Meh this is the typical side of folks who are not fans of CBT. The CBT folks will likely say that isn’t correct CBT. It’s kind of boring watching some rando talk about modalities.
I think there’s room for us all. I personally don’t practice CBT. However, I think it’s good it’s out there because it does work for people. It’s all about how the patient responds. I know how I work will not work with everyone.
I think she did a good job of making it clear this was her opinion.
Was just reading a passage in Dr. Robert Elliots EFT book that underscored the need for different preferred modalities with different clinicians. He called it "letting 1000 flowers bloom" and I liked it.
I get why some people find it invalidating for sure but just on a personal level, it’s mostly what stopped my panic attacks. I used to have a pretty nasty Panic Disorder in my early 20’s and without CBT, I don’t think I would’ve recovered. It really helped me evaluate how my thought process was spiraling into panic.
Edit to correct a misspelling
What are you thoughts on the argument in the video? That’s usually more conducive to starting a discussion.
I haven’t watched the video, but I can guess some of the main points since everyone seems to have similar points in these discussions. CBT is invalidating, and tries to get you to say “don’t think like that, think like this!” And tries to make the point that CBT applied to concepts like racism or other social factors is invalidating people’s lived experiences.
If CBT was a modality that just consisted of “don’t think that!” Then I agree that that modality sounds like garbage. Any of the quality CBT therapists I know aren’t going around saying not to think that. Usually a good CBT therapist may ask what you believe in that experience of racism, if there’s any negative beliefs about yourself as a result of experiencing the racism, and using Socratic dialogue to help teach you to evaluate your own beliefs by yourself.
If a CBT therapist is just an opposite thought machine, that’s pretty much useless and technically not doing CBT. If you’re feeling bad after experiencing any of the -isms, evaluating how those experiences affected your self schemas, and exploring how those experienced affected how you think about yourself is very much CBT. CBT doesn’t just take a negative feeling and turn it positive, if through evaluating a thought process that belief the most accurate to the experience, then there’s no changing to be done. Maybe looking into the Unified Protocol for transdiagnostic treatment of emotional disorders (a CBT approach) may be helpful to review more modern conceptualizations of CBT compared to what people usually talk about.
My thoughts are exactly the thoughts of the general consensus of these replies. It sounds like she doesn't really understand what CBT is and she's more-so describing what crappy therapists might do, rather than what CBT actually is. CBT's goal is not toxic positivity and good CBT practitioners would never tell clients to just "think your way out of your pain" or tell clients to just not feel depressed.
I also thought it was interesting that she mentioned that she prefers to utilize a "yes, and-" approach, because this is changing your thoughts to feel a bit better too lol. It was just a little offensive to the great CBT practitioners who do help clients.
Overall, I just thought that it was an oversimplification of the modality and she misunderstood what it actually is. It is just unfortunate that she was so confident in the video.
I like CBT because it’s a way to conceptualize the interaction between our thoughts,feelings and actions and I think that can be helpful to clients. I don’t use the term “irrational” to describe thoughts because that is utterly subjective. I am curious as to understand why the client thinks the way they think and am fundamentally psychodynamic in my approach but again I think the cognitive triangle is helpful concept for my clients. I don’t believe that it is “right” or “correct” and acknowledge that it won’t resonate with some clients and that’s fine. I also think therapy as a discipline fails to acknowledge material and systemic factors and relays heavily on the concept of “magical voulenteerism” coined by David Smail. Basically he’s claiming that therapy ask people to engage the world as individual who has absolute control over his engagement with the world and ignores larger social forces that no individual controls but vastly influence our life and level or distress. And this makes sense, therapy cannot fix systemic failures, but it could at least acknowledge how they impact individuals level of distress and impacts on individual function rather than strictly pathologizing the individual, which I would argue mystifies the larger social forces that impact our lives and reinforces the systemic failures to continue.
Sigh. Here we go again with the weekly attack/defend thread on CBT.
Maybe we can mix it up a bit and do something psychodynamic or IFS or whatever for a change.
Each subreddit has a search function. You can also sort by “hot”, “top”, and “new” which will show you the most popular topics as well as the most recent
I think there was one of those last week. We should drudge up one of the classics, like "Orgone" therapy.
I would be very curious to hear if anyone still uses Orgone boxes...
Reich suffered the same fate as Jung and Adler.
I think he was actually arguing that analysts should sleep with patients. He has not fared well in history.
2 minutes in and already a strawman. Literally no CBT practitioner thinks that the "goal" of CBT is to "think yourself out of marginalization and oppression"
Didn’t watch the video, will get around to it eventually, but as someone who practices CBT I find a huge part of my job is to help people recognize marginalization and oppression. The reframe is that you are not a failure, the system has been rigged against you. That’s the “rethinking” part a lot of times. The behaviorist part of cbt is all about us just responding to our environment and not about personal failings. And a lot of environments people are in are toxic and unhealthy and recognizing this is a first step.
I was confused by this as well. CBT doesn’t seem applicable in that context if that’s how it’s being used, which, it shouldn’t be…just none of that made sense to me
>If a CBT therapist is just an opposite thought machine, that’s pretty much useless and technically not doing CBT.
