For example when someone we are close to makes a comment that feels  hurtful to you.

At the time the comment is made you have a choice between seeing it “as an innocent comment from a loved one who said something we would just  prefer not to hear ” or  as “an awful and intentionally hurtful” .

The  first way of thinking is allows us to preserve the underlying emotional connection in the relationships  while the second damages  the relationship and stores away emotional material about the event.  If you want this relationship to repair or stay healthy I suggest you to take on the first attitude as quickly and as much as possible.  

Recognizing that at the time of the infraction you are more likely to see it as more problematic and hurtful can help you can some mental flexibility and control.

Two common ways in which may experience the idea of “failure” is when:

-We don’t  get what we want from others

-We don’t  perform  to the level we hoped/expected

Now depending on how YOU VIEW  the idea of failure and therefore the  situation- will result in either you protecting  your self esteem or helping it to  plummet downwards.

People with low self esteem consistently apply a mental filter so that when something bad happens they see that situation as:

• As Personal  ” this could only happen to a looser like myself”; “People are taking advantage of me, I am such an idiot”- This does not give room for other contributions and labeling just shuts us down.

• As Stable- ” I  am  no good. “  “People will never like Me”.  This is too stable because  it implies, this cannot be changed. 

• As  hopeless - Why can’t I ever succeed? This is never ending so it says, “I should just give up”.

• As Global or too general : “My Life is a mess”- This does not give us any direction to start.

Self esteem can broken down into 2 different levels.  Implicit self-esteem refers to a person’s disposition to evaluate themselves in a spontaneous, automatic, or unconscious manner. It contrasts with explicit self-esteem, which entails more conscious and reflective self-evaluation. Both types of self esteem are learned responses and therefore can be changed to include different responses.

What to do:

The next time you experience a failure, sense of disappointment or frustration over not getting what you want.  For example,  let say you get back bad feedback on a report at work.

-Ask yourself, How does this reflect you on personally? Then instead of personalizing the loss by either blaming yourself or others do the following :

- Identify what specifically  you did or  didn’t do to contribute to the failure?  For example,  recognize if you  only put an hour into writing the report and normally you give it 3 hours,  then there’s your solution.  If you want to do a better job, then invest more time.

-Then try to look for external or concrete  factors that influenced the outcome.  For example things out of one’s control or other things you were committed to  dealing  with .  So if  you  look back at the calender and realize that you  only HAD one hour  to give because of  other work or  your children, then so be it.

-If you blame others and see them as disrespecting you, identify what other factors are going on in their life and try to see if from their point of view. Maybe your wife or co work had other commitments or felt overwhelmed themselves.

-Then look for ways to feel hopeful about the situation by accepting that  not everything in life will always work out the same  and re-igniting  your commitment to any contributions you can to achieve more in your life!

-Remember being successful is more about your self efficacy and your willingness to improve and work at it.  For more read my article on Self Efficacy

If you are looking to work towards overcoming these habits the first place to start is by UNDERSTANDING your mental rules and automatic thoughts that overlay your behavior and then DECIDING FIRMLY to do something about it.

Dr. Albin: I use bio-feedback and meditation to help reduce stress and performance anxiety directly. Then I work on the cognitive patterns that are part of the procrastination trap — the “I’ll start when I’m ready” self-talk, or “it’s hopeless now”, or whatever it is.

For some helpful tips listen to the interview I gave on the Procrastination Special Show that broadcasted live on Sept 21, 2009 on the Tom on Leadership Blog Radio Show.

Click Here Dr Jayme Albin’s Speaks on Procrastination92109

Or if you don’t have the time to listen to the 15 minute interview then take a few minutes to look over the main take away points as Tom so nicely summed them up.

Procrastinators struggle with self-control behaviors. It often consists of:

* Self Defeating Thoughts, that lead to
* Anxiety, that triggers
* Avoidance Behaviors, which feed
* Self Defeating Thoughts, etc.

Often my clients don’t realize that performance comes from two things – Ability and Motivation. They focus on Ability, and when performance lags, they see it as reflecting on Ability, which saps their confidence.

Once they undermine their own self-confidence, they continue to lose Motivation. This self-perpetuates.

