A Review of

Albert Ellis, Ph.D., Feeling Better, Getting Better, Staying Better, ű 2001

By Raemie Noelani Monces, December 12, 2002

Instructions for this Report

_______________________________________________________

 

 

As I often say, if the Martians ever get down here and they're sane, they'll die laughing.

- Albert Ellis Ph.D.

Overall Content

Major Topics

Relation

Relevance

Audience

Importance

Problems/Solutions

Relevance

Structure

Activities

Importance

Content

Critique

Personal View

“Likes”

“Dislikes”

Additional Links

Additional Observation

Personal Thoughts

Works Cited

 

________________________________________________________

Feeling Better, Getting Better, Staying Better: Profound self-help therapy for your emotions

Review by: Raemie N. Monces

 

Only you can upset yourself about events--the events themselves, no matter how undesirable, can never upset you.

-Epictetus, Philosopher

 

Part I: Overall Content

Major Topics

This book revolves around the foundation of REBT, which represents Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy. REBT is basically getting the negative feelings, thoughts and actions into positive ones, therefore creating a higher emotional intelligence by getting your IR irrational beliefs to RB rational beliefs. This type of therapy uses psychotherapy and self-help to enable an individual to: disturb self less and lead a happy more fulfilling life (p.3, ¶2).

ABC: theory of human disturbing

Chapter 2: (p.16-19)

 

When an unwanted event occurs it this type of thinking helps YOU to create disturbances that cause YOU to worry about created disturbances.  The underlining point is that YOU are the only person that can choose how you will think and behave after your feelings have ensued.

 

Ways that humans disturb themselves are through steps that work together.  It starts with Adversity that ultimately should initiate Belief and then creates the Consequence.

 

A concept that is discussed in the text, which refers to the process in, which an individual may react to a negative situation therefore causing them to disturb themselves is the theory of human disturbing that is called ABC (p. 18, ¶ 3):

 

ABC refers to

A-    Adversity

B-    Belief (Believing-Emoting-Behaving) =emotional eliciting behaviors from belief.

n      Irrational = Illogical self-defeating emotionally elicited behavior

n      Rational = Logical self-helping emotionally elicited behavior

C-    Consequence

 

Discussed in Chapter 7 pages 87-94 there are two more conditions that are involved in the ABC’s of REBT.  These two extra systems are (p. 89; ¶ 3):

 

D-    Disputing Dysfunctional beliefs

E-    Effective new philosophy reducing negative emotions and behaviors.

 

The ABCDE’s of REBT are used to realize your habits of feeling-thinking-acting. In order for you to understand what beliefs are irrational and help your-self develop your process of feeling-thinking-acting and better equip you with ways that will help you think logically.

Irrational and rational beliefs

Chapter 2: (p. 18-19)

 

Irrational Beliefs are self-defeating (negative threefold self) and are illogical unrealistic ways of thinking that hinder an individual from living accordingly in the “real world.”  It causes individuals to develop mentally unhealthy neurosis about situations, people, themselves and the world that can ultimately diminish happiness in their life.

 

Irrational beliefs affect habits that work together that form from a stimulus, which triggers the resulting feelings, thoughts and Behaviors.  Causing someone to disturb him or herself.

 

Rational beliefs are quite the opposite although it is still negative feelings, these feelings are ones that are healthy and help an individual to cope with the realities of life and perhaps overcome them with a logical mindset. 

Musturbation

Chapter 3: (p. 23-40)

 

As humans, we can never attain a perfect state of physical or psychological existence.  In life, we are faced with a myriad of triumphs and trials.  The way in which we react to negative life experiences ultimately affects your state of being.  When you encounter a negative event in life, it is your choice in what ways you will deal with such occurrences.  There are three states of thinking that many individuals create in their lives that make it much harder for them to positively mentally develop to their full potential.  These three emotionally unintelligent desires are as follows (p.32, ¶3):

 

1.        “I absolutely must do important things well and be approved by significant others, or I am worthless.”