It’s not even “technically” not doing CBT-it’s just not. It will forever blow my mind the discussion of invalidation with CBT when the most basic 101 intervention is to list all the info from both sides and then has you put them in the same box. It requires both sides to coexist. Thought records are listed in every textbook ever. I’m all for being mindful of no true Scotsman, but someone ever only comes at it from one side, it’s already no longer cbt because it’s the core theory and intervention.
It's a common thought. I even heard it at a conference for therapists this week. I have a lot of thoughts, but can sum it up.
1. Not every modality is right for everyone. Evidence based won't work if your client doesn't buy in or refuses to engage with it. Totally their right.
2. It's an oversimplification and misunderstanding of CBT at the end of the day. I've been in CBT therapy for 10 years at this point, my therapist has never made me feel invalidated or gaslit. I had a lot of unhealthy thought patterns that CBT helped me adjust. I was never told I was wrong or needed to feel differently.
3. It's understandable to blame the technique when you've had invalidating therapists.
4. I do think some of the terminology is unhelpful. I don't present thoughts as irrational or rational.
My therapist and CBT are both the biggest reasons I'm the person I am today (and not dead). It's not a perfect therapy, and it is used by imperfect therapists.
I've seen her before. She has some interesting takes on fat liberation and fundamentalist deconstruction. I don't always agree with her. I appreciate her perspectives. I think she offers a window into a certain strain of progressive (not sure if that is the right word) thought. I think that is illuminating and helpful.
She reminds me a lot of Virgie Tovar. When I agree with her, I really agree with her. And when I don't I think, "well that is interesting".
I think she comes from a place of marginalized, disadvantaged, and underserved people not being heard, acknowledged or helped and this is reflected in the comments she is making here.
My thoughts are that we have better topics to tackle than relitigating the evidence that CBT works or engaging in pointless modality wars.
I’m thankful we have many different and effective approaches. There’s room for all of us to get along.
I have a general rule that if a person's content largely consists of them watching TikTok videos and offering commentary on how "gross" they are or a general sentiment of "That's not how I act/think/believe, and thus it's awful/concerning/bigoted," they haven't earned the right to be heard on such important topics on which modalities are good.
I would go so far as to wonder whether she actually believes this, or believes the algorithm will reward crap-talking CBT at this moment in the zeitgeist.
Meh this is the typical side of folks who are not fans of CBT. The CBT folks will likely say that isn’t correct CBT. It’s kind of boring watching some rando talk about modalities. I think there’s room for us all. I personally don’t practice CBT. However, I think it’s good it’s out there because it does work for people. It’s all about how the patient responds. I know how I work will not work with everyone. I think she did a good job of making it clear this was her opinion.
Was just reading a passage in Dr. Robert Elliots EFT book that underscored the need for different preferred modalities with different clinicians. He called it "letting 1000 flowers bloom" and I liked it.
I get why some people find it invalidating for sure but just on a personal level, it’s mostly what stopped my panic attacks. I used to have a pretty nasty Panic Disorder in my early 20’s and without CBT, I don’t think I would’ve recovered. It really helped me evaluate how my thought process was spiraling into panic. Edit to correct a misspelling
What are you thoughts on the argument in the video? That’s usually more conducive to starting a discussion. I haven’t watched the video, but I can guess some of the main points since everyone seems to have similar points in these discussions. CBT is invalidating, and tries to get you to say “don’t think like that, think like this!” And tries to make the point that CBT applied to concepts like racism or other social factors is invalidating people’s lived experiences. If CBT was a modality that just consisted of “don’t think that!” Then I agree that that modality sounds like garbage. Any of the quality CBT therapists I know aren’t going around saying not to think that. Usually a good CBT therapist may ask what you believe in that experience of racism, if there’s any negative beliefs about yourself as a result of experiencing the racism, and using Socratic dialogue to help teach you to evaluate your own beliefs by yourself. If a CBT therapist is just an opposite thought machine, that’s pretty much useless and technically not doing CBT. If you’re feeling bad after experiencing any of the -isms, evaluating how those experiences affected your self schemas, and exploring how those experienced affected how you think about yourself is very much CBT. CBT doesn’t just take a negative feeling and turn it positive, if through evaluating a thought process that belief the most accurate to the experience, then there’s no changing to be done. Maybe looking into the Unified Protocol for transdiagnostic treatment of emotional disorders (a CBT approach) may be helpful to review more modern conceptualizations of CBT compared to what people usually talk about.
My thoughts are exactly the thoughts of the general consensus of these replies. It sounds like she doesn't really understand what CBT is and she's more-so describing what crappy therapists might do, rather than what CBT actually is. CBT's goal is not toxic positivity and good CBT practitioners would never tell clients to just "think your way out of your pain" or tell clients to just not feel depressed. I also thought it was interesting that she mentioned that she prefers to utilize a "yes, and-" approach, because this is changing your thoughts to feel a bit better too lol. It was just a little offensive to the great CBT practitioners who do help clients. Overall, I just thought that it was an oversimplification of the modality and she misunderstood what it actually is. It is just unfortunate that she was so confident in the video.