Another way to describe this is, once you feel high levels of anxiety, your body wants to reduce that and reduce the stress hormones associated with it. One way to get a very small and temporary reduction in the stress is to make an empty promise. The empty promise then kicks real work further into the future and guarantees a return to even higher levels of anxiety. Then the brain wants that small reduction even more, and you’re even more strongly tempted to make the empty promise.

There are five main themes that follow procrastinators:
-Over-estimating how much time is left
-Under-estimating how much time the task takes
-Later I’ll feel better (fooling themselves about future motivation levels)
-Later I’ll feel “right” (belief that emotion must be congruent with the task)
-Perfectionists (belief that everything must be perfect before they can start)

I work with the client to identify the pattern then they work to find different patterns that can combat the dysfunctional pattern. This involves challenging their beliefs and giving them multiple alternative self-talk options and behavior targets.

Try this:
One of my clients who complains that she gets lost in mundane activity such as internet surfing now has the assignment of starting each new task at the quarter-hour mark. If she finishes one task at 9:07, she has to start the next one at 9:15. This gives the client practice at time estimating (an opportunity to challenge her cognitive distortion of underestimating time) and lets her exercise her self-control against impulsiveness.

By working on a system where the person chooses from a menu of options and is partially aware of her self-control problems can help alleviate the behavior pattern. Activating one’s choice and helping one adapt better to situations as they change rather than fall rigidly into black and white patterns of behaviors can have a positive impact on productivity and motivation and reduce procrastination behaviors.

Self-control can definitely be strengthened. You have to want to!!! Many folks believe that “one day” they will suddenly achieve self-control without work.

I (Dr. Albin) counter this by looking to their mission and vision for themselves. Who do they want to be? What sort of aspirations do they have? This provides the impetus for additional change.

I (Dr. Albin) believe very strongly in working outside your comfort zone, so you always grow and change and lead an every greater and richer and more fulfilling life.

For more information:

Listen to entire broadcast that featured 3 other experts including:
Dr. Toni Galardi, Ph.D. of LifeQuake Enterprises
DeAnna Radaj of Bante Design LLC
Rita Emmett of Emmett Enterprises, Inc.
Dr. Jayme Albin, MA, Ph.D www.AsktheCognitiveBehaviorTherapist.com
Or read more of the expert advice on comments here on

For more information on consulting, coaching or clinical psychological services in New York or Los Angeles please contact DrJayme@askthecbt.com or 212-631-1133.
Dr. Albin works with groups and individuals providing cognitive behavior therapy and biofeedback.

My last article posted on decision making, “Are you suffering from ‘decision-making strategy neglect’? Maximizer vs. Satisficer”, focused on Stage 1, the information gathering phase. Now let’s focus on Stage two, the solution focus stage, where a solution is decided upon and then implemented.

More often than not, I see people experiencing mild to intense anxiety during this stage. This can result in a “non-decision”, where the idea of selecting a decision and staying with the decision long enough to implement is too anxiety provoking so nothing gets determined nor implemented in the appropriate manner.

This is anxiety can be driven by a number of reason but a common phenomenon observed is the concept of searching for “THE RIGHT decision” rather than the “the best solution” or “a good decision”. For those who are in search of the “THE RIGHT decision” they are often foolishly led by perfectionist ideals characterized by a desire to not just to maximize their resources, but by the belief that they must make one decision that satisfies their needs 100%. However, as our lives develop and become more complex, it becomes increasingly difficult to make decisions that satisfy all elements involved. Failure to grasp and accept this concept, often leads to internal conflict, dissonance and arousal; triggering the desire to renegotiate the decision process, perpetuating the cycle.

What to do:
Developing insight into your own style, as well as the styles of others, can help you determine which style works best for you and/or your organization and under what set of circumstances.

Like the information gathering phase, there are a number of different strategies that occur during the solution focus phase. We also vary in the number of potential solutions we simultaneously generate and consider.

A uni-focus style is denoted when the information collected is used to assemble one potential solution and follow one course of action in the implementation. Whereas, as multi-focused style includes developing alternative solutions.

