Rational emotive therapy - A direction in cognitive psychotherapy (Albert Ellis), based on eliminating the irrational judgments of a patient suffering from neurosis. The key is the so-called ABC theory, according to which, a certain negative manifestation of emotion (frustration, disappointment) or behavior (C) is awakened to life not directly by any event (A), but only indirectly, through a system of interpretations or beliefs ( IN). The goal of psychotherapeutic work is to detect and eliminate the system of pathogenetic interpretations that lead to disturbances in emotional and behavioral reactions.

Ellis emphasized that people do not have direct reactions to most situations, and that emotional reactions depend on the way they perceive events. Thus, it is not events that excite, upset, irritate or anger us, but the way in which a person interprets and makes sense of them.

Illustration: a child hears his father yelling at him and gets upset; however, the housemate who hears exactly the same “objective stimuli” does not react at all to this parental outburst (or reacts differently: gets angry, for example).

Ellis is based on the fact that people can and do have maladaptive and irrational ways of interpreting events, causing emotional disturbances of such intensity that cannot in any way be justified by a real rational assessment of the event.

Ellis models emotional behavior in a sequence that is easy to remember as a simple ABC mnemonic:

The relationship between A and C is unpredictable if we do not know B. That is, if we know that such and such an individual found himself in such and such a situation (for example, his leg was crushed in public transport), but we do not know the model of the person’s world ( at least in key moments), then the consequences of his actions are difficult to predict (a person with a crushed leg can cause a scandal, he can cry, he can start lecturing, he can ignore him, he can immediately get into a fight...).

Types of irrational judgments

Ellis divided irrational judgments into four types:

1. "Obligatory" indicate that someone (or something) should be different from what it is ("I should win the game", "He should be nice to me", "Everyone should be honest with me") . Such judgments are based on some kind of obsessive goal setting.

2. "Horror" judgments are based on the fact that everything is terrible, creepy and nightmarish, because everything is not as it should be (“It will be terrible if I don’t finish cleaning before my husband arrives,” “It’s terrible that my plan was figured out, now I’m finished "). Such judgments are made based on strong negative emotions, in this case there is a “fear of horror”.

3. Judgments "proper" reflect a person’s inability to tolerate or endure the world if it differs from what he “should” or “should” be (“I won’t stand it if it turns out that my best friend- a deceiver”, “Everyone around me turned out to be enemies, and I can’t bear it”).

4. "Censure" judgments belittle a person (one’s own or that person’s because of whom the situation has become different from what it “should” or “should” be). Such judgments are based on an infantile model of the world, in which people are divided into good and bad, kind and evil, and also an infantile idea of ​​​​the duty of each person to reward or punish good or bad. Examples: “He is a terrible person, he should be punished for being late,” “If he says one more bad word to me, I will understand that he is a scoundrel, and then I will take revenge on him.”

Twelve Basic Irrational Ideas According to Ellis

In more detail, Ellis identified the most typical, “core” irrational ideas that explicitly or implicitly underlie most emotional disorders.

1. For an adult, it is absolutely necessary that every step he takes is attractive to others.

2. There are vicious and nasty actions, and those guilty of them should be severely punished.

3. It's a disaster when everything doesn't go as we would like.

4. All troubles are imposed on us from the outside - by people or circumstances.

5. If something scares or causes concern, you need to be alert.

6. It is easier to avoid responsibility and difficulties than to overcome them.

7. Everyone needs something stronger and more significant than what he feels in himself.

8. You must be competent, adequate, reasonable and successful in all respects. You need to know everything, be able to do everything, understand everything and achieve success in everything.

9. What greatly influenced your life once will always influence it later.

10. Our well-being is influenced by the actions of other people, so we must do everything to ensure that these people change in the direction we desire.

11. Going with the flow and doing nothing is the path to happiness.

12. We have no control over our emotions and cannot help but experience them.

Typical scheme of work in RET

1. Prove to the client the validity of rational-emotive therapy. Explain the theoretical foundations of RET in accessible language. Consider examples from life. Introduce the ABC model and reveal to the client the core idea of ​​the therapy. Give an example of irrational and rational thoughts caused by a social event that would be understandable and close to the client. Discuss what rational or irrational behavioral and emotional consequences these judgments may lead to.

2. Obtain the client’s consent to consider his own irrational judgments using the RET apparatus.

3. The therapist discusses and challenges the client's irrational judgments. Present a list of identified irrational statements and discuss with the client why these statements are irrational and what rational statements can replace them. It's a good idea to write down these rational statements.

4. The client is encouraged to develop his own arguments against irrational judgments, practice them, and replace the irrational judgments with more appropriate appraisals of the activating events. Encourage the client to define their own situation. Discuss with him what irrational thoughts come to his mind in such a situation and what consequences this situation most often leads to. Write down these imaginable consequences and encourage the client to generate and write down more rational thoughts.

5. Development of new rational and realistic judgments about events, actual and possible. At this final stage, it is important to develop and strengthen the client's "repaired" model of the world.

6. Encouraging the client to identify irrational thoughts, feelings and actions that arise in certain problematic situations. Situations must be specific, causing certain difficulties. It is preferable, for example, to say: “When I see an attractive girl, I think... What if I can’t find anything to say... And so I stand there, staring like a fool, with my mouth open...” (to This statement can be applied to irrational thoughts No. 3 and No. 8 from the list of irrational ideas). Less preferable are general statements such as “When I am around people, I have no self-confidence.” To help clients cover all conflicts problem situations, we used a simple imagination technique. Clients are asked to close their eyes, relax, and imagine problematic situations that recently occurred, and then talk about the thoughts and feelings they had in those specific situations.

7. After identifying several situations, you need to order them according to the criterion of difficulty (you can rely on the degree of stress of the situation). If possible, situations are arranged in a hierarchy.

8. The therapist presents each of the problem situations, starting with the easiest. Situations are presented in discussion, in imagination, in real life. The client is instructed to describe his feelings and thoughts during each presentation. The purpose of the exercise is to ensure that a certain emotional state becomes a signal to search for irrational thoughts. At this stage, thoughts will appear less carefully packaged and labeled. The therapist's job is to delve deeper into the client's statements and compare them. When the therapist decides that he is able to formulate the client's thoughts, he can either ask the client to generalize which irrational judgment is dominant in him, or he can make a generalization himself.

9. As each irrational idea is presented, it is challenged by the therapist. The therapist then gradually encourages the client to take on the role of challenger. This process is controversial. The client is asked whether his judgments are 100% true, inevitable and based on irrefutable facts. Counterexamples are presented, and the client is led to formulate more rational judgments about the activating event and imagine what results these rational judgments might lead to.

10. The client is presented with activating events (in imagination, in a role-play or in real life) and asked to practice rational alternatives in the presence of the therapist. The therapist teaches the client how to control his emotional reaction (here the “fear thermometer” method with divisions from 0 to 100 points is most convenient). In the initial stages, the therapist also acts as a prompter and compiler of rehearsed rational judgments. Monitoring and exercises continue until the activating event no longer causes intense emotion.

Hometasks

At different stages of therapy, you can give the client homework, which the client talks about completing at subsequent meetings. Here are examples of homework:

1. Ask the client to identify (in addition to those discussed in the sessions) two more of his real life problems and identify the ABC sequence in them. Let him try to find more rational judgments and study the consequences to which they can lead.

2. The psychotherapist asks the client to try the technique of turning irrational judgments into rational ones in real life situations. Records of this practice and the improvements achieved are recorded in a diary.