2.       You must treat me kindly and considerately or else you are a rotten person.”

3.       Conditions absolutely must be the way I want them to be and not unduly block me from pleasures and goals, or my life is horrible!”

 

There are three ways in which individuals think in order for themselves to be content with life, but the irony of it all is that it is impossible to create a utopia here on Earth above all you are unable to create the exact perfect life you must have.

 

This level of thinking is Egocentric; the person views everything from his or her own point of view (Papalia & Olds, 1998).  It is a self-centered understanding that is a part of centration that Piaget explains that young children are so self-centered that they are unable to take on another person’s point of view (Papalia & Olds, 1998).  Leads to illogical conclusion.

Unconditional self-acceptance (USA)

Chapter 3: (p. 23-19)

 

This topic of REBT is accepting yourself because you are YOU.  It is not loving yourself more or less because you may have done wrong or because you excelled in a particular goal that you wanted to achieve.  To my understanding when you unconditionally accept yourself it is disregarding illogical negative feelings-thoughts-behaviors that cause you to disturb yourself.  When you accept yourself it plants the seed for positivity to grow, therefore creating positive cycle to begin and persist.

 

In contrast, conditional self-acceptance is not accepting that you are a unique individual that makes mistakes and can overcome them.  Setting conditions for yourself to achieve in order to love yourself is a dangerous path that ultimately causes you to panic, feel depressed, rage etc.

 

Because you set conditions that you must achieve in order to love yourself, you can not be prepared for an unexpected event that may hinder your exact plan that you absolutely should achieve.  This is a mentally unhealthy way live, because you are ultimately setting yourself up for failure.  Remember that no one is perfect therefore, no one should expect that in order to love yourself (or others) you must be perfect.

 

Understanding conditional self-acceptance one can have a better view of what is unconditional self-acceptance.  By loving yourself for who you are and not your actions you can ultimately see the others and the world in a new perspective.  Because, negative feelings, thoughts, and actions tend to shift from other/world to self and if these feelings-thoughts and actions are positive, Dr. Ellis is hoping that you can feel better, get better and finally stay better.

 

You are telling yourself:

-         What I did was bad.

n      When an individual thinks that the action is bad, it provides them with hope that they are able to change the action. 

 

Instead of:

-         I am bad.

n      When an individual thinks s/he is bad it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.  An individual act as though as if they are bad. 

Unconditional other acceptance (UOA)

Chapter 3: (p. 29-32)

 

No one on Earth is psychologically similar to another.  We are all apart of the same world but vary in our experiences and feelings-thoughts-actions (three-fold self).  When we realize that people in general are imperfect (as we are), we tend to shy away from them because they do not fit our requirements of acceptance.  We become egocentric, wanting people to comply with our needs and wants.  When we set conditions for people to meet in order to receive them for who they are, we are Conditionally accepting others.

 

Unconditional other accepting helps us to diminish our egocentric selves, and become more empathetic and logical thinkers.  You come to realize that a person cannot be labeled as all bad, because that would mean that someone has the potential to be positively absolutely good.  We are individuals that do good and bad things (some more than others).

 

We want to stay away from judgment of others and lean towards acceptance of an individual not through their actions but as a person who has just as much right to live on this Earth as any one else.  This is a tough concept to grasp.  There is a thin line between acceptance and ignorance.  We cannot select who we will accept as a human or not, because by what guidelines will you use in order to decipher who deserves your acceptance or not.

 

Unconditional life acceptance (ULA)

Chapter 3: (p. 37)

 

Text Box: There are going to be things in life that are not going to be pleasant, and by accepting this you will not have false (illogical) expectations that will cause you to be bitter when things do not develop as you had planned.Unconditional life acceptance is basically the same as acceptance of self and others.  This acceptance involves your life.  Life hands out a myriad of experiences that are unique and unimaginable, one needs to realize that we cannot change life.  There is no way to reverse experiences or specifically live a life that is strategically planned. There are going to be things in life that are not going to be pleasant, and by accepting this you will not have false (illogical) expectations that will cause you to be bitter when things do not develop as you had planned.

