obssessive compulsive disorder

What is CBT?

(script video)

So what is actually cognitive behavior therapy? Well, there’s a long and a short answer to that question. In a way, all that you will find on this site would be the long answer. In this video, I’ll try to give the short version.

To start, CBT is psychotherapy, or rather a family of different therapies that share certain elements.

One of those elements is that it has a strong scientific base, that is there is a lot of research behind it, which shows that specific cognitive behavior therapies can be very effective for many different problems; from more restricted psychological problems like specific phobia (such an excessive fear of snakes or heights) to more broad and pervasive problems like post-traumatic stress (such as reexperiencing severe traumatic experiences, like a physical assault were one thought one would die).

Another element is that CBT is often a short-term therapy. Often, a therapy can be between 10 to 15 sessions long. But it can both be shorter that that (like for a specific phobia, that can be cured in one single session), or much longer for, for severe problems like posttraumatic stress or long-standing emotional instability and interpersonal problems.

One of the reasons that it can be shorter, or more focused, than some other psychotherapies, is that the role of the cognitive behavioral therapist can be somewhat different: He or she is often mor active than in other therapies, by asking questions and by guiding you in therapy.

One important element in CBT is the focus on what happens in your everyday life. That means that the sessions with the therapist focuses on understanding the pattern of difficult feelings, thoughts and behaviors in the here and now. This can be examining what you feel and think during the session but is also often about discovering more about such patterns in your everyday life, during the time that passes between sessions.

During the therapy, you will practice observing these patterns of what you feel, what passes through your head and what you do, in a more concrete or specific way that you’re used to, for instance by writing them down in a certain way.

However, the focus on what happens in the here and now in CBT doesn’t mean that one isn’t interested in your individual past. Many difficult psychological patterns have been there for a long time. The reason why CBT focuses on the here and now is simply that the way to change lies there: we can change the here and now and the future, but not the past.

That is, the way to change in CBT also takes place in your everyday life – by trying out new ways to confront your difficulties. The probably most known type of CBT, exposure therapy, is a good example of this. It is used for overcoming problems with anxiety, for example social anxiety, when one is terribly fearful of being wrong and judged by others, or obsessive-compulsive disorder, when one is fearful of for example being contaminated by dirty surfaces or getting anxious because of blasphemous or forbidden thoughts.

In a structured and gradual way, the therapist will in exposure therapy help you confront what triggers your fears, in a specific way that you haven’t been able to do before, and in so doing, you will step by step experience less and less anxiety, and feeling more and more free in your life.

The focus on everyday life is important in a specific sense – because between sessions with your therapist, you will get ‘homework’ – or ‘individual challenges’ that one also can call them: At the start of therapy, it can be observing and writing down in your phone patterns of thoughts, feelings and behaviors. Later it can be for example doing the same exposure exercise (to something you fear) that you did with your therapist, but now on your own, or with a family member or friend, in your everyday life, several times, til you feel differently about them, or experience something new

One important element in all CBT is that the therapy only will focus on what you really want to change in your life - of course your therapist will never force you to do anything, only support and help you to the often difficult changes that you actually want.

That is, setting goals for the therapy at its start is an important element in all CBT. If one doesn’t know where one is going, its very difficult actually arrive.

I have now talked about some of the elements that all different cognitive behavioral therapies have in common:

• strong scientific base

• (often) a short-term therapy

• active therapist

• focus on everyday life

• ‘homework’ (or ‘individual challenges’)

• goal-oriented

One can actually say that if a therapy lacks several of these elements, it isn’t really a cognitive behavior therapy.

Here I have focused on specific elements of CBT, and in some way what can distinguish if from other therapies. But of course, it also shares many elements with other psychotherapies; such as being a secure place where you are listened to, understood and validated, any many other elements.

I hope you found this video helpful. How knows, maybe by watching you just took the first step to change in your life?