American psychologist and cognitive therapist, author of rational-emotive behavior therapy, an approach to psychotherapy that views negative emotions and dysfunctional behavioral reactions as arising not as a result of experience in itself, but as a result of the interpretation of this experience, that is, as a result of incorrect cognitive attitudes - irrational beliefs. He was also known as a sexologist and one of the ideologists of the sexual revolution.

He created and served as president of The Albert Ellis Institute.

In 1982, he was recognized as the second most influential psychotherapist in the world, after Carl Rogers (Sigmund Freud was named third); in 1993 - the first (Ellis, Rogers, Beck). He deservedly shares the laurels of pioneers of the cognitive approach with A. Beck.

Biography

Albert Ellis grew up as the eldest child of a Jewish family in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where his parents emigrated from Russia in 1910. His parents moved to New York and divorced when the boy was 12 years old. Ellis's entire future life is connected with this city. He graduated from the city university (bachelor's degree in business) and after graduation tried for some time to engage in business and literary work, but soon became interested in psychology. At the end of the 30s. He entered the department of clinical psychology at Columbia University (Master's degree in 1943), defended his dissertation (Ph.D., 1946) and received additional psychoanalytic training at the Karen Horney Institute. Ellis was significantly influenced by Karen Horney, as well as Alfred Adler, Erich Fromm and Harry Sullivan, but by the mid-1950s he became disillusioned with psychoanalysis and began developing his own approach. In 1955, this approach was called rational therapy.

Ellis founded and until recently headed the Albert Ellis Institute in New York, until the organization's board removed him from his position. Albert Ellis, despite being completely deaf, continued to actively work independently. On January 30, 2006, a New York court decided that his removal from office was illegal.

Scientific and practical activities

Albert Ellis devoted most of his life to psychotherapeutic practice and counseling: first as a layman, then as a psychoanalyst. Later, he became disillusioned with psychoanalysis and published the article “Telepathy and psychoanalysis: a critique of recent findings,” containing critical remarks about anti-scientific mysticism and occultism in psychological literature.

In the 1950s and 60s, Ellis created the foundations of rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT) and its central model of the occurrence of emotional disorders - the ABC Model. Throughout the rest of his life, the scientist develops this new direction of psychotherapy, paying special attention to experimental verification of the truth of the basic principles of the theory and the effectiveness of the therapeutic methods used.

Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT)

Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) (formerly “RT” and “REBT”) is a “theoretically consistent eclecticism” of various psychothereutical techniques: cognitive, emotional and behavioral. Distinctive feature REBT is the division of all emotions experienced by a person into rational (productive) and irrational (unproductive, destructive, dysfunctional), the cause of which is irrational beliefs (sometimes “irrational beliefs”, English “irrational beliefs”).

Since Ellis began his journey as a psychotherapist as a psychoanalyst, it is not surprising that his views were strongly influenced by the ideas of psychoanalysts such as Karen Horney and Alfred Adler. However, Ellis subsequently disagreed with psychoanalysis, and as a result, according to the authors and supporters, REBT is a humanistic form of therapy, the consequence of which is one of the main therapeutic principles of REBT - unconditional acceptance (“unconditional positive regard” in the terminology of C. Rogers) by the therapist of the client as an individual while maintaining a critical attitude towards his negative actions.

Moreover, when describing the relationship of a REBT therapist to a client, Ellis puts Rogers' entire triad first. In addition, the list includes humor (only where it is appropriate; humor as an ironic and cheerful attitude towards life, but not jokes about the client’s personality, feelings, thoughts and actions), informality (but not entertainment in psychotherapy sessions that are held outside the client’s money), careful expression of immense warmth towards the client (excessive emotional empathy is also harmful). Ellis defined the role of the REBT therapist as an authoritative and inspiring teacher who strives to teach his clients how to be their own therapist after formal sessions have ended.

The validity of the basic theoretical principles and the therapeutic effectiveness of REBT are confirmed by many experimental studies.

ABC model

The ABC (sometimes “A-B-C”) model of the emergence of mental disorders states that dysfunctional emotions, designated by the letter “C” (“consequences”, English consequences), do not arise under the influence of “activating events” (sometimes - “activators” letter “A”) ", English activating events), and under the influence of irrational beliefs (sometimes - “beliefs”, letter “B”, English beliefs), formulated in the form of absolutist demands or “shoulds”.

The key to positive changes in the model is the detection, analysis and active challenging of irrational beliefs (corresponding to stage “D” in the extended ABCDE model - English disputation) followed by consolidation of the results (“E”, English end result). To achieve this, clients are trained to notice and differentiate dysfunctional emotions and look for their cognitive causes.

Psychological health and its criteria for REBT

A psychologically healthy person is characterized by a philosophy of relativism, “wishes”;

Rational derivatives of this philosophy (rational because they usually help people achieve their goals or form new ones if previous goals cannot be achieved) are:

1. assessment - determining the unpleasantness of an event (instead of dramatization);
2. tolerance - I recognize that an unpleasant event has occurred, evaluate its unpleasantness and try to change it or, if it is impossible to change, accept the situation and pursue other goals (instead of “I won’t survive this”);
3. acceptance - I accept that people are imperfect and do not have to behave differently than they do now, I accept that people are too complex and changeable to be given a global categorical assessment, and I accept living conditions as they are eat (instead of condemning);

Thus, the main criteria for human psychological health are:

• Compliance with your own interests.
• Social interest.
• Self management.
• High tolerance to frustration.
• Flexibility.
• Acceptance of uncertainty.
• Dedication to creative pursuits.
• Scientific thinking.
• Self-acceptance.
• Riskiness.
• Delayed hedonism.
• Dystopianism.
• Responsibility for your emotional disorders.

Awards and prizes

• 1971 - Humanist of the Year Award from the American Humanist Association.
• 1985 - American Psychological Association Award for Outstanding Professional Contributions to Applied Research.
• 1988 - American Counseling Association Award for Professional Achievement.
• 1996 and 2005 - awards from the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies.

Religious and philosophical views

Albert Ellis adhered to agnosticism in his religious beliefs, arguing that God “probably does not exist,” but without denying the possibility of his existence. In the book “Guilt-Free Sex,” the scientist expressed the opinion that religious dogmas that impose restrictions on the expression of sexual experiences often have a negative impact on people’s mental health.

Ellis's basic philosophical views fit within the framework of the concepts of humanism and stoicism. In his books and interviews, the scientist often quoted his favorite philosophers: Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus and others.

Literature in Russian

• Ellis A., Dryden W. The practice of rational-emotional behavior therapy. - St. Petersburg: Rech, 2002. - 352 pp. - ISBN 5-9268-0120-6
• Ellis A., McLaren K. Rational-emotional behavioral therapy. - RnD.: Phoenix, 2008. - 160 pp. - ISBN 978-5-222-14121-2
• Ellis A. Humanistic psychotherapy: A rational-emotional approach. / Per. from English - St. Petersburg: Owl; M.: EKSMO-Press, 2002. - 272 p. (Series “Stages of Psychotherapy”). ISBN 5-04-010213-5
• Ellis A., Conway R. Who does a woman want? Practical guide on erotic seduction. - M.: Tsentrpoligraf, 2004. - 176 pp. - ISBN 5-9524-1051-0
• Ellis A., Lange A. Don’t put pressure on my psyche! - St. Petersburg: Peter Press, 1997. - 224 p. - (Series “Your own psychologist”). ISBN 5-88782-226-0
• Ellis A. Psychotraining according to the method of Albert Ellis. - St. Petersburg: Peter Kom, 1999. - 288 p. - (Series “Your own psychologist”). ISBN 5-314-00048-2
• Kassinov G. Rational-emotional-behavioral therapy as a method of treating emotional disorders // Psychotherapy: From theory to practice. Materials of the 1st Congress of the Russian Psychotherapeutic Association. - St. Petersburg: ed. Psychoneurological Institute named after. V. M. Bekhtereva, 1995. - P. 88-98.
• Where is the proof? Albert Ellis: revolution in psychotherapy // “Common Sense” 2008, No. 1 (46)
• McMullin R. Workshop on cognitive therapy = The New Handbook on Cognitive Therapy Techniques. - St. Petersburg: Rech, 2001. - 560 p. - 5000 copies. - ISBN 5-9268-0036-6.

