Cognitive Behavioral

Therapy

Virtued Academy International, India

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 Contents
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy 1
CBT Starter Guide 3
The History of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy ....................................................................................... 4
The Importance of Negative Thoughts..................................................................................................... 5
Goal Setting 7
When? ................................................................................................................................................................... 7
Tips for Goal Setting ........................................................................................................................................ 8
Behavioral activation 10
For example: .................................................................................................................................................... 11
Cognitive restructuring 13
A Step by Step Plan to Do Cognitive Restructuring .......................................................................... 15
Identify and Change Your Core Beliefs 19
Changing a Negative Core Belief .............................................................................................................. 20
Mindfulness-integrated Cognitive Behavioral Therapy 23
CBT in Procrastination 24
CBT in Stress, Anxiety, and Depression 25
CBT in Fear and Phobias 27
CBT in Panic Attacks 28
CBT in Excessive Anger 29
CBT in Eating Disorders 30
CBT in Addiction 31

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CBT or Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is a goal-
oriented, and short-term psychotherapy treatment
that includes a practical, hands-on approach to
problem-solving. It aims to change the behavior or
thinking patterns behind the difficulties of people, and
so alter the way they think. It is used to treat a
diversity of issues in an individual's life from the
relationship issues or sleeping difficulties to
depression and anxiety, or alcohol and drug abuse.

CBT Starter Guide

CBT works by changing the attitudes of people and
their behavior by concentrating on the attitudes,
beliefs, images, and thoughts that are held and how
the processes are related to the way an individual
behaves as a way of dealing with emotional issues.
An essential benefit of CBT is that it is short, including
around 5 to 10 minutes for the most emotional
problems. Different clients attend one session in a
week, and every meeting lasts about 50 minutes. In
this time, the therapist and the client work together to
have an insight into what the issues are, and develop
new strategies to tackle them. CBT introduces people
to a set of rules that they can apply when they need to,
and it will last the, for their entire life.
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Cognitive-behavioral therapy can be considered as a
combination of behavioral therapy and psychotherapy.
Behavior therapy emphasizes on the relationship
between our thoughts, our behavior, and our
problems. Psychotherapy pays close attention to the
importance of personal meaning we give to the things
and how patterns of thinking to start in childhood.
Many psychotherapists who practice CBT customize
the therapy to the personality and particular needs of
each client.

The History of Cognitive Behavioral

Therapy
In the 1960s, a psychiatrist Aaron Beck invented
Cognitive behavioral therapy. At that time, he was
doing psychoanalysis. During the analytical sessions,
he noticed that his clients tended to have an internal
dialogue in their minds – around as if they were
talking to themselves. However, they would report
only a part of this type of thinking to him.
For instance, in the therapy session, the client may be
thinking to himself: "She (the therapist) has not talked
much today. I see if she is annoyed with me?" These
thoughts may make the client feel annoyed or slightly
anxious. The client could respond to this thought with
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a further idea: "Maybe she is tired, or possibly I have
not been talking about the essential things." The
second thought may alter how the client was feeling.
Beck understood that the association between feelings
and thoughts was highly essential. He coined the term
automatic thought to explain the thoughts full of
emotions that may pop up in mind. Beck realized that
people were not aware of such thoughts but learned to
recognize and report them. If an individual was upset
in some way, the thoughts were typically negative and
neither helpful nor realistic. Beck found that
understanding these thoughts was crucial to the
understanding of the client and overcoming his or her
problems. He called it cognitive therapy due to the
importance it emphasizes on thinking. Now, it is called
CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) because the
therapy includes behavioral techniques as well. The
balance between behavioral and cognitive elements
differ among different types of treatments; however,
all come under the term Cognitive Behavioral Therapy.

The Importance of Negative Thoughts

CBT is based on a theory or model that its not the
events that disturb us, but the meanings we give them.
If your thoughts are negative, we cannot see or do the

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things that do not fit – what we believe is right. In
other words, we carry on to hold on to the same
ancient thoughts and cannot learn anything new.
For instance, a depressed man may think, "I cannot
handle going into work today: I cannot do it. Nothing is
right. I will feel horrible." Because of having these
thoughts and believing them, he may well ring in sick.
If you behave like this, he would not have the chance
to see that he has the wrong prediction. He may find
the things he could do, and some things that were fine.
However, instead, he stays at home, thinking about his
failure to go in and end up thinking: "I have let
everyone down. They will be mad at me. Why can I not
do what everyone else does? I am so useless and
weak." That man may end up feeling worse and has
more difficulty going in to work the next day.
Thinking, feeling, and behaving like this may initiate a
downward spiral. This vicious cycle can result in
different kinds of issues.
Negative things do happen to anyone of us. However,
when we are in a distressed state of mind, we may
base our interpretations and predictions on an unfair
view of the circumstance, making the trouble that we
may face seem much worse. CBT assists people in
challenging their negative thoughts. It aids the
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individual to step outside his or her automatic
thoughts and face them out.

