How To Control Your Anxiety Before It Controls You
Description
Learn to manage your anxiety with this classic self-help book from a respected pioneer of psychotherapy. From social anxiety to phobias to post-traumatic stress disorder, sources of anxiety in daily life are numerous, and can have a powerful impact on your future. By following the rules of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), created by world renowned therapist Dr. Albert Ellis, you can stop anxiety in its tracks if you will admit this important fact: Things and people do not make you anxious. You do. Your unrealistic expectations produce your needless anxiety. Yet not all anxiety is needless . . . Healthy anxiety can ward off dangers and make you aware of negative things that you can change. Unhealthy anxiety inhibits you from enjoying everyday activities and relationships, causes you to perform poorly, and blocks your creativity. Using the easy-to-master, proven precepts of REBT, this classic book not only helps you distinguish between healthy and unhealthy anxiety, but teaches you how to: • Understand and dispute the irrational beliefs that make you anxious
• Use a variety of exercises, including rational coping self-statements, reframing, problem-solving methods, and Unconditional Self-Acceptance (USA), to control your anxiety
• Apply over two hundred maxims to control your anxious thinking as well as your bodily reactions to anxiety . . . and much more, including examples from dozens of cases Dr. Ellis treated successfully. Now you can overcome the crippling effects of anxiety-and increase your prospects for success, pleasure, and happiness at home and in the workplace. "No individual-not even Freud himself-has had a greater impact on modern psychotherapy." -Psychology Today
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Content
- Intro
- Also by
- Title Page
- Dedication
- Table of Contents
- Foreword
- Acknowledgments
- 1 - Why I Am Convinced That You Can Control Your Anxiety Before It Controls You
- HOW I OVERCAME MY PUBLIC SPEAKING ANXIETY
- HOW I OVERCAME MY SOCIAL ANXIETY
- 2 - What Anxiety Is and How It Often Controls You
- HEALTHY AND UNHEALTHY ANXIETY
- 3 - Luckily, Most of Your Anxiety Is Self-Created and Can Be Uncreated
- A CASE OF JOB INTERVIEW ANXIETY
- 4 - Irrational Beliefs That Make You Anxious
- HOW YOU CREATE ACHIEVEMENT ANXIETY
- DEADLY DEMANDS AND MUSTS THAT LEAD TO ANXIETY
- 5 - Disputing Your Anxiety-Creating Irrational Beliefs
- ANXIETY ABOUT LOVE RELATIONSHIPS
- REALISTIC OR EMPIRICAL METHODS OF DISPUTING IRRATIONAL BELIEFS
- LOGICAL METHODS OF DISPUTING IRRATIONAL BELIEFS
- PRACTICAL AND PRAGMATIC METHODS OF DISPUTING IRRATIONAL BELIEFS
- 6 - Using Rational Coping Self-Statements
- A CASE OF PERFORMANCE ANXIETY
- 7 - Using Positive Visualization and Modeling
- ANOTHER CASE OF PUBLIC SPEAKING ANXIETY
- USING MODELING METHODS
- 8 - Using Cost-Benefit Analysis to Control Your Anxiety
- A CASE OF DRIVING ANXIETY
- 9 - Using Educational Methods to Control Your Anxiety
- USING PSYCHOEDUCATIONAL MATERIALS
- USING TEACHING AND PROSELYTIZING METHODS
- A CASE OF WRITING ANXIETY
- 10 - Using Relaxation and Cognitive Distraction Methods
- USING COGNITIVE DISTRACTION
- 11 - Using Reframing Methods
- A CASE OF ANXIETY ABOUT CRITICISM
- 12 - Using Problem-Solving Methods to Control Your Anxiety