Rational Emotive Therapy (RET) by A. Ellis

Continuing the conversation about cognitive psychology and psychotherapy, it should also be noted the developments of another of its representatives - Albert Ellis. Like Beck, Ellis gave great importance namely the cognitive sphere of a person, which was completely ignored by the behavioral approach to therapy popular at that time.

In 1955, Albert Ellis proposed a new type of therapy, which he called rational therapy. He wanted to emphasize that the basis of our psychological problems lies not so much in specific events, but in our rational settings, irrational beliefs that prevent us from accepting life as it is. In 1961, having improved and supplemented his therapy, Ellis gave it a new name - rational emotional therapy, abbreviated RET. It is still used under this name, although Ellis himself renamed it again in 1993 rational emotive behavior therapy, or REBT, thereby emphasizing the importance of attention to the real behavior of the client, which allows it to be classified as both behavioral and cognitive psychotherapy. The new name never caught on, and despite the fact that the latest version of therapy is now being used in work, it is called by its former name - RET.

If behavioral therapy seeks to change behavior by transforming external conditions, then RET sees its task in changing emotions, and then behavior, through transforming thoughts. The essence of the RET concept can be reflected in the diagram: A-B-C, where A - activation event - exciting (activating) event; B - belief system - belief system; C - emotional consequence - emotional consequences. An emotion seems to immediately follow the activating event, but Ellis believed that a person's thoughts and beliefs necessarily lie between them. Anxiety and other negative emotions are initiated by irrational cognitions. Ellis believed that such irrational thoughts and beliefs must be addressed and exposed rational thinking. This will help you overcome them and the negative feelings they provoke.

Ellis identified two types of cognitions: descriptive and evaluative. Descriptive (or describing) - represent relatively objective information about reality, evaluative - express a person’s attitude to what is perceived. The latter are associated with varying degrees of rigidity: evaluative cognitions can be close to reality and very far from it. Ellis called the latter irrational judgments, which include errors such as incorrect conclusions, absolutization, exaggeration, simplification, etc.

One of the goals of Ellis therapy is to separate the negative feelings, emotions and beliefs that are periodically present in any person into rational and irrational. In other words, there are events that inherently should cause sadness, sadness, some dissatisfaction, this normal reaction healthy person. But sometimes experiences arise on the basis of irrational beliefs, for example, when a person suffers because, having set himself unrealistic goals, he cannot achieve them, or because he cannot accept reality as it is, he suffers from the fact that nothing impossible to change. Feelings with such a basis do not help solve problems. It should be noted that Ellis did not use the concept of “irrational” in the sense of pathology. He called rational that which helps a person achieve the goals that he really needs, and irrational - everything that prevents this, and it is precisely certain beliefs - “cognitions” that interfere.

Ellis primarily classified absolutist cognitions as irrational beliefs. These are various oughts - categorical and inflexible, when a person perceives the world through the concepts of “must”, “necessary”. For some, this “should - shouldn’t” extends to themselves and their immediate circle of friends, for others - and to the distant one, for others - it generally reaches the existential level, that everything in the world is not so and should be different. Ellis believed that the most important point in gaining mental health is the refusal of absolutization - “should” must be replaced with “it would be necessary,” “it would be nice,” “I would like.” That is, to soften the rigidity of demands on oneself, others, and the surrounding reality, which drive a person into intolerable internal discomfort and create the same unbearable discomfort for others. Instead of being pleasant, a person sticks out his hard corners in all directions and then is surprised that no one approaches him. This is because you can get cut off and hit on these corners.

Irrational ideas lead to negative emotions (depression, anxiety, anger, guilt), which seriously interfere with the achievement of goals. They underlie dysfunctional behavior, such as avoidance of decisions, the habit of procrastination, alcoholism, etc. At the same time, cognitions create programs of self-fulfilling prophecies due to constant exercise and reinforcement, i.e., a vicious circle arises - a negative judgment causes a negative emotion, which confirms a negative judgment, such as “everything is bad.”

Ellis paid great attention to the first (initial) acquaintance of the psychotherapist with the patient.

Here is a sample instruction from a RET psychotherapist:

“The therapy we begin is aimed at teaching you to manage your emotions and get rid of negative experiences. In the first stages of work, you will be given the opportunity to understand the ways in which you have created your negative feelings. You can also change these ways and thereby experience other, positive emotions. All this will require you to be active in your work both here and at home, since therapy involves doing homework, listening to audio recordings, and reading specialized literature. I am not a magician or wizard who will instantly save you from your problems. I can be a guide who will help you walk the road to your desired goal” (Fedorov A.P., 2002).

It must be said that Ellis did not share the opinion of representatives of Rogerian humanistic therapy about the decisive role of empathic support without the active intervention of the therapist. Ellis agreed that the client must be accepted as he is, but believed that this, however, should not exclude the appropriate activity of the psychotherapist, who can, if necessary, criticize the patient and expose his erroneous judgments. Ellis believed that uncritical, benevolent acceptance of the patient perpetuated his problems, as often happens in the family. And he especially actively recommended attacking the self-tyranny of obligation, when the patient drives himself into stress and anxiety with inflated demands on himself and others.

Based on extensive practical experience, Ellis differentiated approaches to patients different types. Thus, he recommends avoiding an overly friendly, emotionally charged style of interaction with “hysterical” patients; an overly intellectual style with “obsessive-compulsive” patients; an overly directive style with people whose sense of autonomy is easily shaken; overly active style with patients who too quickly become passive.

Let's consider the stages of emotional-rational therapy.

First, you need to identify and verbalize (clearly express in words) irrational beliefs. In this case, special attention is paid to absolutist cognitions, which are manifested in the patient’s use of the words “must,” “must,” and “necessary.” This so-called tyranny of obligation becomes the main object of therapeutic work. The therapist must show the client how this belief system weighs on him.

Once core irrational beliefs have been clarified, the work of restructuring these cognitions at three levels begins: cognitive, emotional, and behavioral.

At the cognitive level, the main task of the therapist is to force the patient to abandon perfectionism (inflated demands for perfection), showing him that this will already make his life simpler and more joyful.

Socratic dialogue and cognitive dispute are used here (step-by-step bringing the client’s beliefs to the discovery of their incorrectness and harmfulness).

To influence the emotional damage, the drama of preferences and oughts is played out to distinguish between these two phenomena - “it would be better” and “should” with the help of role-playing games. Persuasion is carried out at the emotional level.

