Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

What Is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy?

Most of us go through our lives without really examining the things we tell ourselves. We tend to take our own beliefs at face value instead of questioning them—we think “I’m not good enough,” “I’m not attractive,” or, “I can’t trust anyone,” and view these statements as facts.

What’s more, our beliefs have a profound effect on our emotions, behavior, and day-to-day decision-making. We may decide to turn down a date because we don’t feel attractive or pass up a new job opportunity because we think we’re not qualified.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is a form of counseling that can help you become more aware of your own thought patterns and understand how they might not reflect reality. You can learn to challenge and reframe the way you see yourself and the world around you. And once you shift your perspective, it becomes easier to relieve symptoms of anxiety, depression, and other mental health issues. You can feel more confident in who you are and avoid catastrophizing and falling into black-and-white thinking patterns.

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What Makes Cognitive Behavioral Therapy So Effective?

The brain has a remarkable ability to change and adapt to new information, and neuroscientists have a term for this: neuroplasticity. The beauty of CBT is that it taps into the power of neuroplasticity. By teaching you to develop healthier thought patterns and belief systems, you can literally create new neural pathways in your brain and make changes to your brain chemistry and your mood.

The brain is full of neurotransmitters that send messages to different parts of the body. Conditions like depression and anxiety lower the ability of these neurotransmitters to function properly. By equipping you with new information and new coping skills, CBT helps neurotransmitters function properly again, able to successfully transmit messages through pathways in the nervous system.

In this way, CBT is evidence-based and science-backed. It is the most widely research form of therapy in existence, and no other type of therapy has been shown to be systematically superior (1). Over the years, numerous studies have shown that it can effectively treat depression, anxiety, and a plethora of other mental health disorders (2).

One study found that CBT is as effective at treating mild to moderate depression symptoms as antidepressants (3). According to another study, clients who underwent CBT therapy showed sustained improvements in their symptoms six months after treatment, demonstrating the approach’s long-term efficacy (4).

So it’s no wonder, then, that CBT is generally viewed as the gold standard for treating anxiety and depression. I’ve used it to help hundreds of clients overcome negative beliefs and behaviors, and I’m confident that I can help you, too.

How Does Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Work?

CBT is a structured model of therapy that is generally short term. It starts out by helping you explore the facts about a situation you’re facing and then assessing whether or not your thoughts about it are factual. For instance, let’s suppose that there are going to be layoffs at your company, and your response is: “I’ll be fired and end up on the street.” Using CBT, you and I will explore this automatic response and ask whether or not it is really more likely than the alternatives.

The goal is to increase your awareness to the point where you can understand how cognitive distortions are impacting your interpretation of events. By choosing a more balanced and realistic way of looking at triggering events, you can interrupt cycles of emotional distress.

To help you accomplish this, I may encourage you to use a thought record, which is essentially a journal of unhelpful thoughts and beliefs. The thought record can help you put into writing questions like: What is the triggering event? How did it make me feel? Is there evidence to suggest that my beliefs about it actually may not be true? If I changed my beliefs about the event, how would that make me feel?

This kind of activity can be vital for relapse prevention, since it can help you press stop on your automatic thoughts and identify if you’re catastrophizing, generalizing, falling into all-or-nothing thought patterns, etc. As a result, CBT allows you shift your behaviors in a more positive direction. It encourages an increase in pleasurable activities, even when you lack the motivation, to help break the vicious cycle of depression. You can avoid engaging in behavioral choices that aren’t in line with your goals and values, and you can live a life that’s truer to your authentic self.

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How Can A Cognitive Behavioral Approach Benefit Your Life?

Clients often find that engaging in long term “talk therapy,” while it can provide valuable insights, does not provide them with ways to change how they interpret events or understand how their repetitive negative thought patterns are influencing their interpretation of events. Quite often, unhelpful thought patterns can trigger the symptoms of depression and anxiety more than the actual event itself.

The great thing about CBT is that it directly confronts these unhelpful thinking and behavioral patterns rather than focusing on external events that can’t be controlled. It gets right to the source of unhealthy habits and behaviors, leading to deeper fulfillment and long-lasting gains.

Additionally, CBT can teach you to break the cycle of solely blaming others or situations for your symptoms of depression and anxiety. You can empower yourself to develop more balanced and realistic ways of interpreting events. This can help you improve your mood and behavior, thereby reducing symptoms of depression and anxiety.

You Can Choose A Different Pathway Through The Power Of CBT

I have been introducing clients to the benefits of CBT since I began working as a therapist in 2010. In that time, I’ve worked with hundreds of clients who have found transformation through this approach. Many of them are incredibly grateful for the lightbulb moments that CBT provides. When they realize that they don’t have to keep living in old patterns—that they can choose a different pathway—a lightbulb comes on and they are able to see their lives with greater clarity and insight.

If you want to experience the transformative power of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for yourself, I encourage you to email me, fill out the contact form , or call me at 650-675-2604. I look forward to hearing from you!

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