Rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT) is a dynamic, active-directive approach that helped change the direction of psychology in the 20th century and herald in the cognitive revolution in therapy, counseling, and related fields.
Created by Albert Ellis, REBT is considered by many to be the most holistic of the cognitive approaches, with its particular emphasis on philosophical components for helping others in combination with its evidence-based, efficient, and practical tools. Albert Ellis created REBT from his innovative capacity to cope with life adversity and problem solve, combining this personal insight with influences from the wisdom of ancient, eastern, as well as contemporary philosophers of his day. General semantics played an influential part on his thinking, and some of its tenets are incorporated into REBT theory.
REBT's development was fueled by Ellis's research and curiosity, as well as his predisposition toward helping others to suffer less emotional misery.
REBT identifies the interplay of a person's beliefs, emotions, and behaviors. It emphasizes that people are capable of choosing and creating their emotional destinies according to their capacity and willingness to choose rational realistic thinking over irrational unhealthy thinking. It teaches the clear distinction between rational and irrational thinking, and gives tools enabling vigorous disputation of the unhealthy negative emotions.
REBT emphasizes the benefit and importance of practicing unconditional self acceptance, unconditional other acceptance, and unconditional life acceptance, which enables healthy tolerance toward oneself, others, and the world. REBT reminds people that lasting change requires ongoing work and effort, and includes a variety of cognitive, emotive, and behavioral techniques to assist with the maintenance of therapeutic gains.
REBT is applicable to individuals of various cultures and backgrounds, holds a most humanistic outlook, and reminds people to consider and contribute to the well-being of others while also practicing healthy self-care. It is effective for both individual and group therapy, and as a brief or long term approach.
Many practitioners use REBT as their primary approach, while others successfully and easily combine it in multimodal fashion with other approaches.
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