To enhance the emotional background, the therapist can, for example, invite members of the therapeutic group to tell one of its participants what they think about him, or encourage participants to admit their shortcomings, “shameful” feelings (envy, hostility, etc.). To do this, patients will have to show courage and make an effort on themselves, but as a result they will see that the group does not judge them, accepts them as they are, and the participants will be able to experience a sense of mutual trust and intimacy. To enhance this effect, Ellis used techniques that brought sensual pleasure: a friendly hug, stroking, expression kind words, which patients previously did not dare to undertake.

At the behavioral level, work is aimed not only at eliminating symptoms, but also at changing cognitions. For example, perfectionist tendencies can be reduced by the following therapist tasks:

• ? overcome shyness and make a date;
• ? deliberately fail when speaking in front of an audience (therapeutic group);
• ? imagine yourself enduring a situation of failure;
• ? imagine yourself in difficult circumstances and accept them;
• ? allow yourself a pleasant activity only after completing an unpleasant but necessary task;
• ? start doing something right away, without putting it off until later, while enduring the discomfort of fighting the habit;
• ? take on an unpleasant task for the sake of deferred goals;
• ? from time to time behave in a way that is already rational thinking person(so that the patient can understand that changes are possible).

Albert Ellis sought to bring emotional and rational perception to the same level, that is, to show a person his true needs, and not the real ones that possess the patient, false or unrealistic, overestimated or underestimated needs. The work of a psychotherapist should consist largely of revising the client’s goals and desires, assessing them - is this really what he needs, or does it just seem to him that maybe these are far-fetched, not true needs, and they are the ones that drain energy from achieving what is really truly needed?

Ellis believed that For psychological well-being, a person needs to have important life goals and actively strive to achieve them. Therefore, one of the therapist’s tasks in cognitive counseling is to analyze what goals his client sets and what he does to achieve them. After all, goals can be the most “rational” ones, but at the same time a person doesn’t really do anything to achieve them, he only thinks about it, but puts everything off until later. So, for example, a person decided to find a job, but every day he finds reasons to postpone the search, being distracted by all sorts of other things not related to the goal. Start, act, and along the way something will be added that will strengthen your position! Because deferred actions, if we recognize their necessity, give rise to neuroses, and those, in turn, are aggravated by further inaction. Therefore, if a person really understands that he needs to act, he should begin to act without fear of failure. There is a very good proverb: “Not every action brings success, but there is no success without action.” We must understand that not every step promises us success, but if we do nothing at all, then there will be no success. This is a very therapeutic proverb and can be used to counter a client's resistance. “Well, I acted and acted - and nothing happened.” And you immediately remember: “Not every action brings success, but there is no success without action.” You may not have achieved victory this time, but without making an attempt, there would be no chance of achieving it at all.

It is very important that the goals are adequate and not exaggerated, otherwise you will never achieve them, but will only be disappointed and remain frustrated all the time, nervous tension, and not underestimated, since they will not allow a person to achieve personal growth, to reveal his potential, which will also make a person unhappy. Abraham Maslow said: “I warn you that if you refuse to realize your abilities, you will be a deeply unhappy person.” Just like everything in nature - every blade of grass, every animal - so a person is programmed for maximum self-realization, and when not due to some circumstances, but on his own, a person moves away from development into passivity, laziness or some false goals, then this over time causes frustration, dissatisfaction, tension and emotional and sometimes even somatic disturbances.

Since a person lives in society, sometimes the achievement of his personal goals may not be consistent with the goals and desires of other people, which leads to conflicts both with others and with himself. He often has to solve a dilemma: give up his desires or act against the desires of others. This point is also the subject of the work of a psychological consultant or therapist, who must look at where the client’s desires and aspirations conflict with the desires and aspirations of other people, and help him find a reasonable compromise. If a person constantly “pulls the blanket over himself,” his relationships with the people around him will deteriorate, become fragile and insincere, and if, on the contrary, he constantly gives in to others, then his own desires will suffer and his self-realization will not occur, which will also make the person will feel unhappy. This means that it is necessary to be diplomatic and show that “I’m ready to give in, but I’m counting on certain concessions from you, let’s try to be more mutually accommodating!” In many cases, the psychologist will discover that there are no real contradictions as such, there is simply a different assessment of contradictory events, which is based on different psychological attitudes. And it may turn out that to resolve the conflict, it will be enough to look at the situation differently, and then it will become clear that satisfying your desire will actually not hurt anyone. To do this, it is necessary to investigate what beliefs underlie actions - rational, allowing one to achieve a goal, or irrational, preventing this.

Ellis's approach can also be called hedonistic. We know that there is such a direction in philosophy - hedonism. Its ancestor was Aristippus, who lived in Ancient Greece. According to this movement, the purpose of human life is to obtain pleasure. And, apparently, nature itself has laid down in man certain indicators of what he should strive for. Bad, as a rule, is unpleasant, painful; and good things bring pleasure. And one should be less led by social prejudices and trust more in the voice of nature, because she could not turn the good and pleasant into sinful and bad. It must be said that Ellis put a slightly different meaning into this term, hedonism. He spoke about the so-called delayed hedonism. What it is? Ellis believed that a person should have certain delayed gratifications for which he is now willing to endure some discomfort. For example, you understand that you will enjoy receiving a diploma and further good employment. But for this, now you need to study and sometimes do certain work, pass tests and exams, which are now right in your throat. Knowing that your true efforts will pay off in the long run helps you to force yourself to study diligently (to bother yourself with an activity). An athlete trains, tortures himself, so that later he can win and receive awards and glory, because he understands that without effort he will not achieve what he wants.

Many neurotic individuals do not know how to live in delayed hedonism. They prefer instant hedonism and follow the principle “if I can’t get something right away, then I won’t try,” that is, they cannot set themselves up for the fact that effort now will lead to success in the future. This is one of the most important tasks in raising children - to teach them from childhood to work for delayed gratification: if you finish a quarter well, you will get a bicycle, etc. Children must learn to force themselves to endure difficulties, and not just like that, but for the sake of obtaining pleasure in the future. Friedrich Engels said: “Man must live for the joys of tomorrow.” A person should have as many different delayed joys as possible, associated, for example, with a pleasant meeting, achievement, success or some other pleasure in the future, the anticipation of which brightens up our life today.

Ellis identified several criteria for psychological health:

• ? respecting one's own interests;
• ? social interest;
• ? self-government, readiness for reasonable cooperation;
• ? high tolerance to states of frustration;
• ? flexibility, lack of rigidity towards oneself and others;
• ? acceptance of uncertainty;
• ? dedication to creative pursuits;
• ? scientific thinking;
• ? self-acceptance;
• ? riskiness;
• ? delayed hedonism.

Let's try to explain these concepts.

Ellis believed that one of the signs of a person’s mental norm is his healthy selfishness. What did he mean by this concept? First of all, a person should not forget about his interests. Ellis considered complete submission of oneself to the desires of others to be an unhealthy phenomenon, as well as the opposite situation. That is, it must be a reasonable consideration of one’s own and others’ interests, but with priority given to one’s own.

In this regard, the position of the so-called altars, whose role is often played by parents who sacrifice themselves and their interests to the interests of their children, is unhealthy and creates ill health in others. It seems to them that by doing this they are doing better for their children, but in reality they are spoiling them, making them unable to achieve their goals on their own.