Decision making research describes 5 basic decision making styles that consider whether the person is behaving as a maximizer vs. satisficer in combination with uni-focus or multi-focused style:

1. A Decisive style is a satisficing & unifocus style. These people pride themselves on making fast and efficient decision. They choose a course of action and implement it in the most expedited manner, ignoring any desire to reevaluate due to an uncertain future. The down side is that these people are often perceived as inflexible and short sighted. This approach is however seen often with politicians and business-men.

2. A Flexible style is a satisficing, multi-focus style. These people move fast, but are willing to drop one tactic in favor of another at any moment. Flexible decision makers do well in organizations or situations where there is a lot of quick change but can fall into a dangerous pitfall of being too flexible. Too flexible involves the willingness or desire to drop present decisions for new strategies before it’s necessary or because your priorities have changed, rather than the components of the situation itself. Thus they end up trying to be maximizers with the resources and intent of a satisficer.

3. The Hierarchical decision maker is maximizing & unifocus style. They use ample resources to identify the best solution and then work out a detailed and specific plan of action. Implementing this style without seeming too over controlling or rigid requires a lot of self-awareness and patience.

4. The Integrative style involves maximizing and a multi-focus style. Where more than one course of action is developed based on a lot of information. These people often pursue several course of action simultaneously; hence it requires ample resources during both stages. These people value creativity and diverse set of ideas and often work well groups.

5. The Systemic style combines characteristics of the hierarchic and integrative styles. Information is gathered in a maximizer way, but at times the solutions are uni-focused whereas at other times multi-focused. This person will produce multiple detailed solutions, with long terms goals but focus on applying plans that pertain to the near future.

The decisive and flexible styles tend to work best when things need to be done quickly and when the issues to be considered are relatively simple. The hierarchical, integrative, and systemic styles are best when applied to more complex matter that requires long term strategy, and considerable resource investment.

Thank you.

The feedback I received in response to my previous post on “non decision making”, told me that my audience was not only on board with this process, but eager to learn more about decision strategy as well.  So in response, I have decided to present a series of articles over the next few weeks to help you avoid “decision-making strategy neglect” in both your individual lives and within your organizations (if you are in a decision-making position).

Stages:
One way to view the process is to break decision-making down into a two-stage process.

Stage one is the analysis stage, where information is gathered and then analyzed. Stage two is the solution focus stage, where a solution is decided upon and then implemented.

For now, we will focus on Stage One.

Maximizer vs. Satisficers

Depending how much information you require and how much time you spend analyzing the information before moving on to the solution focused stage determines whether or not you are considered a “maximizer” or a “satisficer” in your decision making style (Driver, Brousseau & Hunsaker, 1998)

Maximizers are those who seek to gather ALL the information before making a decision. They invest time, attention and energy. They take advantage of all of the resources available to them with the goal of selecting the “optimal” solution.  They react slower in the decision-making arena than satisficers do.

Satisficers on the other hand pride themselves on reacting in an expedited manner and being decisive. They usually make decisions based on the information at hand or with minimal amounts of information with the goal of selecting the “best available” or a “good enough” decision.

Maximizing is appealing since it can increase the confidence we have in our decisions. Furthermore, sometimes the difference between the “BEST” decision and a “GOOD” decision is a meaningful difference, so there is benefit to the added investment.

However, acting as a maximizer is not always practical since it’s often difficult to implement as the level of information you seek is not always available or is expensive.  This in turn may lead to the over-expenditure of limited resources (i.e. time, money, energy, attention) and as a result you may end up feeling overwhelmed or exhausted, decreasing your chances of either moving onward to the solution stage or leaving your resources too depleted to effectively implement the solution in the next stage.

Satisficers run the risk of missing out on the “optimal” solution since they make decisions as information becomes available. They find solutions that are minimally acceptable, but meet a set of standards. The satisfiers’ attitude is simply: an available decision is sometimes the “best” decision, since it is all that is necessary to accomplish your goal or at least prevent complete failure.

Satisficers work under the premise that the added investment of the Maximizer does not guarantee a better outcome or the upside at its best may not be enough to justify the resource investment. Therefore, this style takes into account the limitations imposed by resources (both internal and external), while allowing us to get the job done. This style it has been heavily supported as a decision making style in organizations (see Herbert Simon’s Administrative Model for more or my future posts).

