A PSA about CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy)

howtosurvivementalillness:

Since I know not everyone can afford therapy, or cannot convince their guardians that they need therapy, or just might be afraid of telling others of their mental state, here is a post about how you can help yourself. 

CBT means combining Cognitive (the way you think) and Behavioral (the way you act) functions in a way to help overcome negative thinking habits or self destructive actions. 

So how does it work? The main idea behind CBT is that if you can train yourself to change your thinking habits, you can then use this to change the way you act, helping you get out of the mental rut you’ve been in. It is quite literally “fake it till you make it” but in a more structured way.

Lets say for example you have trouble making friends and feel isolated because you don’t think people like you, you think you’re annoying, or any other negative trait you think you have.  Because you think these things of yourself, odds are you aren’t going to be going to new places or trying to meet new people because you think won’t like you off the bat.  

Now to handle this in a CBT format, the first step is training yourself to catch when you have negative or intrusive thoughts. So for this scenario, you would catch yourself saying “I can’t make new friends” or “I’m too annoying they would hate me”.  This is where the cognitive part comes in. When you catch yourself feeling/thinking this way, you have to actively stop and say to yourself, no, thats not true. I am fun to be around, people will like me, I can do this. It doesn’t matter if you don’t believe it, you have to say it anyway. You have to sit down and call your own brain out because it is not treating you fairly. I know this is much harder than it sounds, but it is so important to do. The more you do this, over time the intrusive thoughts will lessen and the good ones will come instead. And in the meantime, you are reminding yourself that these thoughts even though they feel very real are not actually the truth. 

The next step is changing your behavior, meaning changing the way these intrusive thoughts effect the way you act or treat yourself. So in the case of this scenario, because you’ve convinced yourself people don’t like you you end up isolating yourself.  To change this, once you catch the intrusive thoughts you have to do something to encourage the positive ones you’re trying to switch to. The trick is to start small and then work your way up to “more difficult” tasks. So instead of staying home, you should go out to a place where you can meet other people, like a club, class, or volunteer activity you are interested in. By going to these places with activities you like, you’re more likely to meet likeminded people making you feel less isolated. Then, as you gain more confidence, the next step would be to speak up more at these events, reminding yourself that you are not annoying and these people are here for the same reasons you are. Once you’ve gotten comfortable speaking, the next step is to talk to a specific person, and either make plans, ask for a number, or even just have a conversation with them if that is all you can manage. As you move on to bigger things it will be easier to control and ignore intrusive or negative thinking, making it easier to take even bigger steps towards your goal. 

The most important things to remember are that starting small is better than not starting at all, and that this will not be a change that happens overnight. It will take time to change the way you think, especially if like me you’ve suffered from mental illness/disorders for most of your life. But if you keep at it, you will eventually notice you’re thoughts shifting, and that is a glorious feeling. Also, don’t be ashamed if you slide backwards and start having trouble again with old thoughts or habits. Recovery is not a linear process. 

I hope this was helpful to some of you, it’s hard but a process but it is worth it. Good luck, keep at it, and let’s recover together.