Sometimes this happens to mothers, and more often to single mothers who give up any pleasure for the sake of their child. And what example do such parents set for their children? If a mother really wants the best for her daughter, for example, then instead of depriving herself of everything, she should show her that, despite the difficulty of the situation, the woman copes, does not lose heart, takes care of herself, she is attractive to men, and is able to rejoice and think about your own interests. The daughter should see in front of her an example of what she should be. Otherwise, she will grow up to be selfish or as “flawed” as her mother, believing from childhood that to love another means to completely abandon own desires. That is, healthy egoism is a necessary condition well-being not only of the person himself, but also of his loved ones, for whom he is ready to sacrifice himself.

The ability to observe one’s own interests is complemented by another important characteristic of the norm - the ability to take into account and social interest. That is, the fact that a person lives as a complete egoist, thinking only about his own needs, Ellis recognized as abnormal. He believed that healthy views are expressed in the ability to take into account not only one’s own interests, but to be attentive to the needs of others, and also to be capable of cooperation and cooperation.

The next standard criterion is self management. This is, on the one hand, the willingness to solve one’s problems independently, without shifting them onto the shoulders of others and bearing responsibility for the results obtained, and on the other hand, the ability, if necessary, to accept help, enter into cooperation and collaboration. Here it is important to emphasize the fact that a person, always relying primarily on himself, does not refuse reasonable help and is capable of being useful on occasion; this is a manifestation of healthy beliefs.

Another characteristic of the norm sounds like high1 high tolerance to frustration. Let us remember that tolerance means tolerance, the ability to endure, and frustration is defined as strong emotional dissatisfaction. The essence of the characteristic is that a person with healthy cognitions is able to experience and overcome life’s difficulties without slipping into deep depression. Life is impossible without failures, troubles and difficulties, and it is natural to feel upset when they happen, but this should not unsettle a person, force him to give up on things and give up. And it is the presence of tolerance to frustration that helps a person resist the ongoing troubles.

Psychological health is also determined by the ability to express flexibility, non-rigidity(rigidity, as is known, is insufficient flexibility) towards yourself and others. Flexibility can be described as the ability of a person to change his thoughts and actions when necessary in accordance with new circumstances, thereby adapting to an ever-changing environment. The world does not stand still, and to be successful, a person must change with it. But here mainly we're talking about about the flexibility of cognitions. Each person has his own principles; these are fairly stable human beliefs that create a system of views on the world. Some of them must remain unchanged, but some must change sometimes. Excessive rigidity of beliefs can hinder a person’s development and prevent his or her normal functioning in general. The most important point of Ellis's rational-emotive therapy is the identification of rigidly fixed beliefs, which, due to their rigidity, cause the patient a lot of trouble. It happens like this: a person, following his principles, not wanting to change them, complicates the life of himself and others, runs into various points that with rational therapy turn out to be unimportant, and it is also discovered that one can look at these things differently. For example, I may not like the behavior of a person, not because it is objectively bad, but because I personally don’t like it, but I take it and give it objectivity. I am beginning to believe that this is not my subjectivity, but an important principle that must be respected. This, naturally, will begin to prevent me from communicating normally with others, and with myself.

Now let's look at the characteristic acceptance of uncertainty. We know that exact definitions exist only in the abstract science of mathematics. In life there is always some element of uncertainty, tolerance. There is no such thing as 100% even gold - it is 99-something, the most high standard. Therefore, nothing in life happens one hundred percent, but not for neurotics - they are not tolerant of uncertainty, everything should be this way, only this way, and no other way! People with such beliefs drive themselves into the framework of their ideas. And since others cannot be driven there, they worry that they are not understood, that they are not loved, that everything is done to spite them. And therefore they feel very unhappy. Therefore, accepting the fact that there is some uncertainty in everything, recognizing that not everything is not always as we would like, is important for reducing internal tension.

The next standard criterion is dedication to creative pursuits- determines the presence of creativity in a person’s life. It appears in the desire to learn and try something new, to be interested in various things, art or science, to have hobbies, hobbies, and not out of necessity, but from the inner needs of a person. That is, this is the desire to enrich and saturate your life, and not reduce it to the automatism of everyday affairs.

Scientific thinking. What does scientific thinking mean? George Kelly said that every person acts like a scientist in his life, but only at the everyday level. What does a scientist do? Puts forward a hypothesis, conducts an experiment, obtains results that confirm or refute the main provisions. If the hypothesis is not confirmed, then the scientist revises it and tries to do something differently. Essentially, this is what happens in our lives. Before we do something, we first assume what will come of it, we expect to get a certain result. And then we carry out an action, an experiment and check - did it turn out what I expected or not? If the hypothesis is not confirmed, then you need to think about what to do next, what should be changed in the initial positions. What happens to a neurotic personality? The hypothesis does not change, although it has not been confirmed many times and is not confirmed further, bringing great discomfort and torment to a person. But, despite this, a neurotic cannot change the hypothesis, his attitude towards himself, or people, or a certain matter, and so on, because he cannot understand that the problem lies precisely in himself, that it needs to be corrected, since the results of his actions are deplorable. Therefore, one of the therapist’s tasks is to analyze the client’s hypotheses for their rationality.

Self-acceptance. This is the ability to accept yourself as you are, with all the pros and cons. We do not always perceive ourselves adequately, i.e. We overestimate some of our abilities, and underestimate others. When a person evaluates himself inadequately, he can be upset all the time, because others evaluate him differently than he evaluates himself, and the person can always think: “They don’t understand me.” Or he thinks: “I’m not presenting myself this way,” and, afraid of being unsuccessful, begins to do something completely out of character for him. This is mistake. Because natural man is always perceived better than what was done, because no one likes falsehood. And we always think that we need to pretend to be something, then I will look better, then they will perceive me better. This is an illusion and torture. Yesenin wrote: “Happiness is dexterity of mind and hands. All awkward souls are always known for being unfortunate, but you cannot understand how much torment broken, deceitful gestures bring.” When a person begins to play a role that is not his own, even a seemingly beautiful one, he experiences discomfort, because the chosen role is not actually consistent with his inner world. And therefore a person may worry that others will notice this discrepancy. That is, the most effective thing will be to accept yourself as you are, and then a person will not need to pretend to be something. Don't be afraid of the word "flaw." Or label it as reserves, that is, where you think you have a gap in something, think: “I have a reserve for improvement.”

Riskiness. This is the ability to take reasonable risks in certain situations. The British have a proverb: “Nothing venture nothing have”, which translates as: “Risk nothing - have nothing.” It perfectly characterizes this criterion of psychological health. To express the essence - taking risks, you can achieve success. It is important to understand here that it is impossible to remain passive in life; it requires movement, action, and sometimes risk. Sometimes, in order to achieve development, it is necessary to take risks: change jobs or place of residence, start a family, etc. Otherwise, a person’s life will turn into a stagnant swamp, stagnation. It is necessary not to be afraid of new things - ideas, acquaintances, activities, circumstances, etc. Taking risks is necessary to move forward. Our life is a risk.

And the last criterion of the norm - delayed hedonism. We discussed it in detail above, describing the features of Ellis's approach. The essence of this phenomenon lies in the ability to live with deferred joy, to consciously endure difficulties in the name of achieving success in the future.

So, we have considered all the criteria for psychological norm, now I would like you to work on the following points.

Take another look at the listed criteria of psychological health, analyze how pronounced each of them is in you, and also rate it on a 10-point scale (10 is the most expressed, respectively 1 is the least expressed). At the same time, I suggest that you do not follow your first feeling when grading, but think carefully (remember examples from your own life), or better yet, ask someone who knows you how well this score really corresponds to the expression of one or another standard criterion.

