[form] LEARNING ABOUT RATIONAL EMOTIVE PHILOSOPHY Each letter of the word L - E - A - R - N stands for an RET idea. These ideas together make up the general philosophy of problem solving using rational emotive methods. Your Name please: [text,r_name,30] Email: [text,r_email,30] LESSON 3 Expanding on the - E - of LEARN E = Every human is error prone - including you! =========================================================== The first step in problem solving is to clearly define the problem. REBT suggests that you define the problem in such a way as to "own" it. Owning the problem means taking responsibility and admitting that the problem is yours. Other people or a difficult situation may be a part of the problem, but owning the problem means acknowledging that your feelings, thoughts, and actions that are part of your upset about a "bad" situation stem back to how YOU are thinking about it. Once you acknowledge that, you have a better chance of resolving the situation because you have some power to control your attitudes, feelings and behaviours. Control "it," the situation? Maybe, yes, often no. Control you, your reaction to it? Definitely yes, if you use REBT. Many people are not willing to own their problems because they fear a tendency to put themselves down if they are forced to admit personal shortcomings. If you say to yourself "I must be perfect!" you can be sure you will often act imperfectly and then down yourself for your "horrible" imperfections! Rather than risk this, people are more likely to be afraid of appearing "imperfect" and own their problems and will end up creating a state of denial. Denial is refusing to admit your part in creating and maintaining the problem situation or refusing to admit that you acted badly about the situation. Overcoming denial and taking responsibility for the problem is an important first step in problem solving with REBT. To do this think of yourself as a person WHO succeeds and fails BUT not as a "success" or a "failure". Admit your errors - certainly to yourself, and also to someone you trust. Accept yourself as a person along with your fallibility. You don't have to like your self-defeating behaviours, thoughts, and feelings. You can even strongly DISlike them. But never condemn, rate, or put down YOU, yourself, or your totality, BECAUSE this will probably not help you to feel or do better. You are a person WHO sometimes acts wrongly or badly, but you are not - yes, not!,a totally or completely bad person. =========================================================== ASSIGNMENT LIST Your Strengths and Weaknesses WITHOUT any SELF-rating (putting yourself down or up) A. List some of the things that you consider you do well [text,do well 01,70] [text,do well 02,70] [text,do well 03,70] [text,do well 04,70] [text,do well 05,70] [text,do well 06,70] [text,do well 07,70] [text,do well 08,70] [text,do well 09,70] [text,do well 10,70] B. Keeping in mind that you are human, and therefore error-prone, identify some of the things that you do poorly - WITHOUT putting yourself down. Rate or measure your deeds, by seeing whether or not they help you fulfill your goals and values. ONLY rate what you DO and not YOU, yourself, the DOER. List some of the things that you do poorly, but that do NOT make you and inadequate person. [text,do poorly 01,70] [text,do poorly 02,70] [text,do poorly 03,70] [text,do poorly 04,70] [text,do poorly 05,70] [text,do poorly 06,70] [text,do poorly 07,70] [text,do poorly 08,70] [text,do poorly 09,70] [text,do poorly 10,70] BE CAREFUL to note that you have written about the DO of what you CAN or CANNOT DO well. EACH of them are not about a person they are ALL about BEHAVIOURS. Behaviours and our skills we can largely change within our personal limits. WHO YOU ARE is not up for evaluation for one simple reason, YOU are a UNIQUE individual whom no one else in this world can replace. We are ALL unique therefore cannot legitimately be compared as PERSONS. What we CAN do is accept our self, and others without conditions, and feel free to critique behaviour, performance, and other changeable factors. =============================================================== Questions or Comments? [textarea,questions or comments,3,70] [checkbox,send copy,checked] TO DO your next steps you'll need to receive a copy of your work here. Uncheck it if you have printed off a hardcopy for yourself. [submit,SEND this Entry][reset,Start Over again] [/form]