- A CASE OF ANXIETY ABOUT MAKING PERSONAL DECISIONS
- 13 - Using Unconditional Self-Acceptance (USA)
- THE EXISTENTIAL SOLUTION TO UNCONDITIONAL SELF-ACCEPTANCE
- THE ELEGANT SOLUTION TO UNCONDITIONAL SELF-ACCEPTANCE
- A CASE OF EGO-ANXIETY
- 14 - Using Unconditional Acceptance of Others to Control Your Anxiety
- CONTROLLING YOUR ANGER BEFORE IT CONTROLS YOU
- USING UNCONDITIONAL OTHER-ACCEPTANCE (UOA)
- A CASE OF ANGER AND SOCIAL ANXIETY
- 15 - Using Rational Emotive Imagery
- A CASE OF PANIC ABOUT IMPORTANT FAILURE
- 16 - Using Shame-Attacking Exercises to Control Your Anxiety
- A CASE OF ANXIETY-INDUCED RESTRICTED LIVING
- 17 - Some Forceful and Dramatic Methods of Controlling Your Anxiety
- SEXUAL ANXIETY AND INADEQUACY
- A CASE OF SEXUAL PANIC
- SOME FORCEFUL AND DRAMATIC METHODS OF DISPUTING IRRATIONAL BELIEFS
- 18 - Firmly Convincing Yourself of Your Rational and Self-Helping Beliefs
- A CASE OF PANIC WHEN PRESENTING AT STAFF MEETINGS
- 19 - Using a Sense of Humor to Control Your Anxiety
- USING RATIONAL HUMOROUS SONGS
- 20 - Using Exposure and Behavioral Desensitization
- A CASE OF SUBWAY RIDING ANXIETY AND PANIC ABOUT PANIC
- A CASE OF ANXIETY ABOUT SUBMITTING TERM PAPERS
- 21 - Tolerating and Staying in Anxiety-Provoking Situations
- A CASE OF ANXIETY ABOUT CRITICISM AT WORK
- 22 - Using Reinforcement Methods to Control Your Anxiety
- A CASE OF ANXIETY ABOUT SHOWING COMPETENCY
- 23 - Using Penalties to Control Your Anxiety
- 24 - Using the Method of Fixed Role-playing to Control Your Anxiety
- A CASE OF ANXIETY ABOUT TRYING FOR A BETTER JOB
- 25 - What About Biology and the Use of Medications?
- 26 - A Remarkably Efficient Way to Control Your Anxiety Before It Controls You
- 27 - 104 Rational Maxims to Control My Anxious Thinking
- MINIMIZING MY ABSOLUTISTIC MUSTS, SHOULDS, OUGHTS, AND DEMANDS AND THE IRRATIONAL BELIEFS THAT GO WITH THEM
- DEALING WITH CATASTROPHIZING THOUGHTS ABOUT THE FUTURE
- REBT INSIGHTS THAT WILL SIGNIFICANTLY HELP ME
- APPLYING A COST-BENEFIT ANALYSIS TO WHAT I DO
- OVERCOMING MY DIRE NEED FOR CERTAINTY AND PERFECTIONISM
- HOW I CAN USE MODELING METHODS
- USING PROBLEM-SOLVING METHODS
- USING FAITH, HOPE, PURPOSIVENESS, AND CARING FOR ONESELF AND OTHERS
- HOW I CAN REFRAME SOME ADVERSITIES
- USING IMAGERY TO CONTROL MY ANXIETY
- USING DISTRACTION METHODS OF INTERRUPTING MY ANXIETY
- SOME ALTERNATIVE RATIONAL BELIEFS I CAN USE
- 28 - 62 Rational Maxims to Control My Anxious Feelings and My Bodily Reactions to Anxiety
- WORKING TO ACHIEVE UNCONDITIONAL SELF-ACCEPTANCE (USA)
- WORKING TO ACHIEVE UNCONDITIONAL OTHER-ACCEPTANCE (UOA)
- TAKING RESPONSIBILITY AS A MEMBER OF MY SOCIAL GROUP
- ENHANCING MY SOCIAL SKILLS AND PLEASURES
- USING SUPPORT AND REASSURANCE
- FOCUSING ON THE PLEASURES AND GOOD ASPECTS OF LIFE
- WORKING TO CREATE HEALTHY EMOTIONS
- USING A SENSE OF HUMOR
- ACKNOWLEDGING MY BIOLOGICAL AND PHYSICAL PROPENSITIES AND LIMITATIONS
- 29 - 65 Rational Maxims to Help Me Act Against My Discomfort Anxiety and My Irrational Fears
- ACQUIRING HIGH-FRUSTRATION TOLERANCE
- USING HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENTS
- USING EXPOSURE OR IN VIVO DESENSITIZATION
- ACTING TO EXPRESS MYSELF AND ASSERT MYSELF
- ACTING, ACTING, ACTING AGAINST MY ANXIETIES
- Selected References
- About the Authors
- Copyright Page
