What is CBT?

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is a practical, skills-based, short-term treatment proven effective in treating a wide range of difficulties including anxiety, depression, low self-esteem, insomnia and emotional problems.

CBT is a talking therapy which focuses on how your thoughts, beliefs and attitudes affect your feelings and behaviour. CBT combines cognitive therapy (examining the things you think) and how our thoughts can create feelings, mood, and behavioural approaches (exploring the things you do). CBT addresses your current problems, rather than focusing on issues from your past.

mindfulness cbt thought checkpoint

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy has a strong evidence base with over 2,000 research studies proving effectiveness. Research studies demonstrate that CBT is as effective as medication for these conditions in some cases, more effective and sometimes less.

Unlike medication, the skills you learn in CBT stay with you after treatment as you continue to utilise life skills learned from therapy. One of the main differences between CBT and other therapies is that you train yourself through CBT. You apply the skills to become your own therapist.

Additional interventions at The Mindfulness Clinic includes third-wave therapies (CBT/Mindfulness) such as Schema Therapy and Dialectical Behavioural Therapy (DBT) for borderline personality, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Mindfulness-Based Cognitive (MBCT) for depression, and compassion-based approaches.

CBT services at The Mindfulness Clinic are for adults, teenagers and children affected by anxiety, depression, and other conditions.

  • Panic Attacks
    Learn to change your relationship to physical sensations and to notice the catastrophic misinterpretations that drive panic.

  • Generalised Anxiety
    Apply life-changing CBT skills to manage excessive worry, maladaptive thinking habits such as intolerance of uncertainty and unhelpful behavioural patterns that fuel generalised anxiety.

  • Social Anxiety
    Change the persistent fear of being watched and judged by others through identifying thinking patterns, unhelpful assumptions, avoidant behaviours and anxiety-provoking triggers. Take a rational and scientific approach to examine the evidence to reduce anxiety in social situations.

  • Phobias
    Work through specific phobias and feared situations by identifying negative automatic thoughts, beliefs and phobic reactions such as avoidance, safety behaviours, overwhelming feelings and distress.

  • Depression
    Unravel cognitive distortions through cognitive restructuring, thought records, and reframing as you identify patterns of unhelpful thinking and behaviour. Apply skills from behavioural activation to increase your contact with positively rewarding activities. Engage with activity as this teaches you that your actions can affect your mood.

  • OCD
    Develop a new relationship and more effective ways of responding to your obsessions and compulsions by testing specific predictions and identifying and questioning the cognitive processes that maintain Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Explore the underlying needs and focus and trust observable reality. Learn keys skills from exposure therapy, habit reversal training and response prevention techniques.

  • PTSD
    Improve daily functioning by modifying cognitive distortions and understanding the links between trauma, thinking and behaviour. Learn to reduce trauma memories and symptoms through gradual exposure, coping skills, psychoeducation and Stress Inoculation Training (SIT).

  • Insomnia
    CBT for insomnia includes cognitive, behavioural, and education components to manage anxiety, worry and daytime fatigue. Learn about stimulus control, sleep hygiene, sleep restriction and compression, relaxation skills, progressive muscle relaxation, and Autogenic training.