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Concrete Thinking and being a Non-BP
One of the biggest stumbling blocks to developing an effective relationship with someone with BPD (and for the person with BPD him/herself) is the issue of concrete thinking. What is concrete thinking? Concrete thinking is the tendency of someone to be unable to generalize about a particular subject. It is the opposite and absence of abstract thinking, in which someone can generalize. Concrete thinking is looking at instance rather than class. What I mean is that a concrete thinker looks at a particular dog and can only speak about that particular dog (instance). He/she is unable to think about dogs, mammals and animals in general (which are classes and subclasses).…
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DBT, MBT and the Behavioral Chain
One of the things I have noticed about Dialectical Behavior Therapy Family Skills versus Mentalization Based Skills is that they operate at a different link on the behavioral chain. In “When Hope is Not Enough” I have a section called “the BPD Dynamic.” What this dynamic outlines is a behavioral chain. That chain goes like this: Event -> Interpretation -> Emotional/Physical Feelings -> Action Impulses -> Expression and Behavior DBT-FST seems to me to operate at the Action Impulses to Expression and Behavior link, while validating the Emotional/Physical Feelings link. Don’t get me wrong, the DBT-FST skills are extremely powerful in communicating with someone with BPD. Yet, the change that…
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Considering the future
I was thinking about it and discovered the following ways of thinking (there be may be more, but this is what I have for now). I am sharing this as a first look into where I am going with my latest book on achieving psychological, cognitive and emotional freedom in your life. “If only” If only is a way of thinking in which the person says to themselves “I would be happy or content, if only a certain thing occurred or if only I had a certain thing.” It is a way of objecting to the unfairness of the world. It is a form of projective, delusional thinking… Like, “if…
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Mentalization and BPD
I am learning mentalization and it shows great promise! Here is a link to Anthony Bateman’s website with info on this technique…. http://www.ucl.ac.uk/psychoanalysis/unit-staff/anthony.htm No related posts.