Hello, I'm Shelley Quinn and welcome again to 00:00:30.25\00:00:33.19 Issues and Answers. We're glad that you've tuned in. 00:00:33.22\00:00:35.77 Let me share something. If you are a sad or anxious person or 00:00:35.81\00:00:40.05 if you know someone who may be a sad or anxious person then 00:00:40.09\00:00:43.91 you're going to be glad that you tuned in today. Tell somebody 00:00:43.95\00:00:47.74 else to tune as well. That's what our topic is today. 00:00:47.77\00:00:51.09 Let me share with you one of my favorite Bible verses and it 00:00:51.12\00:00:56.80 comes from Romans 15:13. You talk about hope for sad, anxious 00:00:56.83\00:01:02.49 people, here it is. The Bible says: May the God of hope so 00:01:02.52\00:01:08.03 fill you with all joy and peace in believing that by the power 00:01:08.07\00:01:13.17 of the Holy Spirit you may be overflowing, bubbling over, with 00:01:13.21\00:01:18.28 hope. And you know what, in the Greek hope means eager 00:01:18.32\00:01:22.57 expectation. You can go to God eagerly expecting him to fulfill 00:01:22.61\00:01:29.52 his promises to you. We want to welcome again 00:01:29.56\00:01:32.89 Jennifer Schwirzer and Jennifer comes to us from Philadelphia. 00:01:32.92\00:01:37.36 She is a Christian counselor, a song writer, ministry director 00:01:37.40\00:01:41.80 and we're just so glad that you're back with us. 00:01:41.84\00:01:44.26 It's great to be here. 00:01:44.30\00:01:45.67 These programs have been so good that you've been coming and 00:01:45.70\00:01:48.50 doing and we really appreciate them. 00:01:48.54\00:01:50.23 I've been the most blessed. 00:01:50.26\00:01:51.79 Well, you're a very wonderful person. Let's just jump into 00:01:51.83\00:01:56.38 this. We're going to be talking about cognitive behavioral 00:01:56.41\00:02:00.36 therapy today and I know you know Dr. Neal Nedley and 00:02:00.40\00:02:04.27 Dr. Nedley believes in this. There are so many people that 00:02:04.31\00:02:07.42 are springing up everywhere I look they talk about cognitive 00:02:07.45\00:02:11.16 behavioral therapy. First of all explain to me what that means. 00:02:11.19\00:02:14.86 Okay well it is kind of the cutting edge of treatment for 00:02:14.90\00:02:19.80 anxiety disorders. It's most effective with anxiety disorders 00:02:19.84\00:02:25.06 and mood disorders and this is a very serious problem just even 00:02:25.09\00:02:29.51 in the United States of America we have a lot of anxiety and a 00:02:29.54\00:02:33.93 lot of mood disorders so... 00:02:33.96\00:02:35.40 I guess depression would be considered a mood disorder. 00:02:35.43\00:02:38.31 It's a mood disorder. The mood disorders are depression, major 00:02:38.34\00:02:41.47 depressive disorder, bipolar disorder and something called 00:02:41.50\00:02:44.71 dysthymic disorder which is actually kind of a mild form of 00:02:44.74\00:02:48.88 depression. What they call the 12-month prevalence rate which 00:02:48.92\00:02:53.02 means in one year's time 20 million people will have a 00:02:53.06\00:02:56.47 diagnosis of one of those disorders. That's a lot of 00:02:56.50\00:02:59.88 people. Just in the United States? 00:02:59.92\00:03:01.31 Just in the United States. Major depressive disorder is the 00:03:01.35\00:03:05.41 leading cause of disability in the U.S. today. That's a lot of 00:03:05.44\00:03:09.65 sad people. But there are even more anxious people because in 00:03:09.69\00:03:13.86 one year's time 40 million, double the amount as mood 00:03:13.90\00:03:17.94 disorders, 40 million will develop an anxiety disorder. 00:03:17.97\00:03:21.94 Let me just give you what some of those are: Panic disorder, 00:03:21.98\00:03:25.64 obsessive/compulsive disorder which is considered an anxiety 00:03:25.68\00:03:29.57 disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, generalized anxiety 00:03:29.61\00:03:33.47 disorder, social phobia which is the most common, and 00:03:33.50\00:03:37.66 agoraphobia which is the fear of crowds and specific phobias. 00:03:37.70\00:03:41.43 So all of those are considered anxiety disorders. Forty million 00:03:41.47\00:03:45.11 people in one year's time will develop an anxiety disorder. 00:03:45.15\00:03:49.10 Okay when we're talking about these mood disorders and anxiety 00:03:49.14\00:03:53.06 disorders and for our international viewers we 00:03:53.09\00:03:55.42 understand that we are giving quotes and statistics from the 00:03:55.45\00:04:00.92 United States, but I know the Scandinavian countries really 00:04:00.95\00:04:05.99 have some very difficult times with depressive disorders but 00:04:06.02\00:04:10.07 we know it is a very prevalent problem. That's just what we're 00:04:10.10\00:04:14.67 trying to establish. So it is becoming even more so. I mean 00:04:14.70\00:04:18.46 I know that I've seen the statistics with how things are 00:04:18.49\00:04:22.21 coming with anxiety and mood disorders. 