BEHAVIOURAL TESTING
Now we are heading into the part of the therapy that will be testing your beliefs. First you write down the belief and how much you believe in it. Then write down the upcoming situation. Then you need to identify exactly what you fear will happen. Next you will need to define what you will be looking out for that will confirm this belief or disconfirm it. After the experiment you will need to write down the outcome and then your conclusions about the event. Finally re-rate your power in the belief. This is how to do it on paper.
Belief: People think I'm a loser (80%)
Situation: Going to a John's party on Saturday
Prediction: People will talk behind my back and snicker and then everyone there will all think the same and laugh and walk away from me.
Confirmation/Discomfirmation: People standing and looking over at me and laughing, people whispering near me and snickering, people looking uncomfortable around me, people being friendly with me, people asking me to join them.
Outcome: People did laugh but not about me or anything to do with me, I got along with everyone there and nobody behaved uncomfortably around me. Things turned out much better than I originally thught they would.
Conclusions: People are not as mean as I thought they were or as readily to humiliate me as I believe. Most people have much more important and better things to discuss other than things they don't like about me.
Re-Rate Belief: 45%
You may also want to write down how the belief has been modified. The example used may go something like this.
Most people do not think I'm a loser. Some might, but most don't. There is simply no basis for them to think that - and I understand that now.
You may very well have to test out beliefs again and again to get them to reduce to the point where no more anxiety is aroused.
This behavioural testing will also help you build new, healthier beliefs in place of the old ones. You should be moderate when suggesting a new belief for it to work. Again, you need to look for evidence to support the new belief. When trying to build up a new positive belief you don't need the feared prediction if you don't want to because there may very well be situations where you don't get anxious but can still use them for building up the new belief.
You can do it like this on paper.
Belief: I'm ok, and some people think I'm alright (20%)
Situation: Going to the pub for a drink with the people from work.
Confirmation/Disconfirmation: People talking to me, people wanting to know more about me, people offering to buy me drinks, some people not noticing I was even there.
Outcome: Many people talked to me and we all got along quite well. Though some people seemed like they didn't care I was there.
Conclusions: Most people like me for who I am and don't really care about any of my flaws once a good conversation gets going.
Re-rate belief: 55%
Remember you must reduce self-consciousness and drop all safety behaviours in order to give yourself the best chance at overcoming social anxiety.
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CHANGING ASSUMPTIONS & RULES
The way to change a rule or assumption is obvious; you simply decide to alter the behaviour that you do or follow. Let's say you assume you need to be entertaining in order to be accepted you will decide to just hold back, or maybe you feel you should never have a different opinion to the majority which would be a rule, so you would decide to voice a different opinion. You first identify your assumptions and rules, how much you believe in them and the behaviours associated with them. Then you predict what will happen. Then you decide to try something different instead of the old behaviour. Then evaluate what happens and draw your conclusions. Then re-rate you belief in it. Do it on paper like this:
Assumption: People don't like me when I am not amusing them (100%)
Old Behaviour: Always trying to come up with ways to make people laugh
Prediction: People will tell me to go away
New behaviour: Stop making jokes and be more quiet
Evaluation: People didn't express any dislike and still treated me as they do when I did make jokes in the past.
Conclusions: It's ok to not always try to be the life of the party and entertain others.
Re-rate assumption: 50%
You can alter a rule or assumption in the same way you did with beliefs if you want to rather than do it this way. It up to you how you do it.
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To finish up, remember all those things you avoided and all those situations you used safety behaviours in. Put them on a scale from easiest to hardest and begin working on them one by one. You will feel a boost in confidence with each success, and this will give you the strength to move on to the next challenge. Don't give up!
Here is a summary of how things procede with this method which is from the Bulter book OVERCOMING SOCIAL ANXIETY AND SHYNESS
1. Learn the connection between environment, thought, feeling, behaviour and bodily reactions. Learn about cognitive distortions. Do this or else you will be wasting your time.
2. Use the mood diary and capture all your negative thoughts in a situation. Find evidence for and against each thought. Suggest alternatives and re-rate your mood.
3. Learn to reduce self-consciousness.
4. Identify and practice dropping safety behaviours
5. Begin doing things you have been avoiding
6. Uncover beliefs, assumptions & rules
7. Challenge them using cognitive techniques
8. Go out and test your beliefs, assumptions and rules starting from easiest to hardest with all safety behaviours dropped and self-consciousness reduced. Repeat this step for as many beliefs, assumption and rules as many times as you need to. It may very well take months to see even a little bit of change. If you really feel cbt isn't working try compassionate cbt and mindfulness since they force you to react at the emotional level. Meta-cbt also is providing even better results than cbt for anxiety disorders so that may be worth looking into. Other than that the only other advice I can offer is to start building up a life for yourself after you have begun fixing your social anxiety.
I hopefully should have the meta-cbt post ready within the next month or even less.
