In 1980, Dr. David D. Burns published one of the best books for helping people with depression called 'Feeling Good: the New Mood Therapy.' In 5 controlled outcome studies, researchers found that 70% of those who read Feeling Good, over the duration of 4 weeks, improved without any other treatment and maintained that improvement up to 3 years.
Dr. Burns focuses on Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) as a means to identify automatic thoughts, recognize any cognitive distortion in those thoughts, and replace the distorted thoughts with more realistic or rational thoughts. In his book, he identifies 10 cognitive distortions and uses a multitude of case studies to show how to apply the cognitive technique to practical situations.
Burns 3 Principles of CBT:
1: “All your moods are created by your “cognitions,” or thoughts...cognition refers to the way you look at things - your perceptions, mental attitudes, and beliefs. It includes the way you interpret things - what you say about something or someone to yourself. You feel the way you do right now because of the thoughts you are thinking at this moment." (Burns 1999, FG 12)
2: "When you are feeling depressed, your thoughts are dominated by a pervasive negativity. You perceive not only yourself but the entire world in dark, gloomy terms...you’ll come to believe things really are as bad as you imagine them to be." (Burns 1999, FG 12)
3: "The negative thoughts which cause your emotional turmoil nearly always contain gross distortions...appear valid, you will learn that they are irrational or just plain wrong, and that twisted thinking is a major cause of your suffering” (Burns 1999, FG 13)
"Neurological fact that before you can experience any event, you must process it with your mind and give it meaning...You must understand what is happening to you before you can feel it." (Burns 1999, FG 28-29)
Hazard of Dismissiveness
Reading through Feeling Good will offer the individual an opportunity to see the method put into practice. It is important to understand the meaning of what someone is trying to say and not dismiss an individuals communication by disregarding a distorted thought. It is important to determine the meaning of what the distorted thought is representing.
Once we have a sense of what the individual is attempting to represent or communicate, we can then reformulate the thought in more realistic terms. If we automatically disregard what an other or our self is communicating, we may interrupt their self-expression while in an emotionally charged state. It is more effective to allow the individual to express their emotions, then once we understand, we can help either our self or another compose more realistic thoughts that will not produce such harmful emotional states in the future.
It is important to ask what the meaning of the thoughts or the emotions are if they appear to be unrealistic due to cognitive distortions. We can also inquire about the motivation for the individual or our self in saying or thinking the thought to understand its meaning.
Burns Cognitive Distortions:
1. All-or-Nothing Thinking
The person sees the world in black or white categories. If they do not perform perfectly, they see themselves as a failure. Ex: I went for an interview and I didn't get the job. I can't do anything right.
2. Overgeneralization
The person sees a single negative event as pattern of failure for the future. Ex: When I was paying for my groceries at the cashier, I forgot my wallet. I will always forget my money when I buy groceries."
3. Mental Filter
Focus on single negative detail that distorts one's perception of reality. Ex: I spilled coffee on myself this morning and nothing seems to be going right all day.
4. Disqualifying the Positive
Dismissing positive experiences by saying they don't count and maintain a negative belief about something even though one's experience is otherwise. Ex: Jim - "Hey Jennie, your hair looks nice today." Jennie - "I do it like this all the time, it doesn't count."
5. Jumping to Conclusions
Making negative interpretations of future events;
a) Mind Reading: assuming other people's intentions, Ex: Victoria didn't answer my text so she must be mad at me.
b) Fortune Telling: assuming the outcome of an event, though no sufficient facts or evidence is present. Ex: I'm probably going to crash my car while driving to my parents next weekend.
6. Magnification (Catastrophizing) or Minimization
Over exaggerate the importance of a negative event or shrink a positive event so it is meaningless. Ex 1: You didn't give me that 80 bucks yesterday. You ruined everything and now I am fucked! Ex 2: Yah I passed the test but you know what, it doesn't matter because I have more tests, I have to work, and my girlfriend is cranky.
7. Emotional Reasoning
Belief that one's negative emotions reflect the way reality is. Ex: "I feel bad therefore I am a bad person."
8. Should Statements
A person attempts to motivate themselves with words like 'should or shouldn't.' The consequence of talking to oneself this way is feeling guilty when we don't meet the unrealistic standards we make for ourselves. Ex: I should not drink this beer.
When 'should' statements are directed towards other people, we can become angry, frustrated and feel resentful when they don't meet our expectations. Ex: That guy shouldn't of cut me off!
9. Labeling and Mislabeling
An extreme version of overgeneralization where instead of describing a mistake we attach a negative label to our self or others. Ex: "I am an idiot!" or "They are idiots!"
Mislabeling occurs when we describe an event with unnecessarily emotionally loaded terms or language. Ex: Someone drops the milk by mistake, 'You fucking asshole!'
10. Personalization
Blame oneself as the cause of an external event or another's behaviour that the individual is not actually responsible for. Ex: My husband was really upset after work. I feel so bad that he was in a bad mood. It's all my fault.
Mental Self Defense
Reading 'Feeling Good' will offer the necessary practice one can use to formulate their thoughts in ways that do not make matters worse or perpetuate unnecessary harm to one's self-esteem. Understanding our emotions is important and learning to translate them into accurate and realistic thoughts is a great skill to learn.
Even if one does't have serious depression, it is important to proactively protect oneself from these distorted thinking patterns. I like the analogy of being in a boat with holes in it. Any energy used to scoop water out from the holes in the boat takes away from energy used to paddle in the direction we want to go. Fixing, and preventing, the holes in the boat will only assist us further in our journey and direct our energy in the most efficient way.
AJ 6.2.18, 14.3.18, 16.5.18, 5.6.18, 19.7.18, 27.3.20
Amazon Link to Burns' 'Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy':
https://www.amazon.ca/Feeling-Good-New-Mood-Therapy/dp/0380810336/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1517959189&sr=1-1&keywords=burns+feeling+good
ISBN: 978-0380810338
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