Goal Setting
Do you know what is goal setting, and why is it
essential to set goals in therapy? Well! It is a process of
finding out particular therapeutic results for
treatment collaboratively. All the goals should be
achievable, measurable, observable, and related to the
behavioral or cognitive changes appropriate to the
client's presenting problem. Goals are linked to
particular skills that need to be addressed in the
treatment process. Goals increase the session's
continuity, allow for focused or directed treatment,
and enable the therapist and patient to assess the
improvement of therapy and recognize changes
objectively.

When?
In addition to recognizing the issue and rapport
building, goal setting is among the first therapeutic
activities that need to be completed in brief CBT.
Though goals can be modified/changed at any point
during the therapy, to increase the benefit and
applicability to the patient, an initial set of goals must

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be established and agreed upon by the completion of
the first or second session.

Tips for Goal Setting

Provide Rationale for Setting Goals: It assists the
patient in understanding the treatment's direction and
how he/she will be involved in the process.
For instance: "If you can find out what you need to
change about your case, we can then take some steps
to reduce the issue."
Elicit Desired Outcomes: It involves the therapist's
helping the patient in setting the goals and explaining
the reasons for coming to treatment.
For instance: "Make a list of a few items you would
get out of this therapy."
Be Precise About What the Goal is: Set each goal,
what the goal is trying to target. What is the role of the
patient about the goal? Direct the individual towards
the goals that include a change from him or her.
For instance: "You stated that you want your best
friend to listen to you. Though we cannot make anyone
do what we need, what can you do to help you feel

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heard or cope with a case when you do not feel
heard?"
State Goals Positively: It explains what a person
needs to do rather than emphasizing what he or she
does not want to do.
For instance: You can list, 'I want to enjoy my favorite
hobbies again,' instead of 'I do not want to be
depressed anymore.'
Weigh Benefits and Costs of a Goal: It helps in
understanding the benefits and costs of achieving the
patient's goal. It can motivate a hesitant patient or
recognize salient goals for a passive individual or a
person searching to please the therapist.
For instance: "If you accomplished this goal, what
would be the advantages? What would be some of the
costs to you?"
Define Behaviors Related to the Goal: It trains the
individual what actions to perform related to the goals
that have been set.
For instance: What would it look like if you were not
much depressed? If I saw you and you were smiling,
what would I see? What do other people do when they
are pleased? What things do you consider have altered
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in your life since you have been unhappy? What did
you used to do that you loved that you do not do
anymore?"

Behavioral activation
Behavioral activation involves a set of techniques and
procedures intended at increasing individual activity
and access to reinforcing the circumstances that
improve functioning and mood. Activating behavior
amounts to the "B" in CBT interventions. From this
behavioral standpoint, depression, for instance,
consists of multiple characteristics that play a role in
maintaining depressive effect (such as feelings of
hopelessness, fatigue, passivity) and reduce the
chances of adaptive coping through increasing
avoidance. Here, the key is that difficulty with mood
frequently serves to increase avoidance of adaptive
coping. It includes enjoyable events that assist in
avoiding and alleviating depression. Re-introduction
of the pleasing events is a kind of behavioral
activation, and it plays a crucial role to improve mood
in multiple ways:

 Increasing feelings of purpose and usefulness

 Increasing self-confidence

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  Increasing physical activity
 Reversing avoidance
In 1996, Jacobson et al. suggested that behavioral
interventions improve different mood symptoms but
also reduce maladaptive patterns of thought.
Behavioral activation includes a host of possible
behaviors including, but not limited to,
 Reintroducing the prior pleasant activities
 Introducing new enjoyable activities
 Active coping (such as, taking a kind of behavioral
action) to reduce or alleviate a life stressor. The
examples of behavioral or active coping that are
not enjoyable-event driven, include
a) Calling a separated family member
b) Cleaning out a messy wardrobe
c) Filing or getting taxes done
Active coping helps to reduce stress through
overcoming avoidance or accomplishment.

