January 31, 2007

Cognitive Developement

Filed under: General, Cognitive Restructuring, Behavior Modification, Self Help, Cognitive Therapy — Editor @ 8:47 pm

Creating a manualized cognitive restructuring program that is effective in helping people overcome faulty thinking errors and self defeating behaviors is an art form that few have mastered.

The question is, is it possible to go into the subconscious mind and actually change thoughts? The answer is yes and the secret lies in Dr David Hawken’s book on truth vs falsehoods. The truth has energy that can penetrate the veil of self imposed falsehoods and help people find the truth about themselves. That is, they are many times better than they think they are.

Developing a cognitive restructuring curriculum requires a deep understanding of the truth, otherwise the written words have no penetrating energy. In effect untrue words fall off the page and on the floor. There they die and disintegrate and are forgotten along with millions of other untrue words.

True words can lift people to a higher calibration whereas untrue words can depress. True words contain a higher intelligence that excites energies that resonate at a frequency that people will accept it. It is this cognitive disonance internalization that affects a change in faulty thinking.

For example after 30 years of working with domestic violence victims it is enlightening to sit in class and watch this self actualization process take place. Most abused women see themselves as $2.00 women where the truth is they are really an $8.00 or $10.00 woman.By the 3rd or 4th session of applying true words delivered through a correctly structured cognitive restructuring program, the truth begins to have its affect.
 

This reprogramming is manifested in their physical, mental and emotional exhilaration. The before and after manifestation for most are remarkable and permanent. However let us remember that cognitive restructuring counseling is an invitation to change, not a force, change is the responsibility of the client.The main reason counseling programs are ineffective is because they aren’t structured properly and they contain little penetrating truth. The reason is that the person(s) who wrote it lacked truth. People can go to psychotherapy for years and not change because the therapist is not aligned with the truth. Whereas the truth can have a permanent impact on people in a matter of hours, the truth is what it is.  

By Larry Lloyd, Lifeskills Counselor               See  www.accilifeskils.com  

January 23, 2007

Cognitive Therapy

Filed under: General, Cognitive Restructuring, Behavior Modification, Cognitive Therapy — Editor @ 5:42 pm

Cognitive Therapy

  The problem with cognitive therapy is the therapy. If someone needs cognitive therapy how do you know the therapist and the curriculum he/she is using is able to change faulty thinking errors and self defeating behaviors? There are thousands of therapists each with their own interpretations and curriculum. Few if any are evidence based with proof that what they are using is correct and highly effective. Almost any counseling program can claim it is cognitive therapy, but few if any can prove it works.  In a sense cognitive therapy is a misnomer. The definition of therapy is the treatment of illness or disability. The use of cognitive therapy in mental illness is largely ineffective because you can’t use cognitive restructuring training on someone who is not cognitive. The same holds true to children. Cognitive therapy is ineffective on children for the same reason, because they are not yet cognitive.  The problem with using therapists to facilitate cognitive therapy programs is that most therapists are emotionally sick themselves with many living in the box of self deception. That is they don’t know they are sick and therefore pass on their sickness (untruths) to their clients. Millions of people go to psycho therapists for years at great costs, yet never get better and many get worse. Yet skilled cognitive life skills counselors with correct evidence based curriculum can assist people in making permanent changes in a matter of hours instead of days, months and years.  This is not to say that all therapists are inefective. The best counselors/therapists have a positive way of being. People respond because of the truth, not to counseling techniques. The truth resonates at a frequency that can pierce the viel of self imposed falsehoods and help people overcome years of bad programing.  

Think cognitive restructuring life skills vs a clinical approach for cognitive therapy. Look for evidence based cognitive restructuring programs that can provide proof that their curriculum and approach works. Look for authors and organizations that have years of experience in holding and facilitating groups. No book learning can replace actual hands on experience. By Larry Lloyd, Lifeskills Counselor                                See www.accilifeskills.com

  

January 20, 2007

Positive Thinking/How To Be Happy In Life

Filed under: Cognitive Restructuring — Editor @ 9:32 am

Recently, Universities and other organizations conducted surveys and studies on “What it is that makes people happy”? Listed below are some of the results.

Step #1: Doing good. The universal laws say there is no happiness in doing wrong. People who do wrong (live the untruth) suffer from anxiety, stress, depression, anger, suspicion, insecurity, fear and pessimism. When you break a law you empower other people to control your life, such as a judge, jailer or warden, etc. Doing Good is the first step in being a happy person.

Step #2: Control. People report that they are most happy when they are in control of their lives. Self-control and controlling one’s destiny brings great freedom and feelings of security. People who have a strong mental self and are able to control their physical self are most happy.

 Step #3: Seek the positive. Optimistic people always expect the best. They have hope and dwell on the positive in life. They tap into the positive side of their subconscious mind with their positive conscious thoughts. Remember, our mind is like a stage and we can control the players on that stage. We can choose to think the positive or negative; it is our choice.

Step #4: Faith in a higher power. Researchers found that people who believed in a higher power where happier than those who didn’t. Most people who recover from a serious drug or alcohol addiction report the need of a higher power than themselves. Faith in the unknown can be a life rewarding experience.

