Comment by cardanome
5 days ago
CBT can definitely veer into gaslightning territory. But then, if it helps you cope, so what?
It is the same with religion. Even though gods objectively do not exist, at least not in a literal sense, it can still help people to cope better with their life and be an overall positive force. Or extremely harmful when abused.
The world is pretty depressing. Everyone is telling themselves little lies one way or another just to be able to function. And no, Atheists are not more rational than religious people per se, they tend to have other delusions.
Personally I think striving to have a realistic model of the world is still the best long term strategy and that those little lies are like drugs that will help you in the short term but wreck havoc in the long term but who knows. It is complicated.
>CBT can definitely veer into gaslightning territory. But then, if it helps you cope, so what?
That's myopic. There's only so much "reframing" you can do before the tension begins to rear its head. Serenity now, insanity later.
Yeah, that is why I wrote:
> Personally I think striving to have a realistic model of the world is still the best long term strategy and that those little lies are like drugs that will help you in the short term but wreck havoc in the long term but who knows. It is complicated.
Though to be fair much of CBT can also be getting rid of false believes that hold you back.
Ultimately CBT has a lot of empirical research backing it up that shows that it is very effective for certain conditions. Though people should also be more aware that it works less well or can be harmful for certain people. It is not a silver bullet but nothing to sneer at.
Ultimately we all cope one way or another. If you believe that you have no delusions, you are more delusional than most of us.