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Material Type | Library | Call Number | Suggested Age | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Book | Searching... Cabell County Public Library | 921 ELLIS E | Adult | Searching... Unknown |
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Summary
Summary
Albert Ellis, the renowned creator of one of the most successful forms of psychotherapy -- Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) -- offers this candid self-assessment, which reveals how he overcame his own mental and physical problems using the techniques of REBT. Part memoir and part self-help guide, this very personal story traces the private struggles that Ellis faced from early childhood to well into his adult life. Whether you are already familiar with Ellis's many best-selling psychology books or are discovering his work for the first time, you will gain many insights into how to deal with your problems by seeing how Ellis learned to cope with his own serious challenges.
In his early life, Ellis was faced with a major physical disability, chronic nephritis, which plagued him from age five to nine and led to hospitalization. This experience then caused the emotional reaction of separation anxiety. At this time he also suffered from severe, migraine-like headaches, which persisted into his forties. Later in life, he realized that some of his emotional upset was the result of initially taking parental neglect too seriously. Active and energetic by nature, he gradually learned that the best way to cope with any problem, physical or emotional, was to stop "catastrophizing" and to do something to correct it.
As Ellis points out in all of his work, when faced with adversity, we must realize that we have a real choice, either to think rationally about the problem or to react irrationally. The first choice leads to healthy consequences--normal emotions such as sorrow, regret, frustration, or annoyance, which are justifiable reactions to troubling situations. The second choice leads to the unhealthy consequences of anxiety, depression, rage, and low self-esteem. When we recognize irrational beliefs as such, we must then use our reason to dispute their validity. Ellis goes on to describe how these techniques helped him to cope with many other adult emotional problems, including failure in love affairs, shame, anger, distress over his parents' divorce, stress from others' reactions to his atheistic convictions, and upset due to his attitudes about academic and professional setbacks.
Honest and unflinching yet always positive and forward-looking, Ellis demonstrates how to gain and grow from trying experiences through rational thinking.
Author Notes
Albert Ellis was a clinical psychologist and a marriage counselor. He was born on September 27, 1913 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Ellis originated the rational-emotive therapy movement, which ignores Freudian theories and advocates the belief that emotions come from conscious thought "as well as internalized ideas of which the individual may be unaware." At first, Ellis' books on marital romance and sexuality were criticized by some as being radical and sensational; however, few realized that Ellis was merely laying the groundwork for modern sex education.
Ellis was educated at the City College of New York Downtown and at Columbia University, where he received a Ph.D. in psychology in 1943. He taught for a number of years at Rutgers University, New Jersey, and the Union Graduate School. He was executive director of the Institute for Rational Living, Inc., in New York City. Ellis was the author of Sex and the Liberated Man, Sex Without Guilt, and Sex Without Guilt in the Twenty-First Century.
Despite his health issues, Ellis never stopped working with the assistance of his wife, Australian psychologist Debbie Joffe Ellis. In April 2006, Ellis was hospitalized with pneumonia, and had to stay in either the hospital or the rehabilitation facility. He eventually returned to his home --- the top floor of the Albert Ellis Institute. He died there on July 24, 2007 in his wife's arms. Ellis had authored and co-authored more than 80 books and 1200 articles during his lifetime. He was 93 when he died.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (1)
Library Journal Review
Author and clinical psychologist Ellis (A Guide to Rational Living; The Practice of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy) is the world-famous creator of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), one of the most successful forms of clinical psychotherapy practiced today. In this surprisingly candid memoir, he shares his self-assessment of how he overcame his mental and physical problems using REBT techniques. Ellis carefully chronicles his health ordeals: the chronic nephritis that plagued him from ages five to nine and led to a long-term hospitalization, resulting in a painful separation from his parents and siblings; and the migraine-like headaches that dogged him well into his forties. He reveals how he used the principles of REBT to overcome the debilitating nature of his pain and continue to function. Now in his nineties, Ellis teaches how the REBT approach to adversity provides opportunities to make rational choices about one's problems, which leads to healthy consequences; our unhealthy emotions and behaviors stem from irrational thinking. Though written in an informal style, this personal reminiscence will be useful for all professionals. Highly recommended for academic libraries supporting the helping professions and for larger public libraries. Dale Farris, Groves, TX (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Table of Contents
| Acknowledgments | p. 11 |
| 1 Introduction: The Beginnings of My Coping with My Disabilities | p. 13 |
| 2 My Bout with Severe Headaches | p. 25 |
| 3 Early Hospitalization | p. 35 |
| 4 Separation Anxiety in the Hospital | p. 43 |
| 5 Coping with Abysmal Parental Neglect | p. 49 |
| 6 Other Childhood Difficulties | p. 65 |
| 7 How I Stopped Procrastinating | p. 73 |
| 8 Coping with Failing, Especially in My Love Affairs | p. 81 |
| 9 Coping with Failing, Especially at Writing | p. 103 |
| 10 Dealing with Damnation for My Atheistic Views | p. 113 |
| 11 Coping with My Poor Eyesight | p. 121 |
| 12 Coping with Sex Shame and Other Shame | p. 125 |
| 13 The Censorship of My First PhD Thesis | p. 139 |
| 14 Coping with My Irritability and Anger | p. 147 |
| 15 Conducting My Lifelong Battle with Diabetes | p. 161 |
| 16 Coping with My Parents' Divorce | p. 171 |
| 17 How I Used My Social Failings to Become a "Real" Philosopher | p. 177 |
| 18 Succeeding in Spite of Neglect and Opposition | p. 197 |
| 19 An Example of Where REBT Has Helped Me in My Personal Life | p. 207 |
| 20 Coping with My Divorces | p. 209 |
| 21 An Example Where REBT Has Not Personally Worked for Me | p. 219 |
| 22 My Philosophy of Sex Revolution | p. 223 |
| 23 Sequence of the Main Events of Albert Ellis's Recent Experiences with Serious Health Ailments | p. 225 |
| 24 The Care You Expect and the Care You Get When You Are Really Ailing | p. 233 |
| Appendix | p. 239 |
| Selected References | p. 253 |
| About the Author | p. 257 |
| Index | p. 259 |