 

Through acceptance in life an individual will be able to cope more efficiently with negative unwanted circumstances, because they will not be overcome by negative feelings, thoughts and actions that hinder them from overcoming the stressor and learning from it.

High frustration tolerance (HFT)

Chapter 3: (p. 32-33)

 

High Frustration tolerance is when you dislike what a person or thing does to you that may have stopped or delayed you from achieving goals.  This does not lead to negative thoughts that cause you to act out aggressively or with destructive behavior.

 

HFT does however cause someone to view things negatively, but not hopeless.  When a person or something disrupts someone from achieving goals they may become upset and feel as if they cannot bear the current situation, by thinking this way an individual may cause themselves to make them more awful than it really is.

Low Frustration Tolerance (LFT)

Chapter 3: (p. 33-34)

 

Low frustration tolerance is a being unable to tolerate problems encountered in life involving your self, others or the world.  It causes you to think in “MUSTS” instead of preferences.  Because of this low tolerance to life’s trials your feelings negative instead of positive causing the negative thoughts and actions to ensue.  Thinking that everything is:

n      Awful

n      Horrible

n      Terrible

You refuse to tolerate occurrences in life that cause frustration, which causes you to disturb yourself, because you chose not to accept circumstance, learn from them and move on.  With low frustration tolerance one cannot attain happiness, there will always be something you will not be satisfied with.

 

This way of thinking may cause you to seek immediate gratification which may help you feel better for an allotted amount of time, but in the end it will not help you get better or stay better. In life, one needs to be able to cope appropriately with negative circumstances that arise in our experiences with life.

Relation of topics

These topics are the foundation of REBT.  It is through the understanding of these topics that one may be able to feel better and get better, which ultimately provides you with ways and understandings that help you stay better.

 

These topics are posed at the beginning of the book in order to help the reader to be better acquainted with techniques brought up in the later chapters.  It is a progression that begins with introducing the ABC as it helps you to understand that there is a chain of events that occur when a stimulus happens.  There is also a description of irrational and rational beliefs so that an individual understands what is the negative beliefs that are holding themselves back from reaching ‘emotional intelligence’, meaning positive feelings, thoughts, and behaviors towards self and the world by understanding, managing, perceiving and expressing their emotions.

 

The topics progress to “musturbation” as it prepares the reader to fully understand that the three “musts” are connected with the types of acceptance:

 

Must #1

I must do well!

 

Unconditional self-acceptance

Accept yourself for who you are not by what you do.

Must #2

Others must treat me honestly and fairly

 

Unconditional other-acceptance

Accept others for being fallible humans, and realize that people will treat you unfairly.  It does not make the negative action okay, but it is bearable. 

Must #3

Conditions must not be very frustrating or they are intolerable

Unconditional life-acceptance

Life is not perfect if things do not happen the way that you plan it is not the end of the world.

 

Relevance to feeling better, getting better, staying better

REBT works in several ways connecting the self and other/world along with life to create a better YOU!  It explains ways that can help you cross over the to the positive side of life.  By understanding, the way your mind works and how there is a connection between feelings, thoughts, and actions, one will be able to become emotionally intelligent.  Choosing the positive thoughts and actions over the negative ones, in order to create a positive cycle in life to live by and make the person become emotionally healthy.

Audience

This book seems to speak to the audience not just one of the members.  As a hobby I play the ukulele, I am able to distinguish some aspects, such as when someone is playing a wrong note in a song.  When I was younger, I sat and listened to, two girls playing a song that I had learned previously, it was horrible.  Some notes were a little off key and there was no tempo.  My parents and sister thought it was beautiful, calming, relaxing etc.  I on the other hand was unsatisfied, understanding that some notes, were not played correctly at the right time.

 

This book is similar to the concert that night.  I believe that this book speaks to the people, not necessarily those who are part of the psychology world that may be more educated on such topics.  My mother found it to speak to her as an individual and said, “This is an easy to understand book, I like it!” 

