![]()
PART 1
Preparing You to Give Informed Consent
Psychological therapy is an ethical enterprise and whether you are using this book on your own or while consulting an REBT therapist, it is important that you give your informed consent to proceed with therapy using REBT. Before you give your consent to proceed, it is important that you are informed about the basics of REBT theory and practice. What I will do in this part of the book is to provide you with basic information about REBT: about how it sheds light on your emotional problems and about how it goes about helping you to address your problems. At the end of my presentation, you should have sufficient information about REBT to make an informed judgement concerning its utility in helping you deal with your emotional problems.
![]()
I
The Theory of Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy
The theory of REBT has a number of features and it is important that you understand what these are before you commit yourself to using REBT either as a self-help therapy or with an REBT therapist.
![]()
1
How REBT Makes Sense of Emotional Problems and the Healthy Alternatives to these Problems
All approaches to counselling and psychotherapy have their own framework for making sense of people’s emotional problems and the healthy alternatives to these problems, and REBT is no exception. In this section, I will discuss how REBT makes sense of both common emotional problems and healthy alternatives to these problems. My purpose in doing so, as I have noted above, is to help you make an informed judgement concerning whether or not REBT is for you.
THE REBT VIEW OF EMOTIONAL PROBLEMS
REBT is one of the cognitive-behavioural approaches to counselling and psychotherapy. As such, it particularly, but not exclusively, focuses on what you think and how you act as ways of helping you to understand your emotional problems and their healthy alternatives. Many years ago, a Stoic philosopher known as Epictetus wrote that people are disturbed not by adversities, but by the views that they take of these adversities. The REBT version of this is very similar. It is this:
People are disturbed not by adversities, but by the rigid and extreme views that they take of these adversities.
I will go into this in greater depth later.
THE REBT VIEW OF HEALTHY ALTERNATIVES TO EMOTIONAL PROBLEMS
Unfortunately, Epictetus did not make clear how he would make sense of healthy alternatives to these emotional problems. Luckily REBT does. It is this:
People can respond healthily to adversities by holding flexible and non-extreme views of these adversities.
Again, I will go into this in greater depth later.
REBT has what it calls the Situational ABC model of emotional problems and the healthy alternative to these problems that elaborates on the above. I will now present and discuss this model.
![]()
2
The Situational ABC Model
The Situational ABC model has four components: i) the situation; ii) the “A”; iii) the “B” and iv) the “C”. I will discuss these one at a time.
SITUATION
You do not experience an emotional problem in a vacuum. Rather, there is almost always a situation in which you experience this problem. In considering this situation, bear in mind that it should reflect as accurately as possible the context in which you experienced your emotional problem.
“A”
When you experience an emotional problem in the situation that you are in, you usually disturb yourself about a particular aspect of this situation. In REBT, we call this the “A” or adversity.
“A” is Often an Inference
It is important to appreciate that your “A” is usually an inference that you have made about the situation or some aspect of the situation. An inference goes beyond the data at hand and can be accurate or inaccurate. Thus, if you receive a note from your boss that he wants to see you after lunch and you think: “He is going to criticise my work”, then this thought is an inference since it goes beyond the facts of the situation. In this example, the facts are that your boss wants to see you after lunch. You do not know why. Your inference may be accurate or it may be inaccurate, but what makes it an inference is that it goes beyond the data at hand.
“A” Relates to your Personal Domain
An adversity (real or perceived) is usually related to some aspect of your “personal domain”. The term “personal domain” was first introduced by Aaron Temkin Beck (1976), the founder of cognitive therapy (an approach to cognitive-behaviour therapy which shares certain ideas with REBT). It is made up of people, objects, concepts and ideas that are important to you. It also contains what is important to you about yourself. When you experience different unhealthy negative emotions, you disturb yourself about different adversities within your personal domain as shown below.
| Adversity | Unhealthy Negative Emotion |
| Threat | Anxiety |
| Loss/failure | Depression |
| Breaking your moral code; failing to live up to your moral code; hurting someone | Guilt |
| Falling very short of your ideal in a social context | Shame |
| Someone betrays you or lets you do... |