Self-knowledge is a most interesting and fascinating process that has no limits to improvement. Therefore, try to assess your reserves for growth, use the word “reserves” and not “shortcomings”. Because it is better to focus your attention on reserves than on shortcomings, because the more resources you discover, the more it will inspire you. Moreover, you will see that many parameters are interrelated with each other. And if you want to develop one of them, the others will automatically develop as well. When you or your client justify your assessments, try to understand what beliefs you (or he) are guided by and whether these beliefs are rational, i.e. really helping him to realize himself, or are they still irrational.

Summarizing the tasks and essence of the RET procedure, we can say: in order to achieve a change in worldview, patients are recommended to:

• 1. Understand what they are psychological problems arose not so much from external conditions and events, but from their attitude towards them.
• 2. Believe that they are capable of solving their problems themselves.
• 3. Realize that their problems are caused mainly by irrational absolutist beliefs.
• 4. Understand your irrational cognitions and make sure that your problems can be looked at rationally.
• 5. Expose your irrational views using logic and common sense, and by experimentally acting against them.
• 6. Repeated repetitions using cognitive, emotional and behavioral methods bring new, rational beliefs to their complete internal acceptance.
• 7. Constantly continue the process of positive restructuring of beliefs, replacing irrational cognitions with rational ones.

Workshop

• 1. Try to find irrational beliefs in yourself (or your client) and justify why you consider them to be so.
• 2. Expose them with logic and common sense(you can use humor).
• 3. Formulate alternative rational cognitions based on the identified problems.
• 4. Analyze your (or your client's) beliefs in terms of Ellis' psychological health criteria, how much you implement them, what reserves you have and how you are going to replenish them.

Self-test questions

• 1. Why did Ellis name his rational-emotive therapy that way?
• 2. Decipher the circuit A-B-C.
• 3. How do rational and irrational cognitions differ?
• 4. What are absolutist cognitions and why are they harmful?
• 5. Describe the main stages of RET.
• 6. List the criteria for psychological health according to Ellis.
• 7. What is delayed hedonism?

Rational-emotive therapy (RET) was created by Albert Ellis in 1955. Its original version was called rational therapy, but in 1961 it was renamed RET, since this term better reflects the essence of this direction. In 1993, Ellis began using a new name for his method: rational emotive behavioral therapy (REBT). The term “behavioral” was introduced in order to show the great importance that this direction attaches to working with the actual behavior of the client.

According to rational emotive therapy theory, people are happiest when they set important life goals and objectives and actively try to achieve them. In addition, it is argued that when setting and achieving these goals and objectives, a person must keep in mind the fact that he lives in society: while defending his own interests, it is necessary to take into account the interests of the people around him. This position is opposed to the philosophy of selfishness, where the wishes of others are not respected or taken into account. Based on the premise that people tend to be driven by goals, rational in RET means that which helps people achieve their basic goals and objectives, while irrational is that which interferes with their implementation. Thus, rationality is not an absolute concept, it is relative in its very essence (A. Ellis, W. Dryden, 2002).

RET is rational and scientific, but uses rationality and science to help people live and be happy. It is hedonistic, but it welcomes not immediate, but long-term hedonism, when people can enjoy the present moment and the future and can achieve this with maximum freedom and discipline. She suggests that there is probably nothing superhuman and that devout belief in superhuman powers usually leads to dependence and increased emotional stability. She also argues that no people are "inferior" or worthy of damnation, no matter how unacceptable and antisocial their behavior may be. It emphasizes will and choice in all human affairs, while accepting the possibility that some human actions are determined in part by biological, social, and other forces.

Indications for rational-emotional therapy. Rational-emotional therapy is indicated in the treatment of various diseases in the etiology of which psychological factors are decisive. These are primarily neurotic disorders. It is also indicated for other diseases that are complicated by neurotic reactions. A.A. Aleksandrov identifies categories of patients for whom rational-emotive therapy may be indicated: 1) patients with poor adaptability, moderate anxiety, and marital problems; 2) sexual disorders; 3) neuroses; 4) character disorders; 5) truants from school, child delinquents and adult criminals; 6) borderline personality disorder syndrome; 7) psychotic patients, including patients with hallucinations when they are in contact with reality; 8) individuals with mild forms of mental retardation; 9) patients with psychosomatic problems.

It is clear that RET does not have a direct effect on the somatic or neurological symptoms present in the patient, however, it helps the patient change his attitude and overcome neurotic reactions to the disease, strengthens his tendency to fight the disease (A.P. Fedorov, 2002).

As B.D. Karvasarsky notes, rational-emotional therapy is indicated primarily for patients who are capable of introspection and analysis of their thoughts. It involves the active participation of the patient at all stages of psychotherapy, establishing relationships with him that are close to a partnership. This is helped by a joint discussion of possible goals of psychotherapy, problems that the patient would like to resolve (usually these are symptoms of a somatic plan or chronic emotional discomfort). Getting started involves educating the patient about the philosophy of rational-emotive therapy, which states that emotional problems are caused not by the events themselves, but by the appraisal of them.

While behavioral psychotherapy aims to achieve behavior change by influencing the external environment of a person, rational-emotive therapy aims to change, first of all, emotions by influencing the content of thoughts. The possibility of such changes is based on the connection between thoughts and emotions. From an RET perspective, cognition is a major determinant of emotional state. Normally, thinking includes and is stimulated to some extent by feelings, and feelings include cognition. How an individual interprets an event is the resulting emotion he has in a given situation. It is not external events and people that cause us negative feelings, but our thoughts about these events. Influencing thoughts is a shorter route to achieving change in our emotions and therefore behavior. Therefore, rational-emotive therapy, as defined by A. Ellis, is “a cognitive-affective behavioral theory and practice of psychotherapy.”

The essence of A. Ellis’s concept is expressed by the traditional formula A-B-C, where A – activating event – ​​stimulating event; В – belief system – belief system; C – emotional consequence – emotional consequence. When a strong emotional consequence (C) follows an important arousing event (A), then A may appear to cause C, but in fact it does not. In fact, the emotional consequence arises under the influence of the person’s B - belief system. When an undesirable emotional consequence occurs, such as severe anxiety, its roots can be found in what A. Ellis calls a person’s irrational beliefs. If these beliefs are effectively refuted, rational arguments and show their failure at the behavioral level, then anxiety disappears (A.A. Aleksandrov, 1997).

A. Ellis distinguishes two types of cognitions: descriptive and evaluative. Descriptive cognitions contain information about reality, information about what a person has perceived from the world around him. Evaluative cognitions are attitudes toward this reality. Descriptive cognitions are connected to evaluative cognitions by connections. varying degrees rigidity. From the point of view of rational-emotional therapy, it is not objective events themselves that cause positive or negative emotions in us, but our internal perception of them, their assessment. We feel what we think about what we perceive.

From the point of view of RET, pathological disturbances of emotions are based on aberrations of thought processes and cognitive errors. Ellis proposed using the term “irrational judgment” to refer to all the different categories of cognitive errors. He included such forms of errors as exaggeration, simplification, unfounded assumptions, erroneous conclusions, and absolutization.

Rational and irrational ideas. Rational ideas are evaluative cognitions that have personal significance and are preferential (i.e., non-absolute) in nature. They are expressed in the form of desires, aspirations, preferences, predispositions. People experience positive feelings of satisfaction and pleasure when they get what they want, and negative feelings (sadness, concern, regret, irritation) when they don’t get it. These negative feelings (the strength of which depends on the importance of what is desired) are considered a healthy reaction to negative events and do not interfere with achieving goals or setting new goals and objectives. So these ideas are rational for two reasons. Firstly, they are flexible, and secondly, they do not interfere with the implementation of the main goals and objectives.