For example:
Therapist: I want to talk about what your day looked
like yesterday. What did you do throughout the day?

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Patient: In the morning, I woke up at 9 am and ate
breakfast. Until noon, I watched TV. After that, I ate
lunch; I look shower around 2:30 pm. I went for a walk
at 3:00 with my dog.
Therapist: Great! Let me know how did you feel when
you woke up?
Patient: I feel tired! I did not want to do anything and
could not get motivated. I was feeling depressed, I
guess.
Therapist: You said that you were feeling depressed.
If you had to rate that feeling on a scale of 0-100 (100
is maximum), how much your depression was?
Patient: 60
Therapist: Okay! What about after your shower and
walk? How would you rate your depression?
Patient: 20
Therapist: What do you think what causes a change in
your depression level?
Patient: When I got off my bed and started moving, it
helped me feel better.

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Therapist: It would be my guess as well. (After that,
explain the link between behavior and mood and
encourage the use of behavioral activation).

Cognitive restructuring
Cognitive restructuring is a technique in CBT
beneficial for anyone who is struggling with overly-
negative patterns of thinking and self-talk. It depends
on the principle of cognitive mediation, which says
that we can alter the way we feel by changing the way
we think about what happens to us.
Let us talk about how cognitive restructuring works to
do multiple things when you are upset and try to
break free from negative thinking patterns:
It assists you in getting mentally organized: A to-do
list helps you feel less overwhelmed and more
organized when working on a big project. Similarly,
cognitive restructuring supports you in handling
better by organizing your mental space in a better
way.
It forces you to slow down: Each negative thought
leads to a consistent dose of negative emotion. If you
can reduce your thinking and have fewer thoughts,
you will end up with the least emotions.

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It helps you to be more aware: The thoughts and the
corresponding emotional reactions can occur
automatically. Cognitive restructuring helps you notice
and become more aware of your mental habit, and it is
an essential step in modifying them.
It gives you a sense of control and agency: Through
noticing your default thinking patterns, and then
creating new alternative thoughts, you can alter the
negative thoughts from anything irrepressible that
happens to you to the things you have great control
over.
It helps you think more rationally and clearly: By
examining your initial line of thinking and
encouraging to the questions, cognitive restructuring
helps you see the mistakes or errors in the way you
are thinking. Recognizing cognitive distortions is an
essential ingredient in managing your moods and
negative thinking patterns better.
It assists you in building instead of reacting: When
you are upset, it is reasonable to respond – distract
yourself with any social media platform, crack open
another beer, worry more, etc. If you react without
reflecting, you deprive yourself of understanding your
mind better and see how it works.

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It breaks terrible mental habits: We all can get into
mental habits (like worry) similar to any physical
practice, such as biting our lip or twirling our hair. The
essential thing to break the patterns is to note when
we begin doing them and replacing with a different
act. Cognitive restructuring forces us to observe some
bad mental habits and substitute with the better ones.
Cognitive restructuring helps us to build all these
mental skills.

A Step by Step Plan to Do Cognitive

Restructuring
Well! You may have an idea about cognitive
restructuring, what it looks like, and its benefits, it is
the best time to talk about the nuts and bolts of
actually doing it.
Before jumping in, a quick note: Like practicing scales
on the piano, running on the treadmill, the power of
cognitive restructuring comes from doing it regularly
with time. Merely understanding and occasionally
doing it is not sufficient; cognitive reorganization to
have a significant effect on life, it should be done
reliably and become a habit. To do cognitive
restructuring, follow these necessary steps:

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Step 1: Hit the pause button
Cognitive restructuring is beneficial in different
situations. However, a great time to use it when you
see that you are having a strong adverse emotional
reaction to anything, mainly if your answer seems out
of proportion to what took place.
Here are some ways of responding to a negative
feeling:
 Feel sad – have a beer
 Feel anxious – hide
 Feel angry – lash out
A substitute is to use a strong, sudden emotion as a
reminder or cue to 'hit the pause button' instead. Once
you have paused briefly, ask yourself: 'What is going
on here?'
When we impede our instinct response to a negative
feeling and approach it with curiosity, the chances of
handling the situation intelligently are increased.
Step 2: Recognize the trigger.
When you have a strong, sudden emotion as a cue to
pause, the next thing is to find out what event
triggered the response in the first place. Often, a
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triggering event occurs in our external environment:
A car cuts us off while driving, a colleague makes an
ironic comment, etc.
The event can be in the internal environment – that is,
in our minds, can act as triggers: The thought pops
into our mind that we do not remember to mention a
fundamental idea during the meeting, a memory of a
recently-died friend comes to our mind, etc.
Step 3: Notice your automatic thoughts
The automatic thoughts are primary interpretations of
what takes place to us. We do not initiate them as they
are always spontaneous. Usually, these thoughts take
the form of memories and images or verbal self-talk.
For instance, if you see an email from your head late at
night, your automatic thought can be, "Oh no! I must
have overlooked something earlier." If anyone cut you
off on the road, your automatic thought can be "What a
jerk!" etc.
Step 4: Identify the emotional reaction and see
how intense it is.
Emotions are produced from mental interpretations of
things that take place. The type and intensity of the

