Akılcı Olmayan Düşüncelerle Baş Etmenin Yolları
Albert Ellis and Robert A. Harper, in their book called The Rational Living Guide, stated that every time we feel sad and uncomfortable, we impose dogmatic demands and obligations on life and people. In their works, the authors have proposed certain methods, including opposition, to deal with all these irrational absolutist ideas.
Absolutist Thoughts
1. “All the dear people in your life need to love and approve of you.”
2. “You must be very competent, competent and successful”. Or, according to a more sane, silly version of this, "you must be competent or skilled in at least one important area."
3. “Blaming or cursing” This is the belief that people should never behave badly or unfairly, and that when they do, you should blame and curse them and see them as bad, lousy, vile people. If you can truly stop cursing yourself, others, and unpleasant circumstances, it becomes impossible to upset yourself emotionally about anything.
4. “When they are disappointed, people think they should be unhappy or depressed” This is the idea that when you are severely disappointed or treated unfairly, you have to view what is happening as terrible, awful, disastrous, and disastrous.
5. “The view that you have to be unhappy when you're under pressure and going through tough times, that you have little control over your troubling emotions and you can't change them.” Most people spend so much time and effort to achieve the impossible, that is, to change and control other people's actions, that they think they cannot change a possible goal, their own thoughts and actions.
6. “If something is dangerous or frightening, we must become obsessed with it and avoid it like crazy” We can often control anxiety through right thinking. However, anxiety, as used here, is exaggerated and unnecessary fears.
7. “You can easily avoid facing many difficulties and responsibilities but still lead a fulfilling life”. Above all, the notion that the best way out of difficulties is to run away from them prevents you from taking action when you have to make a decision, and ultimately leaves you restless for hours, days, or even years.
8. “Your past is always important and continues to dictate your emotions and behavior today because something strongly influenced your life in the past.”
9. “The fact that people and events should definitely be better than they are, and it's pretty bad and frightening not being able to change the harsh realities of life to suit you.”
10. “The idea that the highest level of human happiness can be achieved through inertia and inactivity, or by passively and selflessly “having fun.”
Opposing Absolutist Thoughts
In clinical practice, it seems that all neurotic emotions arise from the idea of necessity, the phrases "I have to", "I have to", and "necessary", which people make up for themselves and then trouble themselves. 1. The thought “I have to be successful or I am a terrible person” causes inadequacy, worthlessness, insecurity, self-humiliation, anxiety and depression. 2. “You are obliged to treat me with kindness, consideration, and fairness; otherwise, that makes you a bad person!” thought leads to resentment, resentment, hostility, and extreme rebellion. 3. “Conditions have to be easy for me; I should get what I want without too much trouble. I can't stand when things go wrong!” The thought leads to frustration, decreased tolerance, inactivity, self-pity, and avoidance behaviors. None of these notions of necessity can be justified. They are all too precise and absolutist. Each almost inevitably elicits upended emotions and self-defeating behaviors. All result in severe or prolonged whining. The whining about the imperfections of oneself, others, or the world is a major component of what we often call neurosis.
We can see that almost all irrational thoughts involve hidden or unconscious imperatives, and that irrational thoughts would not exist if people were simply talking about their preferences.
Here are some common irrational thoughts you may have in your mind, and the hidden imperatives that often accompany them:
• All or nothing (black and white) thinking
• Quick conclusion
• Reading the future (mind)
• Disaster
• Do not scare
• Perfectionism
“Search for necessity! Look for necessity! Use the slogan. This long-established yet simple guideline will help you, in no time, find some of the major philosophical sources of your problems and challenge your harmful absolutist thinking.
Being a Much Harder Person to Disturb
It's relatively easy to be less disturbed or less neurotic. As shown here, you must be aware that your feelings of severe anxiety, depression, anger, and worthlessness are largely self-generated by the three main imperatives.
1. I must be successful and lovable enough to stand out among others!
2. Other people must treat me well and fairly!
3. My living conditions should be comfortable and satisfying!
You want to achieve a more permanent, higher state of mind, that is, to become a more difficult person to disturb, You must adopt an Effective and New Philosophy, which must be firm and rooted. In fact, it should first make you less uncomfortable today; secondly, it should ensure that you rarely bother in the future; thirdly, when you regress, it should reduce your anxiety and depression in a short time; fourthly, it should reduce your tendency to regress even when there are serious Setbacks in life, and fifthly, it should make you happier and more self-actualized as you go through life.
For this, find, create, create radically rational views by first accepting your underlying Irrational Thoughts and then actively opposing them. Second, replace your Irrational Thoughts with Rational Thoughts that make and keep you more effective and happier. What you need to do for this is to create Rooted Rational Philosophies and to constantly review them. These philosophies are:
1. It contains your firm and strong preferences and wishes, but avoids absolutist “musts”, obligations”, “necessities” and other demands.
