North Star Conversations Transcript: What Is CBT? A Clear Overview – Michael Blumberg, LCPC
In this clip, Michael Blumberg, LCPC, gives a straightforward overview of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), emphasizing the connection between thoughts, behaviors, and emotions. He breaks down CBT’s core principles and why consistent practice is key to lasting change.
Brandon Gimbel (00:00)
First let's talk about cognitive behavior therapy.
Michael Blumberg (00:03)
Let's do that. So my specialty is cognitive behavioral therapy. And even within that, a subset of that called exposure and response prevention therapy. But today I'd like to just talk about the general cognitive behavioral therapy or CBT, which I'd rather say. CBT in its simplest forms, uses three suppositions and then a theory to bind them all together. And those suppositions are this, that we cannot just choose to change our feelings. That we can't choose which thoughts occur to us, but that we can change them once they are there. And that we can change our behaviors, that we do have control over our behaviors. And so in order to start feeling better, we have to start changing how we behave and we have to challenge the unhelpful negative thoughts that we have. And if we do that for long enough, and if we do that consistently enough, then our feelings will follow along and we will start to feel better. And so that is what I spent the majority of my career doing.