00:04:22.25\00:04:24.90 Well for instance, social phobia which is the most common kind 00:04:24.93\00:04:28.24 of anxiety disorder... It's estimated that 50% of people 00:04:28.28\00:04:33.38 are chronically shy, this is the U.S. again, but that's a 10% 00:04:33.41\00:04:37.11 increase over the last three decades. So there's an increase 00:04:37.15\00:04:40.54 in social phobia. And it's thought that the reason for that 00:04:40.58\00:04:44.44 is that our society is becoming increasingly isolative, there's 00:04:44.48\00:04:48.31 more loneliness, there's more isolation and there's a more 00:04:48.34\00:04:51.40 competitive atmosphere in society so those things kind of 00:04:51.43\00:04:54.46 breed these disorders. 00:04:54.49\00:04:55.86 So when you're talking about this chronic shyness what you're 00:04:55.89\00:04:59.82 saying is we have this tendency nowadays to cocoon ourselves. 00:04:59.85\00:05:03.88 We've got the internet there and all these things. I know one 00:05:03.91\00:05:07.78 lady that hasn't been out of her home for several months. She 00:05:07.81\00:05:11.48 orders her groceries by internet everything's done online. 00:05:11.52\00:05:15.12 And it's not good. Yeah I used to go to my neighbor to find out 00:05:15.16\00:05:18.85 how to make leaf mulch or how to bake a certain kind of cake. 00:05:18.88\00:05:22.49 But now I just go online and get the recipe. It's so easy to get 00:05:22.53\00:05:26.11 information and I'm and information junkie. I love it. 00:05:26.14\00:05:29.60 But I can see where it doesn't push me into certain social 00:05:29.63\00:05:33.02 situations and I can end up living my life in a form of 00:05:33.05\00:05:36.41 isolation that is not healthy. 00:05:36.44\00:05:38.02 So now let's go back to you said cognitive behavior therapy was 00:05:38.06\00:05:42.58 the most popular way to treat these disorders. What is 00:05:42.61\00:05:46.04 cognitive behavior therapy? 00:05:46.08\00:05:47.79 Okay. Cognitive therapy rests on the basic concept that cognitive 00:05:47.83\00:05:52.98 processing is what causes these disorders. 00:05:53.02\00:05:55.38 All right. So now describe cognitive processing. 00:05:55.42\00:05:58.34 You have negative life events and then negative emotions that 00:05:58.37\00:06:01.75 come out of negative life events and you might assume that there 00:06:01.79\00:06:05.13 is a direct line from the negative life event to the 00:06:05.17\00:06:08.69 negative emotion. However, the CBT theory has said no there's 00:06:08.73\00:06:12.26 something mediating between the negative life event and the 00:06:12.30\00:06:15.80 negative emotion and that is what we call cognitive 00:06:15.83\00:06:18.48 processing or the way that you think about an event. And if the 00:06:18.52\00:06:24.10 processing is negatively biased or distorted in some way often 00:06:24.13\00:06:29.68 times the bad feelings will sustain much longer than they 00:06:29.71\00:06:34.40 normally would because of the way the person is thinking about 00:06:34.43\00:06:37.57 it or they would be more intense than they need to be 00:06:37.61\00:06:39.69 because of the way the person is thinking about it. So that's 00:06:39.72\00:06:42.73 what I mean by cognitive processing and what the CBT 00:06:42.76\00:06:46.12 theorists have discovered... 00:06:46.16\00:06:47.53 CBT being Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. 00:06:47.56\00:06:49.83 I'm like running down the road with this thing. But what these 00:06:49.87\00:06:54.51 researchers have found is that people that are depressed and 00:06:54.54\00:06:58.76 anxious suffer from these disorders are negatively biased 00:06:58.79\00:07:02.46 and they do tend to think of things in very negative ways. 00:07:02.49\00:07:06.13 So what they do is they go in and try to correct those 00:07:06.16\00:07:08.93 negative thoughts. So what you're saying is that... 00:07:08.97\00:07:11.67 Let's say that we have five people attending a group event. 00:07:11.71\00:07:17.30 Something happens at this group event. All five people could 00:07:17.33\00:07:22.89 experience the same thing but they're going to process, 00:07:22.92\00:07:26.41 cognitively they will process this in their mind differently. 00:07:26.45\00:07:30.57 And someone might feel like what happened was a personal affront 00:07:30.60\00:07:34.69 to them and they're taking it very negatively. There's all 00:07:34.72\00:07:38.27 these various aspects that has to do with how we think. 