Summary:
- Discipline your mind to avoid confusing empirically supported natural laws with recommendations, preferences, and good ideas.
- Confusing one of your preferences as a natural law that you and others must follow will likely lead to emotional disturbance when your preferences are unmet.
- Seek to take your rigid, dogmatic, anti-scientific ideas and transform them into solid preferences. Restate the content of your rigid attitude as a strong preference, wish, or desire to attain a psychologically healthy state of mind.
- Incentivize yourself and others to fulfill your preferences. REBT does not encourage resignation.
- Avoid confusing healthy philosophical acceptance with unhealthy resignation.
- Hold preferences for civil behavior from others and optimal functioning for yourself, but see that the universe does not compel you and others to fulfill these preferences.
- Acknowledge that a strong preference is flexible and is not synonymous with flimsy.