Part II: Importance

Problem and Solutions

This text provides many ways in which a person can feel better, get better, and stay better.  These potential attainable goals are obstructed by self-disturbing.  The main concern and problem of all individuals seems that human disturb themselves.  We develop either a high or low frustration tolerance that enables us to view a particular person, situation or the self in a disturbing way, through our musturbations.

 

Our musturbations are habits that negative and developed that affect your train of thinking that ultimately cause you to think that things will be absolutely bad if certain criteria is not met from yourself, others or in life.  It is through these musturbations that people begin to awfulize situations and disturb themselves more.

 

These disturbing feelings, thoughts, and actions can develop into negative habits of living, which ultimately can cause panic attacks, depression and other disabling mental disorders.

 

The solution is through REBT (Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy).  It is through this concept that a person can achieve the positive through the negative.  It helps an individual cross the red or blue bridge as termed by Dr. Leon James when referring to the four options and enables them to develop a positive three-fold self.

 

REBT sessions basically take the illogical, irrational beliefs and develop ways that can help you change them into rational, logical beliefs, through techniques described in the text that are apart of feeling better, getting better and staying better.  An REBT form reviews the ABCDE’s of REBT.  The individual starts with the A aspect which is the activating event and describes their situation whether it is real or imagined, past, present or future and if it is external or internal.  From there they explain the Consequences which are their negative emotionas and behaviors.  The Irrational beliefs are identified and then Disputed in order to develop rational beliefs and create new effective healthy emotions and behaviors.

Relevance

Today the fast pace and get it or its gone society we live in, it is obvious that many more individuals are mentally breaking down, because life just seems unbearable.  On a web site that wants to conquer anxiety I found these statistics:

 

figure 1: http://www.conqueranxiety.com/anxiety_statistics.asp

 

Considering the self-help and psychotherapy advantages of REBT one must understand that this is a beneficial cook to a nation that seems to thrive off of depressing itself.  This is a book that caters to person’s needs that are easy to understand and simple to follow.  It does not focus on short-term results, such as focusing only on breathing and meditation cognitive distractions, but relies on changing the whole self from feelings to thoughts to behaviors. 

 

I feel that this is a good text to read if you are interested or in the psychology field.  It is not only written by a world-renowned psychologist, but it provides the reader with ideas and theories that can be rebutted or accepted to your preference.  It helps develop the readers cognitive capabilities in order to spark an idea such as what are some useful cognitive distractions that anyone could use.  Take for instance the health conscious individual who might want to take yoga as a form of relaxation, or a religious individual who prefers prayer or meditation.  It helps a psychology major to understand that there are not one exact way to treat a patient, but several possibilities that one needs to examine in order to help that individual “stay better”.

 

Part III: Structure

Activities

This book contained various exercises that would help an individual through REBT. It focused in three areas, which were: feeling better, getting better, and staying better.  Feeling better and Getting better have some exercises that one can do to enhance themselves in these two areas.  Staying better involves reexamining the feeling better and getting better and defining them to your preferences and in more detail to how you would go about for example choosing your goals through research.  Staying better also discusses to choose with a conscious so that you will benefit.

 

Feeling better techniques

Some Feeling Better Techniques: Cognitive Distractions

These are used to take your focus off of disturbing yourself (philosophizing) Taking your mind off the Irrational

Jacobson’s Progressive relaxation

Relaxing muscles from head to toes, as you say a mantra, “relax…relax”

My experiences:

My speech professor Mrs. Yokotake told me about this technique and I enjoyed it.  I found it to be relaxing and calmed my nerves when I needed to give a speech for class.  The difference is that she had told me to tense the muscles for 10 seconds and then relax.

Meditation

 

There are several forms of meditation one is to say a mantra, “Peace…Peace…Peace” and focus on your breathing

My experiences:

I tried this when I needed to give my oral presentation for this class because my chapter reviewed cognitive distraction.  I thought it was okay, but I couldn’t do it sitting up straight, I remember laying down on the couch and doing this technique and then I fell asleep.

Yoga

Gentle exercises that require you to concentrate carefully on your movements.

