In 1956 Albert Ellis gave an important address at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association. In this seminal address, he outlined twelve ideas that cause emotional disturbance and human misery. Until this time, Freud’s approach, and variants of orthodox Freudian theory, dominated psychotherapy. Ellis introduced a new paradigm that was to usher in what we now know as cognitive behavior therapy (CBT).
This email is the fourth of twelve successive Intermittent Reinforcement email messages. In each of these messages, I will quote the twelve ideas identified by Ellis in his 1956 address, one at a time, and show how they are still relevant today and further discuss them. If these ideas are corrected, you are likely to experience a healthier emotional life.
Idea #4: The idea that much human unhappiness is externally caused and is forced on one by outside people and events – instead of the idea that virtually all human unhappiness is caused or sustained by the view one takes of things rather than the things themselves.
This single idea may be Ellis’s most important idea. We now refer to it as the Principle of Emotional Responsibility. It is an empowering idea. This idea is why REBT rightfully should be considered a form of cognitive-behavior therapy. Here we see Ellis way back in 1956 being a CBT pioneer and showing the mental health profession that people disturb themselves with their crooked, rigid, and extreme attitudes, beliefs, and thoughts. Ellis showed us that we anger ourselves, depress ourselves, shame ourselves, and guilt ourselves. We make ourselves anxious, panicked, and worried by how we think about adversity and uncertainty. Emotional upset does not happen to us. We upset ourselves by our philosophical view of how things should be.
Other therapy schools do not emphasize how emotional disturbance is our responsibility and encourage us to take sufficient ownership of our dysfunctional emotional and behavioral reactions. Psychotherapists will often focus on what happened to you and how you felt rather than on the attitude you took towards what happened to you. In REBT, we do not deny that bad events occur. Adversity happens to all of us. Adversity is a part of life. Perhaps the only fair thing about life is that it is difficult and unfair to all of us in one way or another and to a greater or lesser extent. When we encounter adversity, fallible humans quickly demand and command that such misfortune does not occur. We do not accept reality as it is. Have you ever wondered why some people handle problems better than others? Those who respond to adversity well do because of how they think, the philosophy they hold towards the burdens, disappointments, frustrations, and injustices that they encounter in life. Our philosophical assumptions about and attitudes towards life profoundly influence our emotional life regardless of the nature of the adversity we face.
In REBT philosophy, we teach that adversity is merely an opportunity for emotional disturbance and unhappiness. However, our philosophical attitudes towards adversity largely determine whether we have an unhealthy, self-harming emotional and behavioral reaction or a healthy and self-helping emotional and behavioral reaction. Ellis emphasized the choice we have to determine our feelings and behavior when we encounter adversity. He also taught us how we could then choose to change our emotional reaction once we have disturbed ourselves. We can actively pick a self-helping negative emotion to experience (e.g., concern, sorrow, disappointment, or constructive anger) or to default to blaming other people for making us and keeping us disturbed.
Ellis taught that humans who have healthy emotional reactions take responsibility for their emotional responses to adversity. As I see it, when a person fully embraces the Principle of Emotional Responsibility, they empower themselves.They no longer are a slave to circumstances. They are liberated and determine their emotional course in life. They see and accept that at the core of their disturbance lie three main rigid ideas. These rigid ideas are:
- I must do perfectly well.
- You must treat me as I want you to treat me.
- Life must be as I want it to be.
When a person takes responsibility for their emotions and notices that they are upsetting themselves, they immediately begin to transform their unhealthy negative emotions into healthy negative ones. They start this self-helping emotional transformation process by seeking to determine which of the three core rigid ideas is responsible for their disturbance. Once this rigid idea is identified, they think critically about the rigid idea and show themselves how it is not consistent with observable evidence. They also acknowledge that they are harming themselves and will not function optimally by holding their rigid attitude. These reflections help them to transform their unhealthy negative emotions into healthy negative emotions that then enable them to change what they can change, accept what they cannot, and have some degree of happiness in their life despite the ongoing presence of the adversity. In a nutshell, they essentially choose and push themselves to adopt one or more of the three rational ideas found below:
- I want to do perfectly well but do not have to do so. The universe allows me to error as I am a fallible human. I will learn from my mistakes and not disturb myself about the consequences of my mistakes. I will address those consequences to remedy them if I can and accept their existence if I cannot.
- I want you to treat me as I want you to treat me, but I clearly see you do not have to do so. The universe does not compel you to be nice to me. I also see that humans often do what they want and not what I want, and when they do, I have a choice. I can disturb myself by demanding they be nice to me or accept that people have free will and are fallible and will sometimes misbehave in their relationship with me. Too bad, I live with fallible, independent humans who do not always do as I want. I can accept others even if I do not like how they sometimes act towards me.
- I want life to be as I want it to be easy, safe, comfortable, predictable, and fair, but unfortunately, there is no universal law that makes life as I want it to be. Sometimes life will be rough, and I have a choice. I can feel sorry for myself, whine and complain how hard I have it, change what I can change, accept what I cannot, and choose to enjoy life to some extent despite the uncertainty, hardships, and injustices I encounter. Much of my happiness comes from within me and the philosophy I have.
In my view, self-responsibility for one’s emotional upset is in short supply these days. We too often fail to teach our children sensible ideas like “sticks and stones will break my bones, but names will never hurt me.” Many of us are easily insulted by other people rather than refusing to be insulted when an insult is hurled our way. I certainly want a kinder, gentler world, but my wish will not transform the world. The universe is indifferent to my wishes. As someone who accepts and implements REBT’s philosophy, I choose to accept reality as it is and not demand I live in utopia. This is not to say I do not do what I can to make things better. However, I acknowledge my limitations. With these assumptions and rational philosophy, it seems best for me to manage my own emotions rather than count on people and life to treat me nicely. Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy’s Principle of Emotional Responsibility liberates those who adopt it. What is stopping you from adopting this useful philosophy?
Saturday Rational Emotive Behavioral Zoom Conversation hour 9 AM Eastern, 1 PM GMT, 1 PM UTC:
If you enjoyed and profited from this piece, you may also wish to attend my Saturday Zoom Conversation hour. Participation is not required, and you may simply observe my conversation with the volunteer. This Zoom meeting is an opportunity to watch me discuss implementing these philosophical ideas with a volunteer who elects to share a real problem. These Saturday Zoom Conversation hours are free of charge to attend. You can select to volunteer, or you may choose to merely witness the conversation and then submit any questions you have about Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy. Go here to learn how to receive the Zoom Invitation:
https://rebtdoctor.com/rational-emotive-behavioral-weekly-zoom-conversation-hour.html