REBT and Treatment of Anxiety - Essay Example

REBT and Treatment of AnxietyRational emotive behaviour therapy (REBT) is the active, time-limited, directive, present-centred structural approach to treating various disorders (Corey, 2009, p.249) which include depression, anxiety and phobias. The treatment was developed by Albert Ellis in the mid-20th century (1955) due to dissatisfaction with the then current psychoanalytic approach of treating these disorders. Cognitive Behavioural Hypnotherapy (CBH) can effectively be integrated into this process, thereby accounting for anxiety and related disorders.

CBH seeks to promote positive thinking by helping people with anxiety and related disorders to identify negative thoughts that are not helpful in their lives. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is complemented by hypnotherapy to constitute CBH, a more effective treatment for anxiety.Ellis realized that unlike animals, humans can create, define and evaluate real life situations as well as imagined ones, and this became a central tenet in the creation of his REBT model. Using the two forms of thinking, the innate tendency of humans to interpret and the strong biological human motivation to change and improve things for the better helps in understanding the human nature, and be able to contain anxiety as a disorder.

Anxiety will always be due to what an individual believes, and when these beliefs cannot be controlled, they become destructive. REBT tries to make individual have positive ideas using the abc of emotional disturbances since they stand for Activating events, Beliefs about the events and Consequences that result (Corey, 2009, p.314). This whole process is applied to the patient, and he/she is able to overcome the condition.ReferenceCorey, G. (2009). Theory and practice of counseling and psychotherapy, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.