00:07:38.30\00:07:41.78 And we really can't control the events, but we can control how 00:07:41.81\00:07:45.10 we think about them. So what you do when you use CBT with a 00:07:45.13\00:07:48.08 person is you give them a sense of empowerment. You know 00:07:48.12\00:07:51.15 something since I've gotten into counseling is that we were 00:07:51.19\00:07:54.17 created for mastery. You know, God gave us dominion over the 00:07:54.21\00:07:57.82 fish and the animals. We were created to be in control of 00:07:57.86\00:08:00.95 things, but because of the fall we've lost control. However, 00:08:00.99\00:08:04.39 God has still called us to mastery. The first thing that we 00:08:04.42\00:08:07.76 must master is our self, our own behaviors and then of course our 00:08:07.79\00:08:11.50 thought life. See now that makes me think of 00:08:11.54\00:08:13.82 2 Corinthians chapter 10, verses 4 and 5, that we are to take 00:08:13.85\00:08:17.48 every thought captive and make it obedient. 00:08:17.51\00:08:20.01 Oh, exactly. That was my verse that I was going to use but 00:08:20.05\00:08:23.47 that's okay. Well we're on the same page. 00:08:23.50\00:08:26.16 So my experience has been... We've already discussed how 00:08:26.19\00:08:31.48 I like to do is take Bible promises, confess them over my 00:08:31.52\00:08:36.74 life, pray them back to the Lord and my experience has been that 00:08:36.77\00:08:41.17 if I'm trying to take a negative thought captive, I have to 00:08:41.21\00:08:45.10 replace it with something else. If I just tell myself you can't 00:08:45.14\00:08:48.99 think about that, or you shouldn't think this way, I have 00:08:49.03\00:08:51.89 a tendency to think about it more. But if I'll go to the word 00:08:51.92\00:08:54.74 of God and replace it with something then it helps me to 00:08:54.78\00:08:58.97 take that thought captive because suddenly my focus is off 00:08:59.01\00:09:02.35 self and the way I'm thinking to what the Lord has said. 00:09:02.39\00:09:06.19 So would that be kind of a form of cognitive behavioral 00:09:06.22\00:09:09.98 therapy? Oh yes. Definitely. In fact, I 00:09:10.02\00:09:11.39 use a technique called FAR and I told you that I use these 00:09:11.42\00:09:15.14 mnemonics because their easy to remember. People can remember 00:09:15.18\00:09:17.94 them in the heat of the moment when they're about to lose it. 00:09:17.97\00:09:21.34 They can remember this and they can put it to use. FAR, based on 00:09:21.37\00:09:24.75 the verse, I don't know where it is, you probably do, This light 00:09:24.78\00:09:28.04 affliction which is but for a moment works for us a far more 00:09:28.08\00:09:30.96 exceeding and eternal weight of glory. The Lord has given us 00:09:31.00\00:09:34.12 wonderful coping mechanisms for the hardships of life and these 00:09:34.16\00:09:36.66 things will someday be far from us but we can make them as far 00:09:36.70\00:09:39.51 from us, but we can make them as far as possible from us even 00:09:39.55\00:09:42.33 today by thinking correctly about them. So FAR is Find, 00:09:42.37\00:09:47.91 Argue and Replace. This is a very technical approach to 00:09:47.94\00:09:53.41 dealing with one's thought life. But basically it's thought life 00:09:53.45\00:09:56.60 management. Very technical approach. Find, first step, find 00:09:56.63\00:10:00.49 People have to find out what they're thinking. Now it's 00:10:00.53\00:10:04.32 pretty easy, and I find this in therapy, it's pretty easy to 00:10:04.35\00:10:07.81 figure out what happened that's upset you. In fact, people 00:10:07.84\00:10:11.27 ruminate on what happened. They'll talk about it in 00:10:11.30\00:10:13.97 excruciating details sometimes; just reliving it over and over 00:10:14.00\00:10:18.26 again. They can summon up tremendous amounts of detail and 00:10:18.29\00:10:21.64 really kind of bring the story alive and they want to do that 00:10:21.67\00:10:25.32 in therapy and I allow that to a certain extent. But then what 00:10:25.35\00:10:28.83 I'll do is I'll tell them to identify the feelings that came 00:10:28.87\00:10:32.31 out of that event and they learn how to use descriptive words to 00:10:32.35\00:10:35.76 describe their feelings. And that's usually pretty easy for 00:10:35.80\00:10:39.30 people. Then I try to find out what they're thinking. I say now 00:10:39.33\00:10:42.74 let's try to find out what it is that you're thinking about this 00:10:42.78\00:10:46.64 event. And all of a sudden it gets very difficult. Often times 00:10:46.68\00:10:49.86 they'll say I don't know what I'm thinking. I'm not thinking 00:10:49.90\00:10:53.01 at all. I'm just