REBT counselling teaches unconditional self acceptance USA. This is central to the philosophy of this original cognitive therapy.
Rebt/CBT counselling is action orientated. You know the old saying: You can feed a person for the day or you can teach them how to hunt for the rest of their life. REBT counselling does just this.
OVERVIEW of REBT which is the predominant therapy utilised in my counselling practice in Edinburgh. With thanks to my great friends; Drs Albert & Debbie Joffe Ellis
Rational emotive behaviour therapy (REBT), a theory of personality and a method of psychotherapy developed in the 1950s by clinical psychologist Albert Ellis, holds that when a highly charged emotional consequence (C) follows a significant activating event (A), event A may seem to, but actually does not, cause C. Instead, emotional consequences are largely created by B-the individual’s belief system. When an undesirable emotional consequence occurs, such as severe anxiety, this usually involves the person’s irrational beliefs, and when these beliefs are effectively disputed (at point D), by challenging them rationally and behaviourally, the disturbed consequences are reduced. From its inception, REBT has viewed cognition and emotion integratively, with thought, feeling, desires, and action interacting with each other. It is therefore a comprehensive cognitive-affective-behavioural theory and practice of psychotherapy (Ellis, 1962, 1994; Ellis & Harper, 1997; Ellis & Ellis, 2011).
Formerly known as rational emotive therapy (RET), this approach is more accurately referred to as rational emotive behaviour therapy (REBT). From the beginning, REBT considered the importance of both mind and body or of thinking, feeling, wanting (contents of the mind according to psychology) and of behavior (the operations of the body). It is a holistic approach. It has stressed that personality change can occur in both directions: Therapists can talk with people and attempt to change their minds so that they will rational emotive behavior therapy –
Albert Ellis and Debbie Joffe Ellis Albert Ellis (1913-2007)
We can help clients change their behaviours and thus modify their thinking. As stated in several early writings on REBT that are reprinted in The Albert Ellis Reader (Ellis & Blau, 1998) and in more recent writings such as Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (Ellis & Ellis, 2011), REBT theory states that humans rarely change a profound self-defeating belief unless they act against it. Thus, it is most accurately called rational emotive behavior therapy. The main propositions of REBT can be described as follows:
1. People are born with a potential to be rational (self-constructive) as well as irrational (self-defeating). They have predispositions to be self-preserving, to think about their thinking, to be creative, to be sensuous, to be interested in other people, to learn from their mistakes, and to actualize their potential for life and growth. They also tend to be self-destructive, to be short-range hedonists, to avoid thinking things through, to procrastinate, to repeat the same mistakes, to be superstitious, to be intolerant, to be perfectionistic and grandiose, and to avoid actualizing their potential for growth.
2. People’s tendency to irrational thinking, self-damaging habituations, wishful thinking, and intolerance is frequently exacerbated by their culture and their family group. Their suggestibility (or conditionability) is greatest during their early years because they are dependent on and highly influenced by family and social pressures.
3. Humans perceive, think, emote, and behave simultaneously. They are, therefore, at one and the same time cognitive, conative (purposive), and motoric. They rarely act without implicit thinking. Their sensations and actions are viewed in a framework of prior experiences, memories, and conclusions. People seldom emote without thinking because their feelings include and are usually triggered by an appraisal of a given situation and its importance. People rarely act without simultaneously perceiving, thinking, and emoting because these processes provide reasons for acting. For this reason, it is usually desirable to use a variety of perceptual-cognitive, emotiveevocative, and behaviouralistic-reeducative methods (Bernard & Wolfe, 1993; Ellis, 1962, 1994, 2001a, 2001b, 2002, 2003a; Ellis & Ellis, 2011; Walen, DiGiuseppe, & Dryden, 1992).
4. Even though all the major psychotherapies employ a variety of cognitive, emotive, and behavioural techniques, and even though all (including unscientific methods such as witch doctoring) may help individuals who have faith in them, they are probably not all equally effective or efficient. Highly cognitive, active-directive, homeworkassigning, and discipline-oriented therapies such as REBT are likely to be more effective, usually in briefer periods and with fewer sessions.
5. REBT emphasizes the philosophy of unconditional acceptance: specifically, unconditional self-acceptance (USA), unconditional other acceptance (UOA), and unconditional life acceptance (ULA). This is explained in The Myth of Self-Esteem (Ellis, 2005a). The humanistic principle of unconditional acceptance holds this assumption regarding human worth: I exist, I deserve to exist, I am a fallible human, and I can choose to accept myself unconditionally with my flaws and mistakes with or without great achievements-simply because I am alive, simply because I exist. It says that conditional self-esteem is one of the greatest of all human disturbances because it leads to people praising themselves when they do well and are approved by others and damning themselves if they don’t do well and others disapprove of them. Rating traits and behaviors can be beneficial because it allows one to learn from mistakes and to improve and grow, but to overgeneralize and rate one’s whole worth, being, and totality as “good” or “bad” is inaccurate and harmful. A person’s totality is too complex and ephemeral to define and measure. Hence, USA, not self esteem, is recommended in REBT.
I look forward to you enquiring more about REBT/CBT counselling in Edinburgh.