My experiences:

My mother bought a $9.00 video “Yoga conditioning for weight loss” I tried the video for two minutes and got disinterested because it was slow and un-amusing.

Religious rituals and prayers

My experiences:

I usually pray at all times of the day.  I find it to be relaxing and it gives me hope that whatever the circumstances I encounter throughout the day I will be facing them with God. 

Pleasurable diversions

Diversions that you can engage in that to keep disturbing thoughts out of your head

My experiences:

My favorite cognitive distraction is playing my ukulele and writing songs.  Going to the beach and spending the day in the sun and riding my skateboard.

 

ABCDE’s of REBT

Getting better involves changing your set of negative feelings, thoughts and behaviors.  One of the ways you might be able to deal with this is through writing I particularly thought that this way of dealing with a situation is most beneficial to a person.  I decided to fill out the exercise on page 121 of our text:

 

REBT self-help form

 

This ABCDE’s of REBT is a very interesting concept as it seems to motivate you to think of alternative feelings and behaviors that you choose to deal with negative circumstances through making yourself think of logically.  A site, which I thought was most helpful and very detailed in its approach to filling out this form, is at: Drednottingham.com.  

 

Vivo desensitization

Another behavioral activity method is vivo desensitization.  It involves desensitizing patient to certain phobias that may cause them to needlessly disturb themselves, which is accomplished through exposure of what is feared. Taking slow steps to go against your irrational feelings, thoughts and behaviors.

 

There are several behavioral methods that that use in vivo desensitization, they are:

Exposure to irrationally Feared Events

Exposing yourself slowly to events that you are afraid of irrationally.

Risk-Taking Methods

Showing that you are needlessly panicking to a situation by doing something risky.

Staying in difficult situation

Sometimes exposing yourself to a situation helps you to realize you were thinking irrationally and there fore ultimately causing you to think logically.

 

It is through some of these techniques discussed in the text that one might get an idea to what exercises they can do to help develop their irrational beliefs into positive ones.

Importance

Through the techniques I learned that it takes your will power and determination to commit yourself to doing these exercises when a situation occurs that will ultimately get you started to feeling, thinking, and behaving positively.  You can study and learn the concepts, however if you CHOOSE not to incorporate them into your daily life and situations, there is no possibility for change.

 

 

If you decide to push yourself to do these techniques you will find that it will not be as much work as first anticipated, because it will change your habits of dealing with specific situations.  I believe that when you are not disturbing yourself your mind is not cluttered with turmoil that holds you back from experiencing a rich and fulfilling life.  With less panic, anxiety and depression ruling over your life.   It enables YOU to CHOOSE and not be controlled by your disturbing, awfulizing, terrible thoughts.

 

I found that this book may serve an ex

Contents of Text:

Feeling Better, Getting Better, Staying Better: profound self-help therapy for your emotions

Written by: Albert Ellis, Ph.D.

Introduction

Chapter 1: The Difference Between Feeling Better and Getting Better

-          Does meditation work?

-          Relaxation?Exercise? Hobbies?

-          How about psychotherapy?

 

Chapter 2: Don’t Just Feel Better, Get Better!

-          You disturb yourself!

-          The ABC’s of disturbing yourself

-          Who, me irrational?

-          “But, I’m really upset about this!”

-          How common irrational beliefs lead to emotional disturbance

-          So what can you do about yourself disturbing beliefs?

 

Chapter 3: Feeling Better and Getting Better

-          Unconditional self- acceptance

-          Unconditional other-acceptance

-          High frustration tolerance (HFT)

-          Using your fine constructivist potential

 

Chapter 4: Feeling Better I: Thinking and philosophizing Methods

-          Using cognitive distracting techniques

-          Achieving a vital absorbing interest

-          Using self-efficacy

-          Staying in the present

 

Chapter 5: Feeling Better II: Emotive, Evocative, and Experiential Methods

-          Other-approval and self-approval

-          When the “other” is a therapist

-          Using support groups

-          Religious faith

-          Spiritual Beliefs

 

Chapter 6: Feeling Better III: Behavioral and Activity Methods

-          Using breathing exercises

-          Exercising methods

-          Sports and Athletic Games

-          Yoga exercises

-          Business and other practical distractions

-          Skill training methods

 

Chapter 7: Getting Better I: Thinking and philosophizing Methods

-          Disputing core irrational believing: absolutistic, shoulds, oughts, and musts.