feeling this way. But then I'll start to 00:10:53.05\00:10:56.67 probe and I'll work with them and like we talked about before 00:10:56.71\00:11:00.29 there's a certain amount of intuition that you have in 00:11:00.33\00:11:03.92 developing this with the person but sooner or later we find out 00:11:03.96\00:11:08.29 that they are thinking something that is distorted in some way. 00:11:08.33\00:11:12.63 Let's say that something has happened and you're taking 00:11:12.66\00:11:16.20 somebody through this process and to try to find out what 00:11:16.24\00:11:20.55 they're thinking have you had someone say I'm just so angry 00:11:20.59\00:11:24.16 and that's what I'm feeling is anger. And then as they go 00:11:24.19\00:11:27.65 through this process about these feelings they find out 00:11:27.69\00:11:31.51 it wasn't anger at all. They were wounded by something and 00:11:31.55\00:11:35.31 so there's a disassociation with their true feelings so they can 00:11:35.34\00:11:39.84 never really get at the root of it if they don't understand what 00:11:39.88\00:11:44.34 they're feeling, is that what your saying? 00:11:44.38\00:11:45.75 That's part of it. Let me give you a specific example on that 00:11:45.78\00:11:48.84 issue of anger. I had a fellow come to therapy when I was in 00:11:48.87\00:11:52.26 my internship. This guy was six foot four, a big booming voice. 00:11:52.30\00:11:55.66 He used to be a law enforcement official. He was disabled 00:11:55.69\00:11:59.01 because he had some joint problem. But he was roughly my 00:11:59.04\00:12:03.14 age, just a very large person and a very kind of energetic 00:12:03.18\00:12:07.69 interesting person but a very, very sad person and often times 00:12:07.73\00:12:12.18 depressed people have struggles with anger. So what happened in 00:12:12.21\00:12:16.07 therapy was... Well first of all the first session he cried the 00:12:16.11\00:12:19.93 entire session. Great big strapping man, big booming voice 00:12:19.97\00:12:24.48 cried the entire first hour, just weeping. But anyway we were 00:12:24.51\00:12:29.13 dealing with some of his issues using the CBT. One of the issues 00:12:29.17\00:12:33.75 was anger. He was angry at a neighbor for saying something 00:12:33.78\00:12:37.38 insulting about his dog and he got in the neighbor's face and 00:12:37.41\00:12:40.57 did something kind of aggressive and then, as is typical, felt 00:12:40.60\00:12:44.18 kind of bad about that afterward and really kind of ashamed of 00:12:44.22\00:12:47.76 himself for losing his composure. Okay, so we 00:12:47.80\00:12:49.85 processed this using Find, Argue and Replace technique. So first 00:12:49.88\00:12:54.59 we had to find out what he was thinking. Well after talking it 00:12:54.62\00:12:58.34 through for a while he realized that he was thinking that he had 00:12:58.38\00:13:01.68 to fix that right then and there That he could not allow that 00:13:01.72\00:13:04.99 person to say something insulting to him about his dog. 00:13:05.03\00:13:08.34 He just couldn't tolerate that and he had to make it right then 00:13:08.37\00:13:11.63 and there. So I refuted that with him. I said, did you really 00:13:11.66\00:13:15.20 have to fix that right then and there; was that necessary? 00:13:15.24\00:13:18.88 What would be so bad about just letting it go? Do you have to 00:13:18.92\00:13:22.39 make that person act the way you think they should act or are 00:13:22.42\00:13:25.64 there times when you can just let people be obnoxious. And he 00:13:25.68\00:13:29.56 realized, You know what, I don't have to make people behave the 00:13:29.59\00:13:33.44 way I think that they should behave. And he started to 00:13:33.48\00:13:35.70 realize that he could have boundaries and he could let 00:13:35.74\00:13:37.89 people make their own choices and he could make his choices 00:13:37.93\00:13:41.23 and he did not have to allow things to bother him. So that's 00:13:41.27\00:13:45.02 just one example of using the Find, Argue and Replace. So what 00:13:45.06\00:13:48.87 we do is we find the thought and once you isolate that thought 00:13:48.91\00:13:53.00 then you teach the person how to argue with themselves. That 00:13:53.04\00:13:57.30 is a really important skill. You don't argue with someone unless 00:13:57.34\00:14:01.36 you respect them. They have to have some kind of power over you 00:14:01.40\00:14:05.13 some kind of prominence in your life, some kind of power in your 00:14:05.16\00:14:08.86 life in order for you to feel like you need to argue with 00:14:08.90\00:14:11.62 them. You don't argue with kitty cats and the mailman or little 00:14:11.65\00:14:15.95 children. You argue with people that threaten you on some level. 