Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

Cognitive Behavior Therapy and Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy I believe, are great views and approaches to counseling and psychotherapy. I believe that we have the ability to change our feelings and behavior based on our own thinking. I believe that our incoherent beliefs about ourselves are the foundation of our emotional problems. Whenever I counsel someone in any job I might receive, Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) and Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) will be the most used approach I would take towards a client. I am a believer of Jesus Christ and I also believe that He has the power to change our feelings, behavior and thinking as well. In this paper I will discuss how I will use CBT and REBT while integrated with my faith while counseling clients. I will go over human nature, the role of the environment in personality development, the model of functionality, and personality change.

The first area discussed is our human nature. Are people essentially good, evil or neutral? I believe people are born neutral. I believe we are brought into this world sinful, and evil.

“For I was born a sinner- yes, from the moment my mother conceived me.” (Psalm 51:5 New Living Translation)

We were born into sin and evil thoughts, but a majority of people, I believe are neutral. We were born sinful, yes but our environment has good and bad in it, which influences our thinking and behavior. Which then balances out to neutral. We have both evil and good in us, and it is our choice to pick which we will live out and act out. (Tan 247) I believe there are some motives and tendencies that all human beings have in common. I believe we all have a human nature and desire for sex, communication, feeding, knowledge, and skills. (Human nature 1) Those are identified “human universals”, or characteristics that are shared by all people everywhere. Our personalities are unique and personalized, but I believe that there are core desires and needs that we all have in common. We may differ on our views and opinions of each universal desire, but the core value and desire is what is common.

The second subject we will go over is the role of the environment in personality development. I believe that our social environment has a lot to do with how we make our personalities out to be. The people you are raised by have a great influence on your personality. The majority of our brain is formed in early age, which also shapes ones personality. So if you are raised by people who believe in good, and do good then you are more likely to look at life in that way. If you are raised by people who believe in more bad than good, then the same applies and you are more likely to look at life in that way. As humans, we grow up and meet new people, cultures, and environments which greatly can further shape ones personality. I believe we can alter our personality. There are some key fundamentals in each person’s personality that cannot be changed, such as disorders, and mental illnesses. But for the majority, we have the ability to alter our personalities based on the environments we surround ourselves in. For example, personally I was raised by two good and wholesome parents. Who both believed in Jesus and set that as our example for everything. When I was younger and spent most of my time with my family, and in church I was in a good an uplifting environment, which reflected into my personality which was always uplifting. When I went into high school I was in a new culture and around new people that I have never come in contact with before. I was communicating with people who viewed and lived their lives our in more of a negative, and evil way. So once that became the majority of my environment, my personality started to alter. I started to not be as uplifting, but negative. And I started to not always have the desire to do well, but to do bad. My personality and behaviors were changing based on my environment.

"bad company corrupts good character." (1 Corinthians 15:33b)

I then by the grace of God, changed my personality even more when I started to surround myself with good people, family, and Jesus. It was when I changed my environment back to good, and wholesome things that my personality fully developed into full understanding of life, and how it works. I firmly believe that our environment and culture sets a tone to the development of our personality.

The next topic researched was the model of functionality. I believe that our mental health and functionality all comes from our thinking. If we think healthy thoughts, we will have functional and rational thinking. If we think unhealthy thoughts, we will have dysfunctional and irrational thinking. If we want to have good mental health then we must help ourselves out by thinking rational. Think of life for what it really is, and what makes you happy. It will have you feeling happy. Think of life as depressing, and not going your