Both styles of information gathering and analysis have their advantages and disadvantages. The most important thing to realize is that the optimal strategy is highly situational dependent, which means that one strategy does not work for all. For example you would want to adopt a maximizing strategy on a multiple choice exam, even if it meant not answering all of the questions since you need to select the “best” answer in order to receive any credit, but you would be better off applying a satisficer approach when taking an essay exam, since you most likely would be better off answering all of the questions to some degree, regardless if they were perfect.

Sometimes combining strategies can be the best strategy in order to optimize your end goal, which is usually the most important component anyway. For example, a satisficer attitude about decisions to accept dates or job interviews would mean you would set standards and remain open to accepting invitations as long as they met your minimum requirements. Thus, when it came time to make a decision about who to marry or where to work for the long haul you could adopt a maximizer approach more readily, whereby you would be in better position to select what you believe is ideal.

Are you a maximizer or a satisficer?
Well hopefully you are both since the optimal strategy is situation dependent.

What to do to determine this and improve your skills:

• For the next week, monitor a few areas in your life where decision-making occurs. For e.g. Career/Work, Relationships, Family, Money, Travel, Health, etc.
• Remember to look at these systems both globally and internally. For example, how you make plans vs. whom you select as a friend. How you selected your gym or exercise regime vs. daily decisions to work out.
• Then each time you make a decision indicate if you are maximizing or satisficing. Focus on: How fast you are responding; how much information you require; were you asked to make a decision or did you feel compelled?
• Keep track over the week. Start with a sample. You don’t need to record every decision. The idea is to get your thinking process going and introduce these concepts
• Then go back over those decisions with the outcomes that occurred in mind. Ask yourself if you think you acted in accordance with the best decision strategy:

Did maximizing when you should have been satisficing cause you to miss out on an opportunity?  Did satisficing when you should have been maximizing lead you to act short sighted?

Don’t get upset and be a Monday morning quarterback. That’s wasted time!  Learn from it and continue the process.

Please post your comments directly here on the blog.
Thanks for reading. Contact me directly for more info on consulting.
Dr. Jayme

Are you ready to get your Monday morning on?

I know its not quite Monday, yet but many of us are our on our way back from a beach weekend via ferry, car, jitney or plane and find ourselves consumed with the events of tomorrow instead of the rest of the weekend ahead. Even if you manged to check out all together during the weekend, you may have returned to work mode.

If you did not intend to end your weekend early, you may feel somewhat annoyed by the intrusion. Perhaps the intrusion came voluntarily ( i.e either you activated your blackberry and checked your work email) or it was an outside force such as a call from an eager colleague.

Either way let’ s figure what triggered this annoyance so you can be in a better position to adjust your thoughts or behaviors, so you can avoid the imposition or accept the need to get a jump start on Mondays’ event.Leave your responses on the comments please so we can establish your triggers.
Dr Jayme

http://twitter.com/AsktheCBT

See Thou Shall Not Avoid for Why .

Some basic ideas on how not to avoid and making approaching anxiety situations easier:

1. Make your own movie with imagery: Play out positive scenarios in your head. Use scenes from films or books to guide you but make sure you are the actor/actress in the film.

2. Role play: practice in front of a mirror or with a friend/therapist. Once you start it can be fun and extremely helpful.

3. Get a job or volunteer. If you see being social as part of your job you may come out of your shell.

4. Go for an hour! Set specific beginning and an end times.

For example, if you are nervous about attending a party. Commit to attending between 9pm and 10pm. Don’t give into to leaving when you feel like leaving. Inform the hostess in advance that you have another engagement or an early morning.

5. Ask one question or state one fact. In a meeting or in a group setting, make a point to say something at the least threatening part of the gathering. Usually this is the beginning or end.

6. Speed date: If dating is not your thing because you shy away from meeting new people or hate the asking out part. Try speed dating. It will help you get used to breaking the ice. Knowing each meeting is only 5 minutes will help you feel in control.