-          And now it’s your turn

 

Chapter 8: Getting Better II: More thinking and Philosophizing Methods

-          Dealing with catastrophizing thinking about the future

-          Applying a cost-benefit analysis to what you do and what happens to you

-          Overcoming the need for perfectionizing

-          Using modeling methods to overcome handicapping and disturbing yourself

-          Using problem-solving methods

-          Minimizing overgeneralizing and absolutistic thinking

-          How to stop disturbing yourself about disturbing yourself

-          Constructivist solution-focused methods of helping yourself

-          Self-help has limits

-          Imaging techniques

-          Writing about past or present feelings or experiences

-          Reframing and checking your negative perceptions of adversities

-          Using anti-catastrophizing and anti-awfulizing

-          Using cognitive flooding methods

 

Chapter 9: Getting Better III: Still More Thinking and Philosophizing methods

-          Three-way disputes

-          Disputing inflexible shoulding and musting

-          Preferable shoulding and wishing

-          Disputing unconditional self-accepting, unconditional other-accepting, and unconditional condition-accepting

-          High frustration tolerating wishing and preferring

 

Chapter 10: Getting Better IV: Emotive, Evocative and Experiential Methods

-          Using forceful disputing of irrational beliefs

-          Using forceful coping self-statements

-          Rational Emotive Imagery

-          Shame-Attacking Exercises

-          Rational role-playing

-          Using humor to interrupt and dispute disturbing

-          Realistic optimism and self-encouragement

-          Seeking fun and pleaure

-          Multiple-chair Role-playing

 

Chapter 11: Getting Better V: Behavioral and Activity Methods

-          Introducing…in vivo desensitization

-          Using in vivo desensitizing: exposure to irrationally feared events

-          Using risk- taking methods

-          Staying in difficult situations

-          Using activity homework

-          Using paradoxical activity homework

-          Using reinforcing and penalizing

-          Using penelizing imagery against irrational believing-emoting-behaving (IB’s)

-          Using relapse prevention

-          Dealing with addicting and personality disorders

-          Commitment to therapy

 

Chapter 12: Getting Better VI: Realistic, Logical, and Pragmatic Methods

-          Philosophies to combat self-downing

-          Philosophies to combat demanding of other people

-          Philosophies to minimize low-frustration tolerating

-          Stopping your demanding, musturbating and overgeneralizing

-          Unconditionally accepting yourself

-          “…And do unto others…”

-          Achieving high frustration tolerating (HFT)

-          Applying a cost-benefit ratio to pleasures and misfortunes

 

Chapter 13: Staying Better I: Avoiding Self-Disturbing Beliefs-Emotions-Behaviors

-          “Good” likes and “Bad” dislikes

-          Whats so awful?

-          Self-disturbing philosophizing

-          Don’t you believe it!

-          Are you bringing on yourself?

 

Chapter 14: Staying Better II: Avoiding Inelegant Methods of Change

-          Unrealistic and relatively ineffective methods of dealing with unhealthy feeling and behaving

-          Distracting methods that tend to temporarily and palliatively interrupt your unhealthy feelings and behaviors

-          Realistic but philosophically inelegant and limited methods of dealing with your unhealthy negative feelings and behaviors

 

Chapter 15: Staying Better III: Implementing Your Resolve to Change what you can Change

 

Chapter 16: Final Wisdom on Feeling Better, Getting Better, and Staying Better

-          To choose or not to choose

-          Making conscious choices

-          Choosing individual vs. social values

-          Balancing act

-          Choosing health over disturbance

-          Helping yourself feel, get, and stay better

 

Selected References

Index

 

 

This book develops nicely into organized sections, which allows readers to easily find specific parts in the text that they might want to come back to or review.