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feelings we experience vary on the kind of thinking we
involve in.
For instance, using the above example of driving: if
your automatic thought is "Oh my God, he almost hit
me! I would have died!" there are chances that you are
going to experience anxiety or fear. If your thought is
"What a jerk," you are probably to feel angry. But if
you think: What the hell is he thinking? Is he mad? You
are likely to feel a stable form of anger. For each
identified emotion, rate how intense your feeling was
on a scale from 1 to 10.
Step 5: Generate alternative thoughts and re-rate
the intensity of emotional response.
After noting your emotional reaction, it is essential to
come up with alternative thoughts for your initial
automatic thoughts. Instead of "Oh my God, he almost
hit me! I would have died!" you can have an alternative
feeling such as, "Wow! That was scary! He was too
close to hitting me, but I handled it well."
It is highly beneficial to note the errors in your
primary thoughts and develop more realistic and
alternative thoughts. You can generate two or three
alternative thoughts for every overly-negative
automatic thought, if possible.
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After that, reassess their intensity. This step is vital
because noticing and feeling relief from decreasing
negative emotions is an essential reinforcer of the new
habit. If you think of a lower negative feeling, you will
get multiple benefits in the long term.

Identify and Change Your Core Beliefs

Core beliefs are the assumptions deeply buried that
guide our behavior, how we perceive situations and
see ourselves. These beliefs influence how we feel,
how we are related to others and guide our success
and satisfaction with relationships and life.
Core beliefs are the core of our identity. Similar to our
name or gender, they can feel as profoundly entangled.
If you consider having a different name, it does not feel
right. The same thing is with our core beliefs; we have
entwined them for so long that accepting new beliefs
does not feel right; therefore, it takes some time to
change.
Our core beliefs can be demanding to alter and feel
like truths. They are accountable for a constant desire
for external approval and validation, low moods, self-
doubt, and persistent insecurity. They can result in
unproductive patterns of behavior such as
perfectionism and people-pleasing. Also, we notice
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situations and events that approve our core beliefs
and overlook those against the core beliefs. Beliefs are
our inner 'walls' without doors and limit us from going
through the new potentials in life.

Changing a Negative Core Belief

Core beliefs can be demanding to change as they are
often automatic and hidden beliefs, which have
become a part of ourselves, our identity. Learning to
identify, challenge, and reframe your negative core
beliefs and thoughts is an essential step in emotional
health.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy provides different
strategies to assist in identifying and changing your
core beliefs.
Step 1: Choose a new core belief that you can
prefer.
For instance, if your old belief is 'I'm useless,' you can
pick 'I'm capable.' Never choose "I am sometimes
capable" or "I am mostly capable."
Step 2: Rate your old and new beliefs.
On a scale of 0 (I do not believe it at all) to 10 (I
believe it entirely), rate your both beliefs. You may say

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that you rate '9' on your old belief (I am useless) and
'1' on your new belief (I am capable).
Step 3: Which type of negative core belief do you
have?
There are two types of negative core beliefs. One type
is a stable kind. For instance, you think you are
useless, and you do not believe anything else, not even
when you are in a good mood.
The other type is the type that goes up and down with
your stress, anxiety, and mood. When you have a low
mood, you think that the negative core belief is
stronger than when your mood is excellent. If the
negative core belief deviates due to transient things
such as your stress, anxiety, or mood, it can assist you
in starting to see that the belief is a combination of
these things, which is not right.
Step 4: Strengthen the new positive core belief
instead of dismantling the old core beliefs.
This is the most potent goal. Usually, the thoughts are
funny things. When you try not to think about
anything, you will feel more about it; hence trying to
get rid of complete negative thoughts does not work.
When you experience negative core beliefs, you can