00:14:15.99\00:14:20.25 So what you do when you learn how to argue with yourself is 00:14:20.29\00:14:23.80 you kind of take responsibility for the management of your own 00:14:23.83\00:14:27.70 thought life. And it's amazing how people respond to this as 00:14:27.74\00:14:31.40 they learn how to deal with themselves and hold themselves 00:14:31.44\00:14:35.07 accountable. I do this all the time. 00:14:35.10\00:14:38.59 Do you really. So I teach them how to argue with themselves and 00:14:38.63\00:14:41.82 what I do is I give them a sheet of various types of distorted 00:14:41.86\00:14:45.02 thoughts. And I say now isolate the thought and then tell 00:14:45.06\00:14:48.58 yourself what's wrong with that thought. So if the thought is 00:14:48.61\00:14:52.04 something like, you know I had this bad experience and my whole 00:14:52.08\00:14:55.50 life is just going to be one bad experience after another. I'll 00:14:55.53\00:14:58.62 say, what is wrong with that thought that your whole life is 00:14:58.65\00:15:01.73 going to be one bad experience after another? And they look at 00:15:01.77\00:15:04.81 the list and they say oh I'm generalizing. I'm taking one 00:15:04.84\00:15:08.14 incident and I'm generalizing it to the rest of my life. And 00:15:08.17\00:15:11.11 then they learn to argue with themselves and say look, you're 00:15:11.14\00:15:14.17 generalizing. Don't generalize. That's not a healthy thing to do 00:15:14.21\00:15:18.21 and it's also not true. So once they accomplish that arguing, 00:15:18.25\00:15:21.94 then they replace the thought with a true thought. And this is 00:15:21.97\00:15:25.36 what you were talking about a minute ago. What I find though 00:15:25.40\00:15:28.93 is that the replacement does not work unless they first do the 00:15:28.96\00:15:32.45 arguing and it's very easy to skip over the arguing step. 00:15:32.49\00:15:36.03 Arguing with yourself. With yourself. What I tell 00:15:36.06\00:15:41.25 people is that their heart and their mind is like a garden and 00:15:41.29\00:15:44.68 if the ground is hard the seed will not grow. What they have to 00:15:44.71\00:15:47.83 do is they have to break up the fallow ground of their thinking 00:15:47.87\00:15:50.89 and that's where that verse that you quoted comes into play. 00:15:50.92\00:15:54.49 Casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalts 00:15:54.53\00:15:58.32 itself against the knowledge of God. 2 Corinthians 10:5. And 00:15:58.36\00:16:01.98 bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of 00:16:02.01\00:16:05.41 Christ. You know, casting down. There's a certain amount of 00:16:05.45\00:16:09.32 force to casting something down. And imaginations is sometimes 00:16:09.36\00:16:13.20 translated arguments. It's logismo and it means like 00:16:13.24\00:16:15.97 calculations, these things we come up with in our heads. We 00:16:16.00\00:16:19.09 need to cast them down. We need to deal with our own thinking 00:16:19.13\00:16:22.40 and break it up. And once we learn how to break it up and 00:16:22.43\00:16:25.63 get that ground all nice and loose and ready for the seed 00:16:25.66\00:16:29.29 then we can replace those distorted automatic thoughts 00:16:29.33\00:16:32.89 those misbeliefs with truth. Now truth, I'm really into this, 00:16:32.92\00:16:37.82 I'm sorry. I'm taking over a little bit. But truth is more 00:16:37.85\00:16:42.68 nuanced and more detailed than a lie. What I typically run into 00:16:42.71\00:16:47.60 with depressed and anxious people is they often say things 00:16:47.64\00:16:51.77 like he's an idiot or life sucks or, you know, they make these 00:16:51.81\00:16:55.73 general comments that apply to everything and they're just too 00:16:55.77\00:17:00.23 black and white. What I teach them to do is replace that lie 00:17:00.27\00:17:03.91 with the truth, which is much more detailed and nuanced. So 00:17:03.95\00:17:07.56 he's not an idiot. It's like taking the diamond in 00:17:07.59\00:17:10.99 the jeweler's hand. The truth has all these different facets 00:17:11.03\00:17:15.47 that you can see. The truth sparkles; it's not just... It's 00:17:15.50\00:17:19.91 detailed. It's multifaceted. So what they 00:17:19.95\00:17:23.12 do is they replace that he's an idiot. They don't go to the 00:17:23.15\00:17:26.74 other extreme of he's a wonderful guy, because the 00:17:26.78\00:17:29.57 reason that a lie has power is because it's partly true. So I 00:17:29.61\00:17:33.89 teach them to take the truth about the he's an idiot 00:17:33.93\00:17:37.54 statement and not to exclude that because if they don't 00:17:37.58\00:17:41.66 replace that lie with the truth then it won't have staying 00:17:41.69\00:17:45.54 power. If they replace that lie with another positivized lie 00:17:45.57\00:17:49.39 it's not going to stay with them So I teach them how to say well 00:17:49.42\00:17:53.20 he has some challenging character traits and sometimes 00:17:53.24\00:17:58.13 I feel very offended by things he says, but he does have some 00:17:58.17\00:18:01.89 really good qualities too. And I choose to see him through the 00:18:01.92\00:18:05.47 eyes of love because God sees me through the eyes of love. And so 00:18:05.50\00:18:09.01 I choose to regard him as a brother in Christ. 