7. Talk to strangers. If you have a hard time meeting new people commit to talking to one new person a week. Start with people engaged in jobs that are designed to share information. For example, go to the local beer brewery and ask the bartender about beer or the person working in the local Barnes and nobles about what books they recommend. Usually people working in these positions are there because are knowledgeable and enjoy something about the topic.

8. Have someone go with you. Enlist a friend or a therapist. It will make things easier and maybe you can share a laugh.

9. Treat everyone the same for an hour. For an hour make an effort to smile at everyone that comes across your path. Make sure you ride the elevator or walk the halls during this hour.

10. Say good morning to everyone on a Monday. This will break the routine and set a stage for new habits.

By breaking down your behaviors into small, manageable acts you not only get to rid yourself of the anxiety, but your actual performance will improve. Just like when you ran teams drills in high school.

1. Explain the situation from your point of view: How do you see the situation?

2. Express how you feel or felt

3. Make it known what it is you want exactly

4. Discuss how following your request will benefit you BOTH

Think of this in comparison to aggressive or passive behavior. When you are assertive you are simply stating what will make you feel happy /successful. By expressing it you are giving the other person time to honor your needs.

When you are aggressive you are essentially demanding that your needs be met over others. And when you are passive you are willing to give into others needs over your own.

Be careful though because sometimes being passive results in passive aggressive behavior, where you begrudgingly give into the needs of others while showing subtle signs of frustration or hostility. Some classic examples are when people slam doors or avoid social contact. Passive aggressive behaviors can be destructive to relationships no matter the setting, because it precludes most chances of an open and honest dialogue. So what generally follows is that one person will remain feeling dissatisfied since their needs are not getting met, while the other person is left to feel helplessly frustrated since they are clueless as to how to satisfy or rectify the situation. So while expressing what you need or want might make you feel vulnerable, remember it might also help you feel a lot more satisfied.

Dr. Jayme

Last week in one of my therapy sessions I did something unorthodox but not unlike me, I met one of my clients at her apartment to target her cluttering and hoarding problems.

Like many of us, she was simply having a hard time making small decisions. “Should I keep these shoes? I haven’t worn them in a year, but they are funky and were kind of expensive……umm….I’ll figure it out later”. Her non-committal behavior of neither storing these items nor disposing of them was simply a reflection of something I like refer to as making decisions by default.

Decision by default is the decision making process that results when no active decision is made. This results in perpetual “non-decisions”, leading to inert behaviors such as procrastination, clutter, and avoidance. Which may add up to someone feeling overwhelmed or bored due to consistent isolation or disorganization.

In my client’s case, it became apparent that her individual dilemmas were never seen as a priority, where they would be significant enough to demand an answer, so she kept putting it off rather than make it a priority to deal with. When faced with a decision she would perceive it as not worthy of her time, energy and attention at the moment. She would back that up with the sincere but erroneous belief that she would “get to it later” when she had more time or considered it more important. This of course would never occur and thus maintain the endless pattern of non-decisions, procrastination and the nagging piles of clothing on her floor.

Non-decisions can leave you with a cluttered life, but they also can prevent you from acquiring things in your life that you really want since acquisition usually requires a definitive decision. Making decisions helps us to set goals and makes its more likely that we will achieve those goals. Those of us that avoid these practices often end up with a life filled with items that they simply acquired by default. We acquire things by default because we either stumbled upon them or they are given to us based on decisions of others.

This applies to possessions, relationships, careers, and personal growth. Take an inventory of your life, Not just your belongings, but look for areas of clutter or leftovers in your life; Look for areas where non activity has created more anxiety or frustration for you or has simply robbed you of peace and satisfaction. Look for areas of your life where you can believe you can be more ambitious.

How to move forward:
Set a definite time for when you will think about the decision. Don’t give in to the temptation to blow it off, the anxiety you feel about the process will just get worse.

Ask yourself “Do I have all the information I need to make the decision”. If the answer is “No” then consider whether or not this new information can be obtained, how timely you can retrieve it; as well as how much time, energy, attention and money will be needed to obtain that information.