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learn to see it as 'just a thought' instead of considering
it right.
Step 5: Positive data log.
For 15 days, write down the evidence that supports
your new core belief. For instance, if you try to live in
the thought "I am capable," and you show up to a
meeting on time, you can write it down like evidence.
Never try to fall into the cognitive bias trap of
overlooking some of the evidence. For instance, if you
make a mistake and then find it out, this is evidence of
capability; hence you can put this in the positive data
log.
Step 6: Re-rate the old and new core beliefs.
You will see a little bit of change while re-rating the
beliefs, hopefully. For instance, you may now believe 'I
am useless,' only 5 out of 9, and believe 'I am capable'
5 instead of 1.
You may have had the negative core belief for an
extended time, hence change usually takes a time of
few months of intensive work. You are not likely to be
there yet.

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Mindfulness-integrated Cognitive
Behavioral Therapy
Mindfulness includes focusing on every event
experienced in the present moment within our mind
and body, with an accepting, non-reactive, and non-
judgmental attitude. To be mindful, we can start to
counter numerous everyday suffering, such as
depression, anxiety, and stress. We are learning to see
events in a more detached and impersonal way.
MiCBT is a four-stage therapeutic process that
includes mindfulness and some basic CBT (Cognitive
Behavioral Therapy) to assist people in improving the
way they feel and change their unaccommodating
behaviors. This therapy helps individuals make
changes differently. It tries to aid people in learning to
develop control over several processes that maintain
unrealistic beliefs and thoughts through the training of
mindfulness. It assists in changing the thinking
process, not only the content of your thoughts. The 4
Stages are:
Personal Stage: This stage will help you learn
different mindfulness skills to consider and let go of
the unwanted emotions and thoughts to address
various challenges of life successfully. At this point,
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you will develop patience and deep insight and
understand that there is no need to be prey to each
emotion that you feel and every thought that comes
into your mind.
Exposure Stage: During this stage, you will learn to
apply different self-regulation skills in circumstances
that you may avoid, resulting in your self-confidence.
Interpersonal Stage: This stage will help you develop
better communication skills and interpersonal
understanding in the face of anxious situations with
individuals and learn not to react to others' reactivity.
Empathic Stage: Here, you will learn how to increase
your capacity to be compassionate with yourself and
kind to others in your regular actions, resulting in a
deep sense of self-worth and a greater sense of
connectedness and care with other people.

CBT in Procrastination
When it comes to talking about procrastination, the
CBT therapist focuses on behavioral strategies that
improve the link between behavior and the
environment. The therapist starts working on ABCs:
Antecedents, Behaviors, and Consequences. For
increasing the frequency of procrastinated activities,

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the therapists ask the client to change the
environmental antecedents to make it easy to start,
change the behavior to make the process manageable,
and modify the consequences to keep it going until
work is completed.
Besides, the CBT therapist works on:
 Correct the thinking pattern of client
 Break the task into smaller steps
 Reward the client for positive steps
 Ask the client to concentrate on the positive

CBT in Stress, Anxiety, and Depression

CBT therapists can help clients in reducing depression,
anxiety, and stress primarily through a technique
known as behavioral activation. The client and the
therapist work together through behavior activation
to reintroduce some events into the life of the client. It
assists in improving the client's mood by increasing
feelings of purpose and usefulness, boosting self-
confidence, increasing physical activity, and reversing
avoidance as well as decreasing negative thoughts.
Activating behavior can include different actions. The
common ones include reintroducing formerly
enjoyable activities, introducing new agreeable
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activities, and coping behaviors that will decrease
particular stressors of life, such as calling a separated
family member, cleaning a messy room, or filing taxes.
The essential CBT techniques for stress, anxiety, and
depression are:
 Journaling (for self-reflection, identifying thought
patterns)
 Nightmare Exposure and Rescripting (treat
nightmares, develop new responses)
 Relaxed Breathing (supports range of issues,
calms and focuses)
 Play the Script Until the End (treat anxiety and
fear, reflecting on the worst-case scenario,
improve the feeling of coping)
 Progressive Muscle Relaxation (calming, focusing
on physical relaxation)
 Cognitive Restructuring (Finding out causes of
faulty thinking, reframing and restructuring them)
 Interoceptive Exposure (treats anxiety and pain,
instills understanding that sensations are not
dangerous)
 Exposure and Response Prevention (purposefully
exposing self to trigger, controlling the response
mindfully)
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CBT in Fear and Phobias
CBT is a therapy that shows how specific cycles and
patterns of thinking and behavior can have a
disastrous effect on our healthy functioning. Through
a process of written exercises, psychoeducation, and
inquiry, a CBT therapist helps the client understand
what type of behavior and thinking patterns he or she
may be involved in, that exacerate or facilitate the
phobia. Through a series of further experimentation
and exercises, the therapist helps find out effective
strategies and a new perspective that allows the client
to decrease, manage, and/or entirely remove the fears
and phobia from life. CBT therapy for phobias is highly
effective if the client can engage actively in different
activities, including testing a new behavioral strategy,
completing a thought record exercise, or keeping a
journal.
A part of the CBT treatment process that the therapists
can utilize to treat phobias:
 Desensitization
 Exposure therapy
It involves imaginary or real exposure to the fear
gradually so that the client feels less anxious about it.