00:18:09.04\00:18:12.08 That's good. So I replace the misbelief with 00:18:12.12\00:18:15.12 the truth. That's really good. You know 00:18:15.16\00:18:16.92 you're talking about plowing up your heart. In Hosea 10:12, I 00:18:16.96\00:18:22.14 love that scripture that Hosea says: I may not be able to quote 00:18:22.17\00:18:26.78 it but anyway he says sow for yourselves righteousness. Plow 00:18:26.82\00:18:33.04 up your fallow ground, untilled ground and then seek the Lord 00:18:33.08\00:18:38.23 till he rains righteousness on you. And I was just thinking 00:18:38.27\00:18:42.40 that when you're talking about this cognitive behavior, that's 00:18:42.43\00:18:47.67 what you're doing with the FAR. You're looking at this fallow 00:18:47.71\00:18:52.13 ground of yours, this hardened ground and you have to break it 00:18:52.17\00:18:56.53 up and say okay what am I really feeling and thinking here. Now 00:18:56.57\00:19:00.90 the Argue, some people have a difficult time with the word 00:19:00.93\00:19:04.08 argue but it's reasoning with yourself. It's coming with that 00:19:04.12\00:19:07.29 positive reasoning, the argument with yourself. You know, I find 00:19:07.32\00:19:10.46 myself doing this all the time. Especially, we've got to 00:19:10.49\00:19:12.87 remember that the devil can plant thoughts in our mind as 00:19:12.91\00:19:16.52 well. He tries to pass off this condemnation. Sometimes if I 00:19:16.56\00:19:20.18 feel like... if I'm really tired and I've been overworked and 00:19:20.22\00:19:23.81 I'll think oh Lord I'm just failing you here and I hear 00:19:23.85\00:19:27.38 these generalized statements coming out and then I realize 00:19:27.41\00:19:31.51 am I relying on works or am I relying on grace. I start 00:19:31.54\00:19:35.56 arguing with myself and thinking that thought's not coming from 00:19:35.60\00:19:39.20 the Lord. I'm not failing the Lord and I have this little 00:19:39.23\00:19:42.80 running conversation that goes on. So then to replace it... 00:19:42.83\00:19:46.07 That's really healthy. You don't even have to go to therapy. 00:19:46.11\00:19:49.31 You just figured out how to do it on your own. 00:19:49.35\00:19:51.05 I've just always done this. Well not always. Since I've been in 00:19:51.09\00:19:54.12 the Word I think is when it started that I've realized boy 00:19:54.16\00:19:58.19 this isn't lining up with God's word and I need to find a 00:19:58.23\00:20:02.33 scripture, replace this and just start trusting and believing 00:20:02.37\00:20:05.98 that God's working in me to will and to act according to his good 00:20:06.01\00:20:09.59 purpose. Well that's why CBT even though 00:20:09.62\00:20:12.35 it is a secular theory the principles are found in the word 00:20:12.39\00:20:18.14 of God. As a man thinks in his heart so is he. 00:20:18.18\00:20:21.02 Be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind. So the 00:20:21.06\00:20:25.20 principles are in the word of God and the reason that it works 00:20:25.23\00:20:28.41 is because it's found in the word of God. I would insert one 00:20:28.44\00:20:31.58 caution and that is that sometimes when the Holy Spirit 00:20:31.62\00:20:34.39 is striving with a person they experience depression, they 00:20:34.42\00:20:37.12 experience despair. I am careful with my clients not to interrupt 00:20:37.16\00:20:41.67 that. I'm careful to let the Lord work with them; of course 00:20:41.70\00:20:45.21 guarding against suicidality, if the person's at the point of 00:20:45.24\00:20:48.85 taking their own life. It's a real tight rope walk I have to 00:20:48.89\00:20:52.46 walk at that point. 00:20:52.50\00:20:53.87 So explain that. Go into that a little bit deeper when you say 00:20:53.90\00:20:57.30 that sometimes when the Holy Spirit is working with people 00:20:57.33\00:21:00.79 they get to that point of despair. 