 

The beginning of the book supplies the reader with foundation and topics that will be fully discussed in the later chapters.  Through these foundations you are slowly being prepared for Feeling Better which deals with problems externally.  This means that the techniques or theories in these “Feeling Better” chapter help you to deal with problems that cause you to disturb yourself with distractions that will focus your attention off of wallowing in negativity.  Once you are able to do that, your mind is open to activities surrounding getting better.  Getting better seems to deal with the internal.  Looking at your feelings, thoughts, and emotions and finding ways to bridge the negative irrational undesirable beliefs into positive rational desirable ones.  Through exercises such as in vivo desensitization and cognitive writing exercises such as the REBT self-help form.

 

Staying better relies on the determination and practice of the person who wants the help

Part IV: Critique

I did enjoy the book though there may have been some controversial topics such as: How can one truly unconditionally accept others.  I truly believe that people “disturb” themselves much more than we have come to realize.  I believe also that this is a problem in society because it causes depression, anxiety and panic, which lead to other psychological disabilities that have an impact on your whole life. 

“Likes”

I am in Psychology 342, which is a course on aging, and development and I have learned that many older adults reaching their later years in life choose to use humor as a coping mechanism.  It dampens the stressors and difficulties associated with aging as well as create a blissful atmosphere instead of a dark one.  The ending of Chapter 9 in our text seems to deal soley on humor as Dr. Ellis put a variety of songs for the disturbed individual.  He writes (p. 159; ¶ 1):

 

On the contrary, deliberately taking things lightly when you are beset with problems is hardly a cure-all – in fact, it may distract you from solving them if you take them too lightly – but it has great advantages.  For example, seeing things, even difficulties, in a humorous light:

*   Prevents you from self-depressing

*   Challenges you to see alternatives in stead of grim results

*   Blocks your tendencies to view things only as black and white

*   Adds a sense of play to your life

*   Helps you laugh at the behavior of yourself and others instead of seeing only the dark side

*   Punctures your and other people’s grandiosity

*   Shows you that you have some real control over your feelings

*   Dramatically interrupts some of your dysfunctional patterns

*   Lets you relate better to people, including some difficult ones

*   Shows you that your human foibles are universal

 

I agree, with Dr. Ellis that humor helps.  However, too much humor or being compulsively funny and disregarding the problem will only create a bigger problem, because although you may have laughed about the situation or take your mind off of your present suffering you will find that the problem is still there.

 

Dr. Phil a nationally renowned psychologist once said that, “Your Perception is your Reality!”  I truly believe this is true.  I believe that using humor or finding something to smile, laugh or be merry about in life helps the individual to create a positive outlook through adversity.  Keeping this positive outlook creates a chain reaction with in the thinking and behaving aspects in their life helping them to cope and find creative possibilities to overcome unwanted obstacles.

 

“Dislikes”

I believe that in order to completely change there are three aspects that need to be addressed and developed they are: body, mind and spirit.  The feeling better aspect deals with the body, the getting better deals with cognition.  However there is no reference to the spirit, which ultimately is the determining factor of who you are!  Someone may be able to think and behave accordingly to societal pressures and create a physical life that is comfortable or decent, however the spirit is your true self. 

 

Text Box: Unconditional Love
Because someone does something, bad are they incapable of Loving or unable to be loved by someone, since love is good?
In regards to unconditional other-acceptance it is difficult to understand how one can accept a person when they commit crimes or are disobedient, because it is not the actions that stem from who they are?  When you consider that by accepting them as a human who has a right to live and breath along with the rest of us, you enhance yourself to be a better person.

 

Consider the topic which I had discussed previously which revolves around people being egocentric.  I find that if you accept others not for their actions but as a person who may not fulfill your expectations you release yourself from being egocentric therefore expanding your mind to become rational thinkers that are able to forgive, help and make a positive difference up on the world, ultimately having this positivity cycle towards you, others and the world.

