We all have, or preferably should have, a vitally absorbing long-term, creative interest. REBT philosophy teaches that vitally absorbing interests make our lives maximally pleasurable and meaningful. Such immersive interests also probably help us maintain our emotional health as well. It is usually the case that our most personally meaningful goals and plans require sustained effort over a long time. They provide structure to our lives. Achievement of these goals often rests on other critical characteristics. Regardless of your creative pursuits and long-term goals, these different characteristics are essential factors in your success. As psychologists tend to go, Dr. Albert Ellis was a paragon of success. In a journal interview, the writer asked him to reflect on what factors contributed to his professional success (Broder, 2001). Below is his answer:
“Well, several things, not necessarily in order. First of all, there is persistence. That is, I persist at what I do. I get an idea, and I keep working at it. Get more evidence and change it and presumably improve it. So along with that persistence may be flexibility. I start with an idea, and then I keep revising it. Of course, a big thing that many people don’t do that I think is by far more important than most people is that I take criticism and take it seriously—if it’s criticism of what I’m doing. But if it’s criticism of me personally, then I don’t take it seriously.”
Today’s essay focuses on how Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) can help you cultivate the characteristics that will help you succeed at your long-term life goals. As articulated by Ellis, those factors include the required persistence, openness, commitment to ongoing improvement, flexibility, acceptance of criticism, ability to tolerate unfair personal attacks and putdowns, avoidance of procrastination, and absence of a fear of failure.
REBT theory posits that rigid and extreme attitudes lead to self-defeating emotional and behavioral reactions. People who disturb themselves as they pursue meaningful life goals are less likely to possess and display the key ingredients for succeeding at their goals. Unhealthy feelings of depression, hopelessness, helplessness, despair, anger, anxiety, and shame are likely to come about, leading to self-defeating behaviors like procrastination, avoidance of steady effort, and the abandonment of one’s goals. REBT theory argues that self-helping, creative, and persistent behavior is more likely to occur when we hold flexible, realistic, and non-extreme attitudes as we pursue these important goals and encounter adversity along the way. These practical and self-helping attitudes will lead to healthy feelings of disappointment and concern, which will reflect our acknowledgment of setbacks and criticism. However, these healthy negative feelings help us to feel appropriately motivated to persist, remain open to improvement, accept helpful criticism and avoid procrastination due to fear of failure.
Below are a few rigid and extreme attitudes that will undermine your ability to succeed at your long-term goals. First, question the functional utility of these attitudes and also attempt to disprove them with the available evidence. Doing this will help you to see that they are dysfunctional and false to the facts. Learn to ask challenging questions about the rigid and extreme attitudes you hold and identify as part of your problem. REBT advocates this type of inquisitive reflection. It also is important to create healthy alternative attitudes that you can use to replace your self-defeating attitudes. In therapy, I teach this type of questioning, which I refer to as disputing. Due to wishing to avoid a very lengthy essay on today’s topic, I will skip the disputing process and jump ahead to the outcome of disputing typical self-defeating attitudes which will undermine your long-term goals. Such questioning would lead to and articulate the healthy alternative attitude you could adopt. Once you create the new attitude, the next step is to build conviction in it and force yourself to act upon it to cultivate the characteristics that will enable you to succeed at your important life goals.
Self-defeating rigid attitude: I must achieve my goals in the timeframe I think is reasonable for success. I cannot bear the extended period my goals are requiring.
Healthy, realistic self-helping attitude: I wish I achieved my goals in the timeframe I desire, but sadly this is not occurring and does not have to happen. My plans often require more time than I would like. This extended time is hard to bear but not unbearable. However, I know the goal is worth achieving, so I will choose to keep at the destination and do what I can to make my dream come true. I will unconditionally accept the terms of life.
Self-defeating, rigid attitude: It is too hard to be open to criticism and committed to ongoing improvement as I pursue my goal.
Healthy, realistic self-helping attitude: I wish it were easier to be open to criticism and committed to improvement as I pursue my goal, but it is not and does not have to be so. It is hard to remain open to criticism and committed to improvement, but I can bear the discomfort and effort ongoing improvement requires, and it is worth withstanding as this is how I will succeed at long-term goals. If I do not get down on myself as a person for receiving criticism, it will make it easier to appreciate the criticism’s value. Keep your ego out of the process of achieving your long-term goals. I will unconditionally accept myself despite this valid criticism.
Self-defeating, rigid attitude: Flexibility absolutely must not be required to succeed at my goals.
Healthy, realistic self-helping attitude: I wish life did not have leverage over me and make flexibility a requirement in the success of my goals, but sadly it does, and things do not have to be otherwise. I will unconditionally accept life as it is and not rigidly demand that I not have to adapt to life to succeed at my long-term goals. When we have a strong desire to succeed, the flexibility to adapt is challenging but never impossible to maintain.
Self-defeating, rigid attitude: People must not make personal attacks out of envy for my progress.
Healthy, realistic self-helping attitude: I wish people did not personally attack me for my goals and progress, but sadly, people will do this to me, and the universe permits such mean-spirited behavior to occur. When this happens, I can choose to ignore it, see it as unhelpful and mean-spirited but never unbearable. I can choose to unconditionally accept myself even when others attack me rightly or wrongly. I will not define myself as a person in terms of what others say or think about me. I will also unconditionally accept the person attacking me but reject their invalid and unfair criticism and personal attacks. I will not create unhealthy anger in response to these attacks which only serves to rob me of energy over the long run.
Self-defeating, rigid attitude: I must not look foolish and fail at my cherished goal.
Healthy, realistic self-helping attitude: Charlie Chaplin famously said, “It takes courage to make a fool of yourself.” If I spend years sticking with a goal and fail, that will not make me a fool. If others think I have wasted my time, I do not need their approval for how I live my life. I will choose to accept myself whether I succeed or fail. I will pursue my goal and keep at it because it gives me pleasure and my life meaning. If I succeed, it will not make me a great person, even though the joy of success will be pretty sweet. I will keep at it knowing full well life often requires courage, as well as considerably more effort and time than we wish it did to accomplish our long-term cherished life goals.
Self-defeating, rigid attitude: I need a guarantee that in the end, I will achieve my goal.
Healthy, realistic self-helping attitude: Life does not work this way, and guarantees of success before years of hard work never exist. Success requires many ingredients, including a willingness to fail after considerable effort. I wish I could be sure I will succeed but do not have to have such certainty. I will control what I can control and accept what I cannot. If I fail in the end, there will be some degree of satisfaction in having made my best effort to achieve my long-term goal. I will never be a failure for failing.
REBT is a discipline of the mind aimed at helping you make your life maximally pleasurable and meaningful. Meaningful goals usually are very time-consuming and require a great deal of effort. REBT philosophy can help you cultivate the important characteristics Ellis thought helped him transform the paradigm of psychotherapy when he originated REBT. These same characteristics will increase the probability of achieving your meaningful, long-term life goals. REBT works when you work it!
Broder, M. S. (2001). DR. ALBERT ELLIS—IN HIS OWN WORDS—ON SUCCESS. Journal of Rational-Emotive and Cognitive-Behavior Therapy, 19(2), 77-88. doi:10.1023/a:1011167121024
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