Step #5: Close relationships. The single most powerful force in life is love. To love and be loved is the highest human experience. Happiness in life is equal to the amount of love in our life. We can see how powerful love is by observing the results of people who don’t receive enough love- nothing in life is more damaging than being rejected,lonely and unloved.

Step #6: Meaningful activity. The happiest people in life have something to look forward to either in their work, hobbies or things they participate in. People who don’t look forward to going to work, don’t have a job, or other meaningful activity experience unhappiness.

Step #7: Helping others. Researchers found that one major activity common in happy people was helping others. Helping others gave them great happiness and satisfactions. We see that life is a mirror and people who give, get back. What is it that people get back from the people they help?

Step #8: Forgiveness. Successful, happy people learn to forgive themselves and other. They understand to err is to be human-that life is a series of obstacles that helps on grow. They recognize that others are human too and treat others as they would want to be treated. Unsuccessful, unhappy people do the opposite.

The first step for unhappy people to become happy is self awareness. Self awareness through cognitive restructuring is effective therapy for a self inflicted problems. The bottom line is if people are not happy it is their fault and responsibility, No one can make them happy except themselves.

                                            See      www.accilifeskill.com       

January 18, 2007

Cognitive Truisms

Filed under: Cognitive Restructuring, Self Help — Editor @ 4:12 pm

  • If you keep on doing what you have been doing; you will keep on getting what you have been getting. To change what you have been getting; you must change what you have been doing.

  • Life is short. The average healthy person will only live 800 to 900 months or about 600,000 hours. It isn’t birth or death that is important, but what happens in between.

  • The subconscious mind doesn’t know right from wrong. It is simply a tape that plays back that which has been programmed into it. To change subconscious thoughts and values requires a six-step process.

  • Much of what we are today was scripted while we were young. Scripting whether good or bad, is passed down from one generation to another. Some relatives who are now dead are still having a powerful influence on personal lives and values.

  • Offenders have a choice about their own children and others. They can be blockers and reduce the wrong done to them, they can stay neutral and pass on what happened to them or they can be magnifiers and make things worse. The message is that they can stand between the past and the future and rewrite their future. They can affect their posterity in a negative or positive way. It is their choice.

  • If a person is seen acting in a negative or self destructive way, lift his/her lid and look underneath to see a person who is hurting. And, under that will be found usually a worthwhile person.

  • One can determine right from wrong by what it produces. There is no true happiness in doing wrong. One can chose to do wrong, but one can’t choose the consequences.

  • There are 6 basic emotional needs that people must have in their lives. Those who don’t have their needs met become emotionally damaged or handicapped. However, they can overcome their emotional handicaps by forgiving others and going on with their life. Life can move forward when the past is released.

  • Life can be unfair. Bad things can happen to good people.

  • People generally treat others as they are. If people don’t trust you, it is because you are not trustworthy. If people don’t believe you it is because you lie. If People don’t respect you, it is because you don’t keep your word. If people are afraid of you, It is because you are mean. If you go back to prison, It is because you are a criminal.

  • Anger is a secondary emotion caused by primary emotions caused by one or more of the four basic sources. Those who anger us control us.

  • The most important thing in a marriage is the people in the marriage. If a couple wants to improve there marriage, then they have to improve themselves.

  • Proper communications first requires seeking to be understood and then seeking to understand.

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  • When choosing to do wrong, one empowers others and circumstances to control his/her life.

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  • Doing wrong will ensure that life will not get better. Offenders will have to suffer the consequences of their bad decisions.

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  • Many people with bad beginnings will have bad endings. Their past will equal their future unless they do something in between to alter it.

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  • Who we are is what we do. What we do is who we are. We can’t hide who we are, eventually we will give ourselves away by what we do. Our long-term behavior is a direct indication of our values and who we are. What we do gives us away.

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  • You can tell right from wrong by what it produces. Good people mostly produce good actions, bad people mostly bad actions. A person can’t be good and bad at the same time. They are one or the other.

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  • Emotionally damaged people are many times better than they “think” they are. They have brought into lies about themselves and have been programmed into believing the untruth about themselves. If they don’t become self aware and have a desire to change they will keep on getting what they have been getting.

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  • There area certain basic laws or needs that are so essential that we must have the to be a whole person. We cannot break thee laws; we can only break ourselves against them. These laws are love, validation, affirmation, understanding, appreciation and security. To the degree these are missing in our life, we become damaged people.

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  • Once damaged, always damaged. However, emotionally damaged people from abusive, dysfunctional homes can overcome their handicaps and be getter for it. People who have to overcome their abuse are more sensitive and can assist in healing others.

  • Life isn’t always fair. Bad things happened to good people. It isn’t life that causes our problems, but our reactions to it. Mistakes can be forgiven, emotional scars can be healed. Life isn’t over until it isn’t over. Each new day brings an opportunity for change

    • The above are cognitive restructuring thoughts used in manualized cognitive lifeskills workbooks to help change distorted thinking and self defeating behaviors.

      

                                   By Larry Lloyd, Lifeskills Counselor      See  www.accilifeskills.com

     

     

     

     

 

 

 

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