00:21:00.83\00:21:02.74 If I was a strictly secular cognitive behavioral therapist 00:21:02.78\00:21:06.84 I would probably if someone was in despair because they felt 00:21:06.88\00:21:11.01 unworthy I would probably say Oh no, you're worthy and I would 00:21:11.05\00:21:14.81 argue with that thought. But I can't really argue with that 00:21:14.85\00:21:17.77 thought on the basis of scripture. It could be that the 00:21:17.80\00:21:20.65 Holy Spirit is striving with a person and bringing them to the 00:21:20.69\00:21:23.73 end of their own resources realizing that they are nothing 00:21:23.77\00:21:28.39 before God. I don't want to reason that away. You know I 00:21:28.42\00:21:32.17 should put in a little bit of a disclaimer here because no 00:21:32.21\00:21:35.81 secular theory is... we're not safe to follow any secular 00:21:35.85\00:21:39.49 theory, but I think that cognitive behavioral therapy 00:21:39.53\00:21:43.10 is in the word of God and that there are many people in despair 00:21:43.14\00:21:45.50 that don't need to be in despair 00:21:45.54\00:21:47.16 Absolutely. Now I'm going to have to correct something you 00:21:47.19\00:21:49.61 said that when you say we realize we're nothing before 00:21:49.64\00:21:51.99 God. Just semantics but I don't want someone to get the wrong 00:21:52.02\00:21:56.77 idea. That we have no goodness, nothing in our self that we can 00:21:56.81\00:22:01.26 present to God as good or worthy but that we're not nothing to 00:22:01.29\00:22:05.36 him because he did send his Son to die for us and he does see 00:22:05.40\00:22:10.80 great value in us and he loves us unconditionally. So if you're 00:22:10.84\00:22:16.20 feeling that way, God would have you come to him and say 00:22:16.24\00:22:19.89 I'm the God of hope and if you will trust me I will change your 00:22:19.92\00:22:25.81 life and understand that I do love you with an everlasting 00:22:25.85\00:22:31.70 love and therefore with loving kindness I am drawing you. 00:22:31.73\00:22:34.81 Can I give more illustration here? This fellow that I 00:22:34.85\00:22:37.85 worked with one of the distorted thoughts that he had, he had 00:22:37.89\00:22:41.33 done some things wrong in his youth and he was feeling this 00:22:41.36\00:22:44.84 residual guilt because of it. I'm not allowed to preach 00:22:44.87\00:22:47.63 religion but I'm allowed to look on their intake form and 00:22:47.67\00:22:50.07 if they say that faith is an important part of their life 00:22:50.10\00:22:52.43 I can say well let's pursue that So I said you know faith is an 00:22:52.46\00:22:55.42 important part of your life; how do you view God. And he 00:22:55.46\00:22:58.04 basically said, Well God is holy and I try to earn his 00:22:58.08\00:23:00.60 forgiveness but no matter how hard I try it just doesn't seem 00:23:00.63\00:23:03.74 to be... I'm not good enough to earn his forgiveness. So I had 00:23:03.77\00:23:07.21 the privilege of introducing the gospel to this man and it all 00:23:07.25\00:23:10.72 happened very naturally in the context of a counseling office. 00:23:10.75\00:23:13.85 I want to say this one more thing just to give you an idea 00:23:13.88\00:23:17.87 of how powerful this type of therapy, biblically based CBT, 00:23:17.91\00:23:22.13 can be. The man came to me for eight sessions. At the last 00:23:22.16\00:23:26.36 session I was moving out of my internship and kind of ending 00:23:26.40\00:23:30.56 our sessions. He was doing better. He had quit 00:23:30.60\00:23:33.27 antidepressants on his own, he had quit smoking and he had 00:23:33.30\00:23:36.42 gotten a job and he basically pronounced himself cured. 00:23:36.45\00:23:39.50 And he said to me, I have been coming to this counseling office 00:23:39.53\00:23:42.35 for 15 years talking to different therapists and I come 00:23:42.39\00:23:46.75 to this lowly intern, and it's true, I had no idea what I was 00:23:46.79\00:23:50.09 doing, you know, really as far as experience went, but he had 00:23:50.12\00:23:53.25 eight sessions with me and he said he was better. He said this 00:23:53.28\00:23:56.37 thing you're doing keep doing it because it works. 00:23:56.40\00:23:58.93 And the reason, it was more than eight sessions with you. 00:23:58.97\00:24:02.59 He had eight sessions with the Lord, Jesus Christ in you and 00:24:02.63\00:24:06.68 you sharing the gospel, the good news with him. Praise the Lord. 00:24:06.72\00:24:12.58 So cognitive behavioral therapy is simply taking someone and 00:24:12.62\00:24:17.76 showing them that many times behind these mood disorders and 00:24:17.80\00:24:22.80 this anxiety is that people are making generalized statements. 