The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

The Selfish Path to Romance. Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com and at Amazon.com

I know it's me. I'm going through some changes.

Well, welcome to the world. Things happen, don't you think I'm going through a lot?

Not like me.

Oh, what? So now you're special. You're special. Boy, imagine that you're feeling awfully depressed, and you may not have to imagine very hard to do that. Maybe you're in that situation right now, or you're just jittery, you're anxious, and you've been that way for a while, and you don't want to be that way anymore. Or it could be that you're having marital problems.

You've probably heard me mention cognitive therapy on the air many, many times, and today I have the absolute pleasure of introducing someone who is delightful. Her name is Dr. Judy Beck, and she is the director of the Beck Institute for Cognitive Therapy and Research in Philadelphia. She's the Clinical Associate Professor of Psychology and Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania, and she's given wonderful workshops worldwide, nationally and internationally.

In fact, I went to one of her workshops recently, and she can talk about cognitive therapy for anxiety or for depression or couples problems.

Welcome, Dr. Judy Beck.

Thank you, Ellen.

I want to ask you if somebody is thinking of, “Well, maybe I'll go to therapy, but I feel a little anxious because I don't know what therapy would be like. Maybe they'll tell me I'm just as bad as I feel I am, or maybe they'll ask me to lie down on a couch, or I don't want aromatherapy.” Help me understand—what is cognitive therapy? What would you tell a person?

Cognitive therapy is a kind of talk therapy, and the reason to consider it is because there's more research that says that it's effective than for any other kind of psychotherapy. And it's a fairly straightforward kind of therapy. You and the therapist— the patient— sit around a table or sit at the desk, and it's fairly structured. A large part of what we do is helping patients solve current problems.

I hear the word “structured,” and I don't think that does cognitive therapy justice in the fact that, if I'm a client coming in—say I'm coming in to you, Dr. Beck—what would you first ask me? What would be some of the initial things that you would be looking for?

Well, the first thing I want to do is to do a very thorough evaluation.

Okay, so that's one of the ways you mean the structured, right? Is that you don't let me just ramble aimlessly?

No. I really want to make sure that I know what your diagnosis is. If I were an ear, nose, and throat doctor, I'd be asking you lots of questions about your symptoms so I could find out—do you have a sinus infection? Do you have an infection someplace else?—in order to figure out how I can help you the most. So when you come to see me, I'm going to initially ask you questions to find out: Do you have a clinical depression? Do you have an anxiety disorder? Is there anything else going on?

Because in cognitive therapy, we really tailor the treatment to the person.

Okay, so it's not just a boilerplate treatment for everybody. Let's say that I am someone depressed, and I tell you, “I'm just down. I don't have a job that I'd like. You know, my marriage is a mess, and I can't get along with my kids, and I don't even know where to begin. I'm all over the map.”

One of the things that I would ask you—and I would do this at every session—is: What problem do you want my help in solving today? Or what problems? If you were overwhelmed and all of the problems seemed of equal importance to you, I might say, “Gee, if we were able to make some headway on one of these, which one do you think might make the biggest difference to you this week?”

You know, I think it's the problem in my marriage.

Then I would have you describe to me what is going on right now in your marriage. I'd find out kind of what is the history of your marriage? How long have you been married? Did things go well at first? Did things then later become more problematic?

So the first thing I have to do is really hear your story so I can figure out where to start working with you.

One of the things I'm loving in this is you're letting me set the agenda. But it's not aimless.

That's right.

So right away, I will feel validated. I will feel like you are listening to me.

Exactly. I don't want you to feel confused. I want everything in therapy to make sense to you. And so when you first come in and I figure out what your diagnosis is, then I'm going to tell you, “This is what I think we need to do in therapy. Step one, step two, step three. How does that sound to you? Does that sound as if it fits you, or is there some other way that you think I can be more helpful?”

So then I can guide you, so I won't be sitting there thinking, “Well, this is a waste of my time.” It's that we work together collaboratively.

That's right. And everything should make sense to you. It should make sense to you to work on this problem. It should make sense to you—the kinds of problem-solving solutions that we come up with.

