REBTOZ

It is my experience that no matter how competent, experienced, or well credentialed an educator might be if your face doesn't fit you may as well look elsewhere if you're a teacher dedicated to teaching students. I've heard of teachers targeted because of their teaching competency, their popularity with students and staff. I'm speaking of the jealous and vindictive narcissist other, who cannot accept nor appreciate those by whom they are threatened. A narcissist inclined person at a school I've heard of could not contemplate that a colleague could be so popular, vivacious, and highly respected amongst staff, students, and parents. They intentionally set out to undermine and besmirch the character of their target. How was this done? The narcissist protagonist surfed the internet to get background information on their quarry, downloaded pictures and passed them on to leadership. This information was used to bully and intimidate them. I'm told they were slut sh...

Rational Emotive Behaviour Education (REBE) is a powerful teaching tool to use in the classroom at any level. It is based on REBT (Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy). It’s been around a long time, and  started out as RET (Rational Emotive Therapy) in the 1960’s. Dr. Albert Ellis created the theory and his counselling paradigm, the ABC Theory of Emotional (and behavioural) Disturbance, provides us with a framework for our teaching and counselling practice. As with all effective teaching it helps to know what we are doing and why. So, step one in our learning journey would be to understand what the ABC Theory is. ABC easy as 1,2,3… It might appear easy, but there’s more to it than meets the eye. And therein lies the genius of Albert Ellis as he took all his reading, thinking and psychotherapy practice and put it into a little package, a formula for us to use in the classroom. Indeed, Albert Ellis said a long time ago that: ‘The future of psychotherapy is in the school system.’ ...

This is warts n’ all acceptance of all the things that make up the complexity of the ‘self’,  a term we use when referring to the ‘me’ we understand ourselves to be. We decide who we are, how our ‘selves’ are constituted, by processing and interpreting the information we glean from our environment. How do others esteem me? Do they like me? Does my self-assessment, my own estimation of my worth, depend on the assessments of others? Or do I accept that any clanger, rejection, or failure don’t or can’t in themselves define me in a global sense i.e., my total worth or value. If we tend to over rely on others estimation of us, we have reached a stage of ‘needing’ rather than ‘preferring’ that others view us well e.g., likeable, respected, esteemed, funny, smart. ‘I need you think I’m OK for me to be OK.’ A student once asked me if he was a good boy. I asked what he meant and he said I like it when people say I’m a good boy. I asked him how he knows when he is a good boy and he...

The narcissist has an approval need receptacle somewhere in their subconscious. It leaks like a sieve it seems, and the more its fed by admiring others, the need to be admired never diminishes, it just intensifies. No matter how much they are adored and revered, too much is never enough. They are constantly in ‘tell me how much you love me' mode .  If we were to suggest a rule that drives this kind of need it might be: ‘I need your approval for me to feel OK about myself.’ Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy, created by Albert Ellis, would suggest, that this kind of need is characterised by an attitude of demand , a belief that one must  get what one wants i.e., the approval of others because only then will one feel OK about themselves. This is what Ellis calls ‘musturbatory’ thinking, where the person believes they absolutely  must have the approval of others if they are to feel OK, to have and maintain positive self-worth. This need puts that person at considerab...

Albert Ellis Dr Debbie Joffe Ellis agreed to answer a few questions about her mission to keep the work and legacy of her late husband Dr Albert Ellis, creator of Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy, alive and thriving. She took time out from her busy schedule to answer some questions. Giulio:  Thanks for the chat, Debbie. Could you give us a snapshot of Dr Ellis’ childhood? Debbie:  His childhood contained a number of challenges. He suffered from various serious and painful conditions, including nephritis and migraines, from infancy onward. Al made a conscious decision that he didn’t want to feel so very sad, hence he found ways to distract himself from the deep sadness such as reading books in the hospital’s children’s library, making up games to play with children in the ward, talking with their visitors, and daydreaming about his baseball heroes and about what he wanted to do when he grew up. Al was 3 years of age when he taught himself to read with the help of his 5-year-ol...

Roger Bent was an aspirational type who worked out early what he wanted and aimed to become what he imagined he could be. He was not particularly gifted in any significant way but he had a brimming reservoir of self-belief that fuelled his trajectory to his goal of greatness. He was besotted with himself and his narcissistic desires, and his wants and needs took precedence over those of others, who were useful only as far as that they could help him onwards and upwards. 'The only thing worse than ignorance is arrogance.' Albert Einstein He was a classroom teacher for a while and he tolerated the discomfort and ignominy of sitting on what he thought was the bottom rung of the corporate ladder. This was a temporary situation as he worked out the lie of the land, and how best he would use those around him to get what he wanted. He made strategic connections with significant others, saying the right thing to the right people at the right time, making personal and professional a...

Seven-year-old Eabha (Ava) came by my office. She would occasionally drop in to tell me one of her stories or to sing me a song, but she seemed preoccupied and wasn’t her usual bubbly self. She played with a fidget she found in the toy box and after a short while, without looking in my direction said, ‘my dad has moved out and my mum has been crying a lot.’ She continued to play with the fidget. ‘Things were not right!’ Eabha stopped playing and then she came and sat down opposite me, settled in her seat, and grabbed a teddy that was nearby. Her eyes betrayed how she was feeling, and I wondered how a seven-year-old processes such a traumatic episode unfolding before her and around her and within her. I asked her how she was feeling, and she lowered her eyes and said, ‘When my mum told me that dad was leaving my brain felt sad and then I cried.’ I asked what she meant when she said that her brain felt sad. She said that she was thinking about why this happened and if her mum and...