Irrational ideas, in turn, differ from rational ones in two respects. Firstly, they are usually absolutized (or dogmatized) and expressed in the form of rigid “must”, “must”, “must”. Second, they lead to negative emotions that seriously interfere with the achievement of goals (eg, depression, anxiety, guilt, anger). Healthy ideas are the basis of healthy behavior, while unhealthy ideas are the basis of dysfunctional behavior, such as withdrawal, procrastination, alcoholism, abuse various substances(A. Ellis, W. Dryden, 2002).

The emergence of irrational judgments (attitudes) is associated with the patient’s past, when the child perceived them without yet having the skill to conduct a critical analysis at the cognitive level, without being able to refute them at the behavioral level, since he was limited and did not encounter situations that could refute them , or received certain reinforcements from the social environment. People easily come up with absolute requirements for themselves, for other people and for the world as a whole. A person makes demands on himself, on others and on the world, and if these demands are not met in the past, present or future, then the person begins to bully himself. Self-deprecation involves the process of a general negative evaluation of one's self and condemnation of one's self as bad and unworthy.

According to the RET theory, all irrational ideas can be divided into three categories: (1) absolutist demands made on one’s own personality, (2) absolutist demands made on surrounding (other) people, (3) absolutist demands made on the surrounding world.

1. Requirements for yourself. Typically expressed in statements of the following type: “I must do everything perfectly and must be approved by all significant others.” Beliefs based on this requirement often lead to anxiety, depression, feelings of shame and guilt.

2. Demands on others. They are often expressed in statements such as: “People must be perfect, otherwise they are worthless.” This belief often leads to feelings of resentment and anger, violence and passive-aggressive behavior.

3. Requirements for the environment and living conditions. These demands often take the form of beliefs of this kind: “The world should be fair and comfortable.” These demands often lead to feelings of resentment, self-pity and problems with self-discipline (alcoholism, drug addiction, constant procrastination).

Catastrophization. Man tends to have these three basic irrational beliefs. catastrophize life events:" It's horrible– and not just unpleasant and uncomfortable – when I didn’t do the job as well as I did should do"; “It couldn’t be worse than what happened.”

Low frustration tolerance is another form of irrational belief, which can be called anxiety about discomfort. "I won't be able to bear it."

Global ranking is the tendency to evaluate oneself and others in “all or nothing” terms, to evaluate a person by individual, sometimes isolated, actions. “If I don’t do this job well, then I will always and under any circumstances fail the tasks assigned to me!”

From the point of view of A. Ellis, 4 main groups of such attitudes can be distinguished, which most often create problems for patients:

1. Must attitudes reflect the irrational belief that there are universal oughts that must always be realized regardless of what happens in the world around us. Such attitudes can be addressed to oneself, to people, to situations. For example, statements such as “the world should be fair” or “people should be honest” are often identified during adolescence.

2. Catastrophic installations often reflect the irrational belief that there are catastrophic events in the world that are assessed outside of any frame of reference. This type of attitude leads to catastrophization, i.e. to excessive exaggeration of the negative consequences of events. Catastrophic attitudes are manifested in the statements of patients in the form of assessments expressed to an extreme degree (such as: “terrible”, “unbearable”, “amazing”, etc.). For example: “It’s terrible when events develop in unpredictable ways,” “It’s unbearable that he treats me like that.”

3. Setting the mandatory implementation of your needs reflects the irrational belief that a person, in order to exist and be happy, must necessarily fulfill his desires, possess certain qualities and things. The presence of this kind of attitude leads to the fact that our desires grow to the level of unreasonable imperative demands, which as a result cause opposition, conflicts, and, as a result, negative emotions. For example: “I must be completely competent in this area, otherwise I am a nonentity.”

4. Evaluation setting is that people, and not individual fragments of their behavior, properties, etc. can be assessed globally. In this attitude, the limited aspect of a person is identified with the evaluation of the whole person. For example: “When people behave badly, they should be condemned,” “He is a scoundrel because he behaved unworthily.”

Since RET connects pathological emotional reactions with irrational judgments (attitudes), the same quick way changes in distress are changes in faulty cognitions. A rational and healthy alternative to self-deprecation is unconditional self-acceptance, which includes a refusal to give one’s own “I” an unambiguous assessment (this is an impossible task, since a person is a complex and developing being, and, moreover, harmful, since this usually interferes with the person’s achievement of his main goals). goals) and recognizing one's fallibility. Self-acceptance and high tolerance to frustration are the two main elements of the rational-emotional image of a psychologically healthy person.

Once formed, irrational attitudes function as autonomous, self-reproducing structures. The mechanisms that support irrational attitudes are present in the present tense. Therefore, RET concentrates not on the analysis of past reasons that led to the formation of one or another irrational attitude, but on the analysis of the present. RET examines how an individual maintains his symptoms by adhering to certain irrational cognitions, due to which he does not abandon them or subject them to correction.

Cognitive attitudes can be detected through signs of demandingness. In particular, Ellis looks for variations in “shoulds” that signal the presence of absolutist beliefs in clients. In addition, you need to pay attention to explicit and implicit phrases like “This is terrible!” or “I can’t stand it,” which indicate catastrophizing. Thus, irrational beliefs can be identified by asking the question, “What do you think about this event?” or “What were you thinking when all this was happening?” Analysis of the words used by the client also helps to identify irrational attitudes. Usually associated with irrational attitudes are words that reflect the extreme degree emotional involvement client (terrible, amazing, unbearable, etc.), having the nature of a mandatory instruction (necessary, necessary, must, obliged, etc.), as well as global assessments of a person, object or event. Identification of rational attitudes is also necessary, since they constitute that positive part of the attitude, which can subsequently be expanded.

Irrational cognitions can be changed. But in order to change them, it is necessary to first identify them, and this requires persistent observation and introspection, the use of certain methods that facilitate this process. Only the reconstruction of erroneous cognitions leads to a change in emotional response. In the process of REBT, a person acquires the ability to control his irrational cognitions at his own discretion, as opposed to the initial stage of therapy, when irrational attitudes control a person’s behavior.

A normally functioning person has a rational system of attitudes, which can be defined as a system of flexible emotional-cognitive connections. This system is probabilistic in nature, expressing rather a wish, preference certain development events. The rational scheme of attitudes corresponds to moderate strength of emotions. Although sometimes they can be intense, they do not capture the individual for a long time, therefore they do not block his activities or interfere with the achievement of goals. If difficulties arise, the individual easily recognizes rational attitudes that do not meet the requirements of the situation and corrects them.

On the contrary, from the point of view of A. Ellis, irrational attitudes are rigid emotional-cognitive connections. They have the character of a prescription, a requirement, a mandatory order that has no exceptions; they are, as A. Ellis said, absolutist in nature. Therefore, ordinary irrational attitudes do not correspond to reality, both in strength and in the quality of the prescription. In the absence of awareness of irrational attitudes, they lead to long-term unresolved situations, emotions, complicate the individual’s activities, and interfere with the achievement of goals. Irrational attitudes include a pronounced component of evaluative cognition, a programmed attitude towards an event.