You know, your father is Dr. Aaron Beck, and so he's not only your father, but he's the father of cognitive therapy.

That's right.

And I read in one of the—I think it was a Brown Alumni Monthly from 1982—about how he had a phobia, and he was able to cure his own phobia using his own methods.

That's right.

At an early age.

Hey, I’ve got to interrupt this, because we've got to pay some bills. Thirty seconds, that's it. A very quick ad, and then Ellen will be back.

Romance? Oh, I wish guys knew more about what we want from a relationship. Boy, I wish I knew more about what I want. Where's that ad I saw? Ah, here it is: The Selfish Path to Romance, a serious romance guidebook. Download chapter one for free at SelfishRomance.com and buy it at Amazon.com. Hmm, The Selfish Path to Romance. That is interesting.

He was able to cure his own phobia using his own methods.

That's right. He, at an early age, needed to have surgery, and he really kind of had a phobia after that. And he decided actually to go into medicine because it was so interesting to him, and also he knew it would give him an opportunity to overcome this problem.

And a lot of what he did was to realize exactly what his fears were, and then to look at reality and to see whether his fears had a basis in reality. And as one would imagine, it turned out that they didn't. His anxiety went way down, and he was later able to use some of the methods he initially used on himself to help his patients tremendously.

I mean, that's a wonderful understatement, because your father—you know, I'm looking here, I've got a floor full of books here: Cognitive Therapy with Children and Adolescents, for Personality Disorders, for Anxiety, for Marital Problems, for Trauma, for Substance Abuse—and I could go on and on, I've only gone through a portion of them. What your dad has done is tremendous, because it's made mental health so readily available.

People don't have to be on a couch for years and years, but they can get better much quicker, mostly because you help them understand how emotions are connected to their thinking. Could you spend a moment on that?

Sure. When most people come to my office, they think that it's situations that directly affect how they feel. So they say, “My boss is driving me crazy,” or “If only my kids would listen to me, then I would feel better.” They don't realize that it's not the situation that directly affects how they feel—it's what they think about the situation.

So if I'm at work and I'm feeling very hassled, like there's way too much for me to do, I might start having thoughts like, “I can't do it all.” Now, it's not the fact that I have a lot to do that's making me feel anxious. It's the thought, “I have too much to do.” And in fact, when I look at that thought and I realize, “I don't have to do everything. I can delegate some things. I can put some things off, and I can problem-solve and figure out how to spend a couple hours on the weekend working,” once I realize that, then I feel a lot better.

So it reduces your mood. Now I'm speaking with Dr. Judy Beck, who is the President of the Academy of Cognitive Therapy. How could someone listening who's interested get in touch with the Center of Cognitive Therapy?

Well, there are two very good websites to go to. One is the Academy of Cognitive Therapy, and that website is www.academyofct.org. And on that website, which is partially directed toward consumers, there is a lot of information that I think your listeners will find helpful—both information about cognitive therapy, information about specific psychiatric disorders, and also a wonderful referral list to certified cognitive therapists.

That's wonderful. Thank you so much for joining us today, Dr. Judy Beck.

You're welcome.

And what I love most about cognitive therapy is that it teaches you thinking skills—how to understand your own mind and come up with better coping strategies to deal with all the stressors in your life, whether it's your family, your friends, your kids, or yourself—how to have a happier life.

For more Dr. Kenner podcasts, go to DrKenner.com, and please listen to this—

Here's an excerpt from The Selfish Path to Romance by Drs. Kenner and Locke.

Here's another tip for handling unreasonable resistance: Let your partner hear his or her own words. If your irrational partner calls you a coarse name—bitch, pig, ignoramus—or mocks you, you might try repeating their words: “You're calling me a bitch and telling me I'm worthless.” Sometimes, hearing his or her own words helps the irrational partner recognize what he or she is doing and to tone it down a bit.

If your partner persists in using insulting words, the relationship is likely unfixable. In situations where your partner may pose a physical danger, you must act to protect your safety.

First, take physical threats seriously. If you think your partner might harm you, get out of the house, move to a secret location, and get professional help as soon as possible.

Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com and at Amazon.com