2. It is not exaggerated and magnified, it is realistic.
3. It is logical, sound and reasonable. It greatly helps you achieve your own goals and those of your society. It prevents you and your community group from getting into serious trouble.
4. It is flexible, open and changeable.
5. It does not cause you to terrify or curse yourself, other people, or the world.
We're going to suggest some Rooted Rational Philosophies that you can consider to become a more difficult person to disturb. However, none of these are absolute and immutable.
1. Freedom of Choice and Power of Will
I don't seem to have a choice over my inherited traits and many things that have happened to me in my lifetime. I can influence other people, but it is very difficult for me to control. However, with hard work and effort, I can control my own thoughts, feelings, and actions to a large extent, and therefore control a large part of my own emotional destiny. I can decide my own goals, give meaning to my life, get most of what I want, avoid most of what I don't want.
To change and control myself, I need willpower, not just willpower. Willpower consists of: 1. Deciding to do (or not do) something; 2. to be determined to do it; 3. obtaining appropriate knowledge of how to do that thing; 4. to act on the basis of determination and knowledge; 5. to continue to make decisions, to be determined, to obtain appropriate information and especially to take action. Actions are more important than words. If there is no action, there is no willpower.
2. Flexible Thinking
By thinking in terms of choices and desires, including strong preferences and desires, rather than absolute demands, particularly persistent "musts", "musts" and "must haves", I am able to deal with my emotional and behavioral disturbances, particularly severe anxiety, depression, anger, worthlessness and unworthiness. I can greatly control and limit my feelings of pity. It would be good if I took many things seriously without exaggeration, and if I saw projects as important without sacrificing them. I can lead a comfortable life away from certainty and perfectionism. I will monitor my tendencies to generalize, carelessly label, mold, and make an effort to be open-minded and less biased.
3. Unconditional Self-Acceptance
I will always consider myself a fallible person who will make many mistakes and mistakes. I will largely choose my own goals and objectives, and I will categorize or rate my thoughts, feelings, and actions as "good" that aid my individual and social goals, and "bad" those that undermine them. I will not classify my self, essence, personality, or being as a whole. Regardless of whether I am successful or not and whether others approve or disapprove of me, I will accept myself unconditionally and try to be more successful and get along better with other people; I will do this not to prove my worth as an individual, but to increase my effectiveness and enjoyment.
4. Accepting Others Unconditionally
I will accept other people unconditionally, even if I don't like their behavior towards me and others. I will accept that they can be wrong as human beings, and I will not despise them. I will admit to those who make mistakes, as I do when it comes to myself, but I will not turn a blind eye to their mistakes. I will try to help people change their bad behavior, and if they don't, maybe I'll walk away from them; but I will not insist that they must change, and I will not hold grudges or vengeance upon them when they do not. I will try to help people act justly, but I will not necessarily command them to act justly.
6. High Tolerance for Disappointment
I will admit that human life is full of many troubles, problems, misfortunes, and injustices, and these often dominate life. When it comes to these troubles, I'll be smart enough to change what I can change, accept what I can't (even if I don't like it), and know the difference.
7. Anti-Terrifying Opposition
I'm not going to describe the very bad things in my life as terrible, awful, or disastrous. When I insist that something is terrible, I may rightly view it as extraordinarily bad, even a catastrophe like a violent earthquake or devastating wars. But when I make it scary, I tend to whine about bad conditions, thinking they're so bad that they shouldn't exist at all, that they're utterly bad and far worse than anything. These are all exaggerations that won't help me deal with unfortunate events. So, I'd better stop whining and try to better deal with the worst Setbacks.
Similarly, when I insist that I can't stand setbacks, I'm implying that they will kill me or that I won't be happy at all because of them. Yet they don't kill me and I can find some happiness despite them. I can handle it.
8. Accepting the Duty to Become Someone Harder to Disturb
Since I have faults and fallibility, other people are far from perfect, and life is always full of dangers and misfortunes, I can never be a completely uncomfortable or undisturbed person. Even when I do my best to deal with setbacks, at times I go backwards and unnecessarily piss myself off. My most important task, then, is to continue to create and maintain Deep-rooted Rational Philosophies; Use and review those philosophies vigorously, no matter what, when things go wrong or cause trouble for myself!
A. Ellis and RA Harper – “The Rational Living Guide”
Source: Albert Ellis and Robert A. Harper (2005), Rational Living Guide (Translated by Semra Kunt Akbaş), HYB Publishing, Ankara.