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It helps people to gain control over their fears and
phobias.

CBT in Panic Attacks

CBT therapists target panic attacks by exposing the
individual to a fearful situation. Different interoceptive
exercises utilized by the therapists permit the clients
to challenge the physical sensations related to panic
without letting them spiral into a panic attack. While
talking about imaginal exposure, the CBT therapist
reads the script of the fearful situation to the client in
session again and again until the anxiety of the client
diminishes. In vivo exposure is used to assist clients in
reducing their tendency to avoid the situations that
often prompt a panic attack. A hierarchy of challenging
situations is made, and the client works through
different steps gradually with the help of a therapist.
Finally, the client develops the attitude that they will
seek out and challenge difficult situations. The
therapists work through these stages:
 Recognizing and replacing negative thoughts
 Using a wide range of exercises and activities
 Skill building and behavioral changes
 Relaxation techniques
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CBT in Excessive Anger
Cognitive-behavioral therapy uses different exercises
and questions to help to know about the triggers,
which can cause the anger to become excessive and
therefore leading to angry and unconstructive
outbursts. When the CBT therapists come to know the
triggers and their causes, they can apply different
techniques to see which solutions work best for the
client. The therapist designs the following set of
techniques to help the client control his/her anger:
 Mindfully acknowledging the anger
 Rating the anger
 Weigh the pros and cons
 Take a break when in a triggering situation
 Consider alternate perspectives
 Develop love and compassion
 Re-rating the anger
In this way, the CBT therapists help the client identify
and test out the highly effective strategies and
techniques that enable the client to cope better in
circumstances he or she previously found anger-
provoking, overwhelming, and challenging.
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CBT in Eating Disorders
CBT treatment concentrates on decreasing concerns
with body shape and weight, replacing dieting with
flexible and regular patterns of consumption,
enhancing motivation to change, and avoiding relapse.
CBT is more productive and acceptable as compared
to antidepressant medication in eradicating eating
disorders.
CBT is a structured treatment, and the goals are set.
Different sessions include weighing the client,
reviewing the case formulation, reviewing homework,
problem-solving, and teaching skills. CBT for eating
disorders consists of the following techniques:
 Psychoeducation to know what maintain the
disorder and the medical and psychological
consequences
 Replacement of dieting with healthy eating
 Meal planning
 Completion of food records immediately after
eating
 Regular weighing to check the progress
 Development of strategies to prevent binges, such
as problem-solving techniques, use of delays, etc
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  Replace all-or-none thinking
 Relapse prevention

CBT in Addiction
A mind changed by addiction cannot make a healthy
environment of changeable emotions, negative
emotions, and compulsions for drug use. These
elements can easily color how individuals relate to
their experiences and alter the way they view their
substance abuse. Along with any pre-existing mental
illness or patterns of negativity, this imbalance can
fuel drug abuse and lead an individual to self-
medicate. According to the cognitive-behavioral
approach, addictive behaviors such as food addiction,
video game addiction, compulsive shopping, problem
gambling, drug use, drinking, and other unhealthy
excessive behavior, are the result of negative feelings
and inaccurate thoughts.
CBT has different goals to encourage this openness
and promote healing, including:
 Identifying the circumstances or issues which are
linked to addiction
 Developing an awareness of negative behaviors,
feelings, and thoughts, which lead to addiction

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 Identifying the negative ways of false beliefs or
thinking that make addictive behaviors worse
 Evaluating why these thoughts are there and how
they can be eliminated or reshaped differently

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