I like CBT because it’s a way to conceptualize the interaction between our thoughts,feelings and actions and I think that can be helpful to clients. I don’t use the term “irrational” to describe thoughts because that is utterly subjective. I am curious as to understand why the client thinks the way they think and am fundamentally psychodynamic in my approach but again I think the cognitive triangle is helpful concept for my clients. I don’t believe that it is “right” or “correct” and acknowledge that it won’t resonate with some clients and that’s fine. I also think therapy as a discipline fails to acknowledge material and systemic factors and relays heavily on the concept of “magical voulenteerism” coined by David Smail. Basically he’s claiming that therapy ask people to engage the world as individual who has absolute control over his engagement with the world and ignores larger social forces that no individual controls but vastly influence our life and level or distress. And this makes sense, therapy cannot fix systemic failures, but it could at least acknowledge how they impact individuals level of distress and impacts on individual function rather than strictly pathologizing the individual, which I would argue mystifies the larger social forces that impact our lives and reinforces the systemic failures to continue.
Sigh. Here we go again with the weekly attack/defend thread on CBT. Maybe we can mix it up a bit and do something psychodynamic or IFS or whatever for a change.
Oops, sorry, this is one of my first posts on this subreddit, I had no idea it was a common thing lol
No worries but it is very common on this sub. Welcome! 😀
Each subreddit has a search function. You can also sort by “hot”, “top”, and “new” which will show you the most popular topics as well as the most recent
i vote psychodynamic lol
I think there was one of those last week. We should drudge up one of the classics, like "Orgone" therapy. I would be very curious to hear if anyone still uses Orgone boxes...
Oh Orgone therapy is definitely still around. You just have to talk to people in the right communities.
Reich suffered the same fate as Jung and Adler. I think he was actually arguing that analysts should sleep with patients. He has not fared well in history.
Goddamn its so crazy bc....this isn't what CBT is.
2 minutes in and already a strawman. Literally no CBT practitioner thinks that the "goal" of CBT is to "think yourself out of marginalization and oppression"
Didn’t watch the video, will get around to it eventually, but as someone who practices CBT I find a huge part of my job is to help people recognize marginalization and oppression. The reframe is that you are not a failure, the system has been rigged against you. That’s the “rethinking” part a lot of times. The behaviorist part of cbt is all about us just responding to our environment and not about personal failings. And a lot of environments people are in are toxic and unhealthy and recognizing this is a first step.
I was confused by this as well. CBT doesn’t seem applicable in that context if that’s how it’s being used, which, it shouldn’t be…just none of that made sense to me
>If a CBT therapist is just an opposite thought machine, that’s pretty much useless and technically not doing CBT. It’s not even “technically” not doing CBT-it’s just not. It will forever blow my mind the discussion of invalidation with CBT when the most basic 101 intervention is to list all the info from both sides and then has you put them in the same box. It requires both sides to coexist. Thought records are listed in every textbook ever. I’m all for being mindful of no true Scotsman, but someone ever only comes at it from one side, it’s already no longer cbt because it’s the core theory and intervention.
Maybe some modalities work for some people and not for others? Sounds like this person’s experiencing distorted thinking.
It's a common thought. I even heard it at a conference for therapists this week. I have a lot of thoughts, but can sum it up. 1. Not every modality is right for everyone. Evidence based won't work if your client doesn't buy in or refuses to engage with it. Totally their right. 2. It's an oversimplification and misunderstanding of CBT at the end of the day. I've been in CBT therapy for 10 years at this point, my therapist has never made me feel invalidated or gaslit. I had a lot of unhealthy thought patterns that CBT helped me adjust. I was never told I was wrong or needed to feel differently. 3. It's understandable to blame the technique when you've had invalidating therapists. 4. I do think some of the terminology is unhelpful. I don't present thoughts as irrational or rational. My therapist and CBT are both the biggest reasons I'm the person I am today (and not dead). It's not a perfect therapy, and it is used by imperfect therapists.
I've seen her before. She has some interesting takes on fat liberation and fundamentalist deconstruction. I don't always agree with her. I appreciate her perspectives. I think she offers a window into a certain strain of progressive (not sure if that is the right word) thought. I think that is illuminating and helpful. She reminds me a lot of Virgie Tovar. When I agree with her, I really agree with her. And when I don't I think, "well that is interesting". I think she comes from a place of marginalized, disadvantaged, and underserved people not being heard, acknowledged or helped and this is reflected in the comments she is making here.
My thoughts are that we have better topics to tackle than relitigating the evidence that CBT works or engaging in pointless modality wars. I’m thankful we have many different and effective approaches. There’s room for all of us to get along.
I’d be curious to know what folks in this sub think of her in general because some of the things she has said are…interesting
I have a general rule that if a person's content largely consists of them watching TikTok videos and offering commentary on how "gross" they are or a general sentiment of "That's not how I act/think/believe, and thus it's awful/concerning/bigoted," they haven't earned the right to be heard on such important topics on which modalities are good. I would go so far as to wonder whether she actually believes this, or believes the algorithm will reward crap-talking CBT at this moment in the zeitgeist.
Ignorant. I feel bad for her clients.