Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is one of the most popular psychotherapeutic approaches. It combines two treatment methodologies:
Cognitive therapy
Behavioral therapy
Cognitive behavior therapy recognizes that the way we feel emotionally is affected by our thoughts. It centers on a client's current thinking, communication, and actions, rather than their past experiences, to begin problem-solving.
Behavioral therapy utilizes principles of learning and conditioning to reduce symptoms and change unproductive or dysfunctional behavior patterns. It focuses on a client's actual behavior and any life circumstances reinforcing negative actions.
These empirically proven approaches to mental illness acknowledge the link between our thinking, feelings, and behavior, particularly in challenging situations.
During sessions of CBT therapy, a client gains a clearer understanding of their own attitudes, expectations, and thinking. Our thoughts, feelings, and actions are fundamental to our sense of well-being. CBT counseling helps a client recognize and overcome distressing, false beliefs that undermine mental health.
Life events can cause us great distress, but where mental health is concerned, it is frequently how we think about ourselves, our life, and our problems that are causing unhappiness rather than the situations and things we experience. CBT psychotherapy helps a person focus on positive change.
Counseling with a therapist at the Vita Recovery facility in Miami, FL will counteract unhelpful thought patterns and behaviors and help you implement lasting changes to enhance your daily life.
The noted psychiatrist Aaron Beck developed cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) at the University of Pennsylvania during the 1960s. He observed that many clients treated for depression had profoundly negative thinking patterns.
Beck concluded that these negative thought streams arose spontaneously. He called them automatic thoughts and categorized them as negative ideas about the self, world, and future.
Beck recognized the interrelated nature of these thoughts and identified them as a cognitive triad. By using therapy to become aware of and challenge these concepts, Beck was able to help patients change their thoughts about themselves and their life experiences. In turn, this helped to change behavior and improve patients’ emotional health.
In subsequent years, the initial research into CBT therapy was modified to treat additional mental health conditions.
Amongst other mental illnesses, CBT counseling is an effective treatment approach for:
Addiction
Anxiety disorders
Bipolar disorders
Depression
Insomnia and other sleep disorders
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)
Phobias
PTSD
Sexual disorders
Substance use disorders
CBT has been studied extensively and found to be effective in eliminating or reducing the symptoms of mental illness. It is effective for all age groups . Frequently, cognitive behavioral therapy is combined with medication to treat severe mental health conditions like major depressive disorders.
A therapist at Vita Recovery Miami, FL can help you identify negative emotions by building a positive therapeutic relationship with you during counseling sessions. A medical illness such as anxiety, depression, an eating disorder, or substance use can be overcome using CBT and other types of psychotherapy.
In general, talk therapy, often called psychotherapy, helps a client's mental health condition by providing a safe, confidential space to talk through:
Feelings
Life experiences
Thoughts
CBT and other therapies help a client or patient dealing with mental illness for many reasons:
A therapist can help a client gain awareness of thinking patterns and behavior. Importantly, underlying psychological issues prompting negative behavior can be brought to light and healthily resolved.
Airing thoughts and feelings with a trained therapist helps clients to better understand and process their experiences. Repressed negative emotions contribute to poor mental health.
Participating in talk therapy helps clients better understand their conscious thoughts, subconscious reactions, and unconscious programming and be more cognizant of factors influencing their attitudes toward themselves and their relationships with others.
Therapy helps clients understand and improve their essential relationships. Social and family connections are vital for mental health and well-being.
Under a therapist's guidance, clients can learn or develop new coping skills and improved modes of behaving, reacting, and thinking that help them better manage their mental health.
More specifically, as a form of therapy, cognitive behavioral therapy concentrates on identifying and changing negative behaviors, beliefs, and thoughts that contribute to mental wellness. The aim is to challenge and overcome harmful patterns and develop new ways of acting and deeper understanding.
As a goal and solution-oriented form of treatment, a client works with their therapist to set SMART goals (specific, meaningful, achievable, relevant, and time-bound) during CBT counseling sessions.
These goals motivate clients and give them a definable sense of progress. The therapist can evaluate the treatment's effectiveness by tracking a client's breakthroughs and challenges.
During a session of cognitive behavioral therapy, the following core steps are employed:
Cognitive restructuring: the therapist helps a client identify and then challenge negative thinking patterns and beliefs
Exposure: the therapist gently encourages a client to gradually open themselves up to and experience the situations, people, and things they currently avoid or fear
Relaxation: the therapist helps the client discover new ways to cope with anxiety and stress
To help a client understand the interconnected way their behavior, feelings, and thoughts affect their mental health condition, a cognitive behavioral therapist may use the following techniques:
CBT is possibly the most widely researched form of psychotherapy. It is proven to help a wide array of mental illnesses.
Amongst the ways CBT counseling can improve your life are:
Boosting self-esteem: CBT helps clients to evolve a more positive self-image by challenging negative patterns of thought and belief.
Enhancing and repairing relationships: CBT develops a client's social and communication skills. This improves and heals relations with friends, family, and life partners.
Improved problem-solving and coping: CBT teaches clients effective ways of identifying and solving problems, thereby helping them achieve career, educational, and interpersonal goals
Increased life satisfaction: CBT improves clients' quality of life by helping them better manage mental ill health symptoms.
At our quality, inclusive and compassionate space in Miami, Fl, you can experience the benefits of CBT. Our therapists have honed their cognitive behavioral expertise through years of experience and practice.
Recovering from addiction, or substance abuse requires a multidisciplinary approach. Our therapists are joined by expert clinicians and case managers, ensuring your every psychological and physical need is met.
Our programs for drug, alcohol, and mental health recovery include group and one on one individual therapy sessions, education and ready access to specialist psychiatric care. We combine CBT tools with different therapeutic modalities, including dialectical behavioral therapy.
At Vita Recovery, you discover a transformative, healing experience for body and mind. You can identify unhealthy thought patterns and make good health and abstinence a specific goals.
Recovering from substance abuse and regaining good mental health can be challenging.
Contact us today to discover how Vita Recovery can aid you on your path back to health, well-being, and sobriety.
