Observing Negative Core Beliefs Using CBT
In this blog post, I’ll go over what CBT is, what a negative core belief is, and the laddering system. Observing negative core beliefs is one of the toughest parts of CBT. I laughed CBT out of the room during my first week. I felt as if all these therapists with good jobs, money, and education could never understand what I went through. They couldn’t walk a second in my shoes, how could they help me?
What Is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy?
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is a form of psychological treatment that helps change negative thinking patterns. It’s effective for a range of problems that you could be going through. It’s helped tremendously with my substance abuse issues and with depression, but it can be used for eating disorders and marital problems as well.
What Is a Core Belief?
A core belief is not always a correct belief! It’s more like your most central ideas about yourself and others. These beliefs act as a negative lens through which you see yourself and others. In effect, making your life less enjoyable. In CBT, core beliefs are thought to underlie automatic thoughts! Therefore, we must change these thought patterns to get to the root of the issue.
The 4 Stages Of CBT
Assessment Stage
Cognitive Stage
Behaviour Stage
Learning Stage
The Assessment Stage is the first and sometimes hardest stage, this is where you get to know your therapist and make up a treatment plan.
The Cognitive Stage is where you both work together to understand your thought patterns and your past.
The Behavior Stage is where you start finding new thinking patterns. You will also start applying your new patterns of thinking to new behaviors.
The Learning Stage is where you and your therapist start making permanent changes! You’ll learn the common principles of CBT in everyday life. This means you can cope with everyday problems in the future without therapy!
The four stages are not always separate because CBT is not a rigid therapy system with fixed rules but in order to be successful it MUST ALWAYS have ALL four stages!
Observing Negative Core Beliefs
Observing negative core beliefs is a process that will probably hurt your feelings and might make you cry. In CBT a process called laddering or downward arrow is used to pinpoint negative core beliefs. In my opinion, laddering is not very effective on your own. You could try to do this without a therapist but it is extremely hard to hold yourself accountable. Even if you can hold yourself accountable, it’s hard to change negative thinking patterns on your own.
With laddering, you can get to the bottom of your negative automatic thoughts by asking yourself a question meant to shed light on what the consequences would be if it were true. Try using one belief at a time! Let’s ladder one of my beliefs.
I Can’t Stop Using Drugs
What if I can’t stop using drugs, what will this mean? — I will keep spiraling out of control.
What if I keep spiraling out of control, what will this mean? — I can end up in prison or dead.
What if I ended up in prison, what would this mean? — My life would fall apart.
What if my life fell apart, what would this mean? — It means I can’t be a normal member of society.
What if I couldn’t be a normal member of society, What would this mean? — It means I belong in a cage forever.
What if you belonged in a cage forever, what would this mean? — It means I’m a worthless animal.
My Core Belief — I’m a worthless animal.
This was just an example because I’m feeling so happy that I couldn’t possibly make anything super real at the moment. Therefore, I hope you enjoy that example!
My Experience With CBT
I have countless hours of CBT under my belt. I was in cognitive behavioral therapy for 6 months, which was 8 hours a day, Monday through Friday. Like I said in the intro, my first week I was super skeptical. How could these therapists help someone like me? I had 3 therapists working with me all day, bouncing ideas back and forth on how to help. They used all their education combined to see that I did not end my life as an animal in a cage. Therefore, even though I resented them in the beginning, I am grateful and I owe my life to them.
Being a heavy addict with major street smarts will make you think you can fool the CBT laddering system. My first week I was giving answers that I and everyone else knew they didn’t want to hear just to see what their reaction would be. They kindly brushed off anything crazy I would say and continued to try to help me. They then proceeded to make me cry using the laddering system the next week.
Conclusion
Getting into the first stage of CBT is actually one of the hardest things to do for yourself. If you think you need it, I’m sure it’s easier than ever before to get a virtual therapist. If that’s something you’re interested in, message me and we can look for one together.
The therapists that assisted me were super professional and actually cared about my life. They made it their goal to work in the prison system to help people specifically like me! You can find someone that will help you get the fundamentals down so you can do it on your own in the future too!