Additonal Links:

Impact Publishers (2002). Feeling Better, Getting Better Staying Better Retrieved December 1, 2002, from http://www.impactpublishers.com/books/fbgbsb.html

Horwatt, S. (n.d.). News and Views Book review of Feeling Better, Getting Better, Staying Better.  Retrieved December 1, 2002, from  http://www.division42.org/MembersArea/Nws_Views

      /articles/Reviews_Books/feeling_better.html

Johnson, C. (2002). Bookreview Feeling Better, Getting Better, Staying Better.  Retrieved December 1, 2002, from http://www.anxietysupport.org/cc19menu.htm

 

Additional Observation

This book definitely spoke to those who are in need of help instead of those that are in the psychology profession.  The terms and stories written in the text were ones that many people who seek help go through daily.  The writings in this book are blunt and the use of profanity such as Push Your Ass (PYA) is definitely not a concept that seems to be one that is empirically studied and labeled.  I truly believe that the terms, stories and verbal language is one that may actually speak to those that want to seek help. 

 

“Push Your Ass “ is something that I recall hearing in my younger days, while paddling on a canoe team in town.  The majority of my teammates did not grow-up in affluent neighborhood in fact many of them were living in difficult circumstances.  When the coach would scream, “Push your Ass, stop cruising!”  Those girls, including myself knew what she meant.  It is unfortunate that the language and concepts seem too simple with out thought, BUT I do believe that it will have some affect on those who want to read a book that is easy to understand and covers basic steps that might help them achieve a more positive way of emotionally living.

 

Many times we forget that majority of those that need help cannot or are unable to get the psychological help that they need.  There are numerous amounts of individuals who do not have the money, time or insurance to pay for treatment offered in psychology sessions.  This book with its faults is overall a handy book for anyone who may need help in areas in their life and they just do not know where to get started. 

 

In Seasons of the Heart, an educational reading for older adults reaching their “third age” states that many aging adults use humor as a coping mechanism to deal with problems (Gross, 2001).  Perhaps by his interviews, and web pages dedicated to songs revolving around melancholy emotions to old folk tunes one might be able to understand that Dr. Ellis is not your “normal” Mental Health Professional.  He takes his topics with an intermingling of seriousness and wit.

 

Albert Ellis, Ph.D. When you read through interviews with him and some of his songs that he finds humorous, you will find that the book is written in very much of the same character.  Perhaps when understanding the personality behind the author his writings and concepts may seem more clear.  An example of his train of thinking, in regards to meditation in an Interview on the Web page PsychotherapistResources.com Dr.Ellis responds to the question posed by interviewer Myrtle Heery, Ph.D., “So you do incorporate meditation in your work?”

Silence would be the most boring thing I ever thought of. I spend time thinking, if you call that in silence, but I don't meditate or anything like that. That's a waste of time except that it's cognitive distraction and temporarily gets people not to worry, but it doesn't show them the basic philosophy behind worrying. So a lot of meditation is just useless. But temporarily in REBT we teach people how to do it.

 

Text Box: It's a fucking waste of time. Why should I meditate? I'm not anxious.
   -Albert Ellis Ph.D.
I first found his interview to be shocking because of his use of profanity and his very blunt way of speaking, however it was different.  His overall analysis of people and life seems to be quite accurate, as we all tend to disturb ourselves and that it is our choice to choose how we will feel, think and act when circumstances arise.  As individuals of the human race, we are all capable of change and to say that one person is bad or good is saying that s/he can never be good or bad, therefore achieving the good is impossible and forgiveness is not needed.   

 

Part VI: Works Cited

 

Notting, E. (n.d.). Practice information and handouts. Retrieved December 5, 2002, from http://drednottingham.com/handouts.html

Conqueranxiety.com (2002). Anxiety statistics: you are not alone.  Retrieved December 7, 2002 from http://www.conqueranxiety.com/anxiety_statistics.asp

Papalia, D. & Olds, S. (1998) Physical and cognitive development in early childhood, Human Development 7th Edition (197-200). McGraw Hill

Gross, Z. (2001). Troubles and triumphs, Seasons of the heart (75-77) Novato, CA: New world library

 

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