Rational-emotive therapy, notes A.A. Aleksandrov, is not interested in the genesis of irrational attitudes, she is interested in what reinforces them in the present. A. Ellis argues that awareness of the connection between emotional disorder and early childhood events (insight No. 1, according to A. Ellis) has no therapeutic value, since patients are rarely freed from their symptoms and retain a tendency to form new ones. According to RET theory, insight #1 is misleading: it is not the arousing events (A) in people's lives that allegedly cause emotional consequences (C), but that people interpret these events unrealistically and therefore develop irrational beliefs (B ) about them. The real cause of disorder is therefore the people themselves, and not what happens to them, although life experience certainly has some influence on what they think and feel. In rational-emotive therapy, insight #1 is properly emphasized, but the patient is helped to see his emotional problems in terms of his own beliefs rather than in terms of past or present arousing events. The therapist seeks additional awareness—insights No. 2 and 3.

A. Ellis explains this with the following example. The patient experiences anxiety during the therapy session. The therapist may focus on arousing events in the patient's life that appear to be causing anxiety. For example, the patient can be shown that his mother constantly pointed out his shortcomings, that he was always afraid of displeasure and scolding from teachers for a bad lesson answer, was afraid of talking to authority figures who might not approve of him and, therefore, because of all his past and present fears in situations A-1, A-2, A-3...A-N, he is now experiencing anxiety during a conversation with a therapist. After such an analysis, the patient may convince himself: “Yes, now I understand that I experience anxiety when I encounter authority figures. No wonder I’m anxious even with my own therapist!” After this, the patient may feel more confident and temporarily relieve anxiety.

However, notes A. Ellis, it will be much better if the therapist shows the patient that he experienced anxiety in childhood and continues to experience it now when confronted with various authority figures, not because they are authoritative or have some kind of power over him, but because consequence of the conviction that he must approve. The patient tends to perceive disapproval from authority figures as something terrible, and will feel hurt if he is criticized.

With this approach, the anxious patient will tend to do two things: first, he will move from “A” to considering “B” - his irrational belief system, and second, he will begin to actively dissuade himself of his irrational beliefs that cause anxiety. And then the next time he will be less committed to these self-defeating (“self-defeating”) beliefs when he encounters some authority figure.

Therefore, insight #2 is to understand that although the emotional disturbance is a past occurrence, the patient is experiencing it Now because he has dogmatic, irrational, empirically unfounded beliefs. He has, as A says. Ellis, magical thinking. These irrational beliefs of his are preserved not because he was once “conditioned” in the past, that is, these beliefs were fixed in him through the mechanism of conditional connection and are now preserved automatically. No! He actively reinforces them in the present – ​​“here-and-now”. And if the patient does not accept full responsibility for maintaining his irrational beliefs, then he will not get rid of them (A.A. Alexandrov, 1997).

Insight #3 is to realize that only through hard work and practice can these irrational beliefs be corrected. Patients realize that to free themselves from irrational beliefs, insights No. 1 and No. 2 are not enough - it is necessary to repeatedly rethink these beliefs and repeatedly repeat actions aimed at extinguishing them.

So, the basic tenet of rational-emotive therapy is that emotional disturbances are caused by irrational beliefs. These beliefs are irrational because patients do not accept the world as it is. They have magical thinking: they insist that if something exists in the world, then it must be something different from what it is. Their thoughts usually take the following form of statements: if I want something, then it is not just a desire or a preference for it to be so, but must be, and if it is not so, then it is terrible!

Thus, a woman with severe emotional disturbances who is rejected by her lover does not simply view this event as unwanted, but believes that it is terrible, and she can't bear it her should not reject. What's her never no desired partner will love you. Considers himself unworthy of man, since her lover rejected her, and therefore condemnable. Such hidden hypotheses are meaningless and lack empirical basis. They can be refuted by any researcher. A rational-emotive therapist is likened to a scientist who discovers and refutes absurd ideas (A.A. Alexandrov, 1997).

The main goal of emotional-rational psychotherapy, according to A.A. Alexandrov, can be formulated as “refusal of demands”. To some extent, the author notes, neurotic personality is infantile. Normal children become more intelligent as they mature and are less insistent on having their desires immediately satisfied. The rational therapist tries to encourage patients to limit their demands to a minimum and strive for maximum tolerance. Rational-emotive therapy seeks to radically reduce ought, perfectionism (striving for perfection), grandiosity and intolerance in patients.

Thus, in accordance with the ideas of the founder of rational-emotive therapy A. Ellis, disorders in the emotional sphere are the result of disorders in the cognitive sphere. A. Ellis called these disturbances in the cognitive sphere irrational attitudes. When an unwanted emotional consequence, such as severe anxiety, occurs, its roots can be found in the person's irrational beliefs. If these beliefs are effectively refuted, rational arguments are given, and their inconsistency is shown at the behavioral level, then anxiety disappears. A. Ellis consistently identified basic irrational ideas that, in his opinion, underlie most emotional disorders.

The ideas of A. Ellis are consistently developed in the works of his student G. Kassinov. From the point of view of cognitive intervention, G. Kassinov notes, the main problem that the therapist helps his client cope with is the tendency to over-request and over-demand. Patient with impairments emotional sphere always demands from those around him: 1) that whatever he does is considered good, and that whatever he wants to achieve, he succeeds; 2) to be loved by those people from whom he wants to receive love; 3) to be treated well by other people; 4) so ​​that the entire universe revolves around him and so that the world in which he lives is comfortable for life and never causes any grief or is a source of conflict. Thus, patients with emotional disorders do not accept reality as it is; they persistently demand that reality change in accordance with their demands and ideas about it. From the point of view of A. Ellis, irrational attitudes are rigid emotional-cognitive connections that have the nature of a prescription, requirement, order and therefore do not correspond to reality. The lack of implementation of irrational attitudes leads to long-term emotions that are inadequate to the situation, such as depression or anxiety.

When planning consultations with patients (clients), the psychologist should adhere to a certain stage in the work carried out. The entire counseling process can be divided into four stages.

At the first stage, the client’s emotional state is identified and clarified. In fact, this is the problem that the client expresses in the first minutes of the conversation.

At the second stage, it becomes clear what thoughts the client has regarding the current situation.

The third stage of RET is direct discussion, challenging irrational beliefs. At this stage, the Socratic dialogue used can be very effective.

At the fourth stage, a new philosophy is formed, it is determined which thoughts and emotions will be most appropriate in a given situation. And then tasks are given that will help the client change their beliefs, emotions and behavior, and also consolidate these positive changes.

The criterion for the success of the work carried out is the reduction of psycho-emotional stress, recorded by the psychological scales of Tsung and Beck, as well as possession theoretical foundations RET.

Psychological work with such patients (clients) requires a refusal to present demands, dictates and ultimatums to others, replacing them with requests, wishes and preferences. The main task is to wean patients from dramatizing their failures, from displaying panic, and from presenting excessive demands to society. Realism-oriented treatments attempt to train the client to seek approval by making real progress in real world. When the patient accepts reality, he feels better. Following the correction of clients’ irrational attitudes, adequate behavioral models are mastered by reinforcing the acquired skills with a system of rewards, as well as by simulating situations that require the possession of appropriate behavioral skills. A normally functioning person has a rational system of attitudes, which is a system of flexible emotional-cognitive connections and which is probabilistic in nature. A rational system of attitudes corresponds to a moderate strength of emotions.

So, rational-emotive therapy strives for a radical reduction of should, perfectionism, grandiosity and intolerance in patients.