Then evaluate if it’s worth it to obtain the information with a simple cost benefit analysis. If it seems worthy, then set a time frame and create an action plan for obtaining the new information. Be sure to reschedule your decision date for when you will make the decision. Share with someone your deadline to hold yourself and accountable and follow through on your decision. Once you make the decision, you will begin to realize one of the toughest obstacles in reaching your goals has been met!

Don’t let non-decisions fill your life. You will most likely end up feeling dissatisfied, lethargic and bored. Take charge. Make decisions. After all at least they will be your decisions!

-Dr Jayme

Cognitive Behavior Therapy: A Life Model

Cognitive Behavior Therapy: A Life Model

Thinking about what you think about is certainty worth thinking about, but how many of us actually do it?

I find that most people have more insight into their poker or blackjack strategy than they do when it comes to their relationships, their careers or emotional well being. They might have a strategy in place when it comes to tackling major cross roads, but what about the thoughts that guide the daily behaviors. Ironically, while these are the ones that usually go unnoticed as they occur, but overtime add up and really determine our course.

As a Cognitive Behavior Therapist I work with clients to develop insight into their cognitive processes. Together we draw connections between how their cognitive processes translate into their daily thoughts, behaviors and emotions. As a therapy, CBT is symptom focused, meaning we look to apply the wisdom and the techniques towards investigating and fixing problems. However, why stop here with its application.

After all, CBT is based on a life model rather than just a model for therapy. At its core it represents a basic model for how we relate to the world.

Let me elaborate– as humans, we continually process thoughts and images (cognitions if you will), in response to the world around us. We also generate cognitions in response to our own internal cues of emotions, body sensations and other thoughts. So yes, while we think about the outside world, we also create mental images and thoughts in response to ourselves.

These immediate, momentary thoughts and images, known as Automatic Thoughts, are more then just mere recordings of events as they occur. They are the result of our thinking style. Our thinking style colors our view of new events.

Our thinking style at its core consists of the values and attitudes we hold deeply. Usually these are inherited or learned at an early age. For each of us, these core beliefs generate a set of assumptions about how things should turn out. These assumptions create the mental rules and expectations from which we view new situations, thus influencing the immediate explanations and inferences we derive from new events.

These thoughts directly influence our mood, physical state and behaviors. These behaviors are not limited to the ones we actively engage in, but also include the ones we avoid.

What’s more, our mood, physical state and behaviors work to reinforce each other, while continuously reinforcing the original belief. The concept is similar to that of a school of fish that swims tightly together. Thus, if one member changes his position or switches direction the rest of the school naturally adapts, adjusting their behavior accordingly. Left unconsidered and unchallenged the shape and direction of your future is heavily derived by the patterns of your past. But what if the beliefs of your past are creating rules or patterns for your future that are no longer effective? What if some of the rules you employ could be effectively transferred to other areas of your life? Would you even know it?

To start the process, begin examining the expectations and assumptions in specific areas of your life. School or works histories are good places to start, since the patterns are usually consistent. Relationships patterns (romantic, friendships or familial) are important areas as well, but may be too complex to examine on your first attempt.

Make a list of the values and rules you believe to hold yourself to in situations that relate.

Make a list of the assumptions and expectations you knowingly have of others in those relatable situations.

Now think of 2 different scenarios that have occurred in that area of your life: one that you see as successful and one that you view as disappointing.
Decide in both situations if you were satisfied or disappointed in yourself or the other person or both? If you were disappointed, decided what expectations you and/or they failed to meet? If you were satisfied, decide which expectations and assumption were met or perhaps consider that maybe you were satisfied since a negative expectation was defied.

Compare these to original list of expectations and assumptions you assembled since chances are that is not a complete list. Consider what value each expectation brings to your life and how likely it is to be met. Think about the behaviors and rules that come along with those expectations, for you and for others. Think about the feelings that come with these expectations and how often they bring you happiness, anxiety, anger or disappointment.

As you begin to look at various scenarios across the different areas of your life you will start to begin to understand more about the beliefs you hold, how likely they are to bring you success and what beliefs and patterns needs to be extinguished.

I look forward to continuing the application of this valuable science in enhancing your life as I provide guidance and share my knowledge.

Dr. Jayme