Now we are heading into the part of the therapy that will be testing your beliefs. First you write down the belief and how much you believe in it. Then write down the upcoming situation. Then you need to identify exactly what you fear will happen. Next you will need to define what you will be looking out for that will confirm this belief or disconfirm it. After the experiment you will need to write down the outcome and then your conclusions about the event. Finally re-rate your power in the belief. This is how to do it on paper.
Belief: People think I'm a loser (80%)
Situation: Going to a John's party on Saturday
Prediction: People will talk behind my back and snicker and then everyone there will all think the same and laugh and walk away from me.
Confirmation/Discomfirmation: People standing and looking over at me and laughing, people whispering near me and snickering, people looking uncomfortable around me, people being friendly with me, people asking me to join them.
Outcome: People did laugh but not about me or anything to do with me, I got along with everyone there and nobody behaved uncomfortably around me. Things turned out much better than I originally thught they would.
Conclusions: People are not as mean as I thought they were or as readily to humiliate me as I believe. Most people have much more important and better things to discuss other than things they don't like about me.
Re-Rate Belief: 45%
You may also want to write down how the belief has been modified. The example used may go something like this.
Most people do not think I'm a loser. Some might, but most don't. There is simply no basis for them to think that - and I understand that now.
You may very well have to test out beliefs again and again to get them to reduce to the point where no more anxiety is aroused.
This behavioural testing will also help you build new, healthier beliefs in place of the old ones. You should be moderate when suggesting a new belief for it to work. Again, you need to look for evidence to support the new belief. When trying to build up a new positive belief you don't need the feared prediction if you don't want to because there may very well be situations where you don't get anxious but can still use them for building up the new belief.
You can do it like this on paper.
Belief: I'm ok, and some people think I'm alright (20%)
Situation: Going to the pub for a drink with the people from work.
Confirmation/Disconfirmation: People talking to me, people wanting to know more about me, people offering to buy me drinks, some people not noticing I was even there.
Outcome: Many people talked to me and we all got along quite well. Though some people seemed like they didn't care I was there.
Conclusions: Most people like me for who I am and don't really care about any of my flaws once a good conversation gets going.
Re-rate belief: 55%
Remember you must reduce self-consciousness and drop all safety behaviours in order to give yourself the best chance at overcoming social anxiety.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CHANGING ASSUMPTIONS & RULES
The way to change a rule or assumption is obvious; you simply decide to alter the behaviour that you do or follow. Let's say you assume you need to be entertaining in order to be accepted you will decide to just hold back, or maybe you feel you should never have a different opinion to the majority which would be a rule, so you would decide to voice a different opinion. You first identify your assumptions and rules, how much you believe in them and the behaviours associated with them. Then you predict what will happen. Then you decide to try something different instead of the old behaviour. Then evaluate what happens and draw your conclusions. Then re-rate you belief in it. Do it on paper like this:
Assumption: People don't like me when I am not amusing them (100%)
Old Behaviour: Always trying to come up with ways to make people laugh
Prediction: People will tell me to go away
New behaviour: Stop making jokes and be more quiet
Evaluation: People didn't express any dislike and still treated me as they do when I did make jokes in the past.
Conclusions: It's ok to not always try to be the life of the party and entertain others.
Re-rate assumption: 50%
You can alter a rule or assumption in the same way you did with beliefs if you want to rather than do it this way. It up to you how you do it.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To finish up, remember all those things you avoided and all those situations you used safety behaviours in. Put them on a scale from easiest to hardest and begin working on them one by one. You will feel a boost in confidence with each success, and this will give you the strength to move on to the next challenge. Don't give up!
Here is a summary of how things procede with this method which is from the Bulter book OVERCOMING SOCIAL ANXIETY AND SHYNESS
1. Learn the connection between environment, thought, feeling, behaviour and bodily reactions. Learn about cognitive distortions. Do this or else you will be wasting your time.
2. Use the mood diary and capture all your negative thoughts in a situation. Find evidence for and against each thought. Suggest alternatives and re-rate your mood.
3. Learn to reduce self-consciousness.
4. Identify and practice dropping safety behaviours
5. Begin doing things you have been avoiding
6. Uncover beliefs, assumptions & rules
7. Challenge them using cognitive techniques
8. Go out and test your beliefs, assumptions and rules starting from easiest to hardest with all safety behaviours dropped and self-consciousness reduced. Repeat this step for as many beliefs, assumption and rules as many times as you need to. It may very well take months to see even a little bit of change. If you really feel cbt isn't working try compassionate cbt and mindfulness since they force you to react at the emotional level. Meta-cbt also is providing even better results than cbt for anxiety disorders so that may be worth looking into. Other than that the only other advice I can offer is to start building up a life for yourself after you have begun fixing your social anxiety.
I hopefully should have the meta-cbt post ready within the next month or even less.