00:24:22.84\00:24:28.22 They are overreacting. They are assigning values to things that 00:24:28.26\00:24:32.99 don't really belong there and it's simply taking them through 00:24:33.02\00:24:37.26 to help them recognize their own thinking, to help them then 00:24:37.29\00:24:42.47 confront themselves, argue, have this reasoning this argument 00:24:42.51\00:24:47.65 within themselves to say you know what I'm saying and 00:24:47.69\00:24:52.49 thinking isn't really true. Life isn't over for me because I 00:24:52.52\00:24:57.14 embarrassed myself so badly. Life isn't over for me, my life 00:24:57.17\00:25:00.72 is not over because I got a divorce. You know that's a good 00:25:00.76\00:25:04.27 one. That's right. It doesn't mean I 00:25:04.31\00:25:05.68 can never be loved again and often times people will 00:25:05.71\00:25:08.39 generalize a very negative experience like that to the rest 00:25:08.43\00:25:11.10 of their lives. But you can say to them, you know, is that true? 00:25:11.14\00:25:14.15 And then you can start to work with that and then you realize 00:25:14.18\00:25:16.89 well no. Just because this person rejected me doesn't mean 00:25:16.93\00:25:19.75 that I can never have another relationship. What am I saying 00:25:19.79\00:25:22.38 about everybody else who's been divorced if I say that about 00:25:22.41\00:25:25.08 myself. And they can start to deal with their own thinking. 00:25:25.11\00:25:27.71 Just because one spouse may have had an adulterous affair doesn't 00:25:27.74\00:25:32.78 mean that everybody of the opposite sex is untrustworthy. 00:25:32.82\00:25:36.12 Then the replacement though I think as a Christian what you're 00:25:36.16\00:25:42.32 helping people to do is to see the replacement thoughts 00:25:42.36\00:25:46.18 should line up with the word of God. 00:25:46.21\00:25:48.89 That's right, that's right. Amen You got it. 00:25:48.92\00:25:51.79 That is so exciting. Let's run through you FAR again because 00:25:51.82\00:25:56.61 we've just got about a minute to encapsulate this. 00:25:56.65\00:25:59.33 First you find what it is that you're thinking. What are you 00:25:59.37\00:26:03.12 thinking about this negative event. That's going to take some 00:26:03.15\00:26:06.27 work. It's going to take some effort. You're going to really 00:26:06.30\00:26:09.99 sort of grill yourself and you are going to have to try to get 00:26:10.03\00:26:13.06 under the layers and some of these thoughts are actually kind 00:26:13.10\00:26:16.37 of unconscious thoughts. But once you identify those thoughts 00:26:16.40\00:26:19.81 once you found those negative thoughts then you argue with the 00:26:19.85\00:26:23.12 thought then like you said you start to engage in a reasoning 00:26:23.15\00:26:26.23 process with yourself. Hold yourself accountable for your 00:26:26.26\00:26:29.27 own thought life. Then when you finally have convinced yourself 00:26:29.30\00:26:32.78 that this is not the way to think about this negative event 00:26:32.82\00:26:36.22 then you replace that misbelief with the truth which is going to 00:26:36.26\00:26:40.59 be nuanced, it's going to be detailed. It's also going to 00:26:40.63\00:26:44.93 contain the negative elements. It's not going to be Pollyanna. 00:26:44.97\00:26:47.51 But it's going to be more whole and it's not going to be 00:26:47.55\00:26:50.44 negatively biased. Then you'll find that your mood will lift. 00:26:50.48\00:26:53.59 Thank you so much Jennifer for being with us again today. 00:26:53.62\00:26:56.70 It's been a pleasure. We have enjoyed having you. 00:26:56.73\00:26:59.21 You know for those of you at home 2 Corinthians 10:4 and 5 00:26:59.24\00:27:02.96 God isn't just saying take your thought captive and not telling 00:27:02.99\00:27:07.52 you how to do it. He starts off by saying, The weapons of our 00:27:07.55\00:27:11.70 warfare are not carnal but they are mighty to the pulling down 00:27:11.74\00:27:15.67 of strongholds. Whatever the devil's trying to set up in here 00:27:15.70\00:27:19.60 and casting down any vain argument, anything that would 00:27:19.64\00:27:23.58 exalt itself against the knowledge of God. So what I 00:27:23.61\00:27:27.63 want to encourage you to do, you don't have to see a 00:27:27.66\00:27:31.61 behavioral therapist to do this, just get into the word even and 00:27:31.64\00:27:36.28 have the Lord give you promises and show his truth to you that 00:27:36.32\00:27:40.22 you can replace some of that negative stinkin' thinking with. 00:27:40.25\00:27:44.12 Well our time is all gone already. We just ask in the 00:27:44.16\00:27:47.73 name of Jesus that his grace will be with you, that the 00:27:47.76\00:27:50.98 Father's love will be with you and the fellowship of the 00:27:51.01\00:27:55.28 Holy Spirit will be with you throughout today and always. 00:27:55.31\00:27:59.54