Self-Therapy : The Cognitive-Behavior-Therapy-Catharsis-Script Technique
As discussed previously during my therapy experiences, I eventually created a self-therapy tool to help me efficiently and effectively deal with difficult emotions from the past. This tool is what I call the Cognitive-Behavior-Therapy-Catharsis-Script. The purpose of this letter exercise is to give the writer an opportunity to express their feelings to themselves or to another person. Furthermore, as suggested by my friends who’s attempted this letter exercise, it also allow the writer to get direct access to their unconscious and all their hidden thought processes.
Before I explain this technique in depth, I want to give proper acknowledgements to one source of non-fiction and three sources of fiction that were an inspiration to these scripts.
- Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus, specifically the chapter on about love letters. This particular chapter became the foundation for this self-help techniques. In these letters, a person is allowed to write how they feel about an incident accompanied by also writing the intended recipient’s response.
- House M.D., specifically the last episode Everybody Dies. In this episode, House talks to his own subconscious represented by hallucinations of the people in his past. These character-hallucinations are either unreachable (missing, dead, moved away) or who they once were rather than their present self (one of the hallucinations were dressed in how they looked at the start of the series). Each of those characters-hallucinations not only represented their original character but also doubled as a different fragments of House’s own personality shared with that character. I really admired this writing technique. The unavailability of those characters provided House a chance to have closure with these people in his past, and furthermore give House a chance to have his former colleagues help him with a medical mystery (his own) one last time.
- It’s a Wonderful Life / A Christmas Carol, specifically being assisted by an angel character and being able to examine the past, an alternate present on what-could-have-been and the potential future. Both George and Scrooge is given a chance to view/talk to people from important times thoroughout their life. However, fortunately both of them does not do it alone and they are lucky to have been given a chance to dialogue with the angel when they need help.
My script-writing technique combines these ideas together. Like “A Christmas Carol” & It’s A Wonderful Life, I write about an angel who visits me to help me explore the past, an alternate present, or the potential future. Then, like “Everybody Dies”, the angel presents a chance for me to talk to people that are unreachable to me for whatever reason. When these conversations occur, the dialogue will be written similar to the love letter techniques from “Men are from Mars, Woman are From Venus” and/or like the dialogue in “Everybody Dies”. Once again like, “A Christmas Carol” & “It’s A Wonderful Life”, I am given a chance to also speak to the angel if I need any spiritual assistance. The overall script is meant to help me reach to unavailable people and also choose that person’s response to me, accompanied by spiritual advice/development.
Some Script Ideas For You and The People In Your Life
When you are writing the dialogue of the other person, you are given the opportunity to either write the other person as how you want them to react to you, or to write the other person as how you perceive them. Either way, you may want to share the script to others so other people can understand you more.
— If you want to have to have a difficult conversation with somebody but you don’t feel comfortable doing it with them and need this letter as a stepping stone or to smooth the conversation with them
— Saying goodbye to people you didn’t get to say goodbye to for whatever reason
— Saying something to someone you’ve been holding in or didn’t have the courage to say
— Telling someone their effect on you or what you’ve learned about them or yourself
— Telling someone what you didn’t like about them and how you want them to react
— a conversation between you and someone who died
— a conversation between you and someone who you’ve lost
— a conversation between you and someone who you need to confront
— a conversation between you and yourself
— a conversation between you and God
— going back to the past and changing something you said
Some Script Ideas For You and The Angel
The story line of “It’s A Wonderful Life” and “A Christmas Carol”, where the guardian angel is a father/mentor-figure-like. This guardian angel would teach me things I would need to learn in desperate moments, and encourage me to do things I would need to do. He would also have a list of “special” powers such as time travel and entering alternative realities to explore more conversations or to summon “special” special characters. Here are a list of ideas I have tried :
— A conversation between you and the guardian angel exploring philosophical ideas, and discussing major issues about yourself and others
— A conversation between you and a deceased loved one’s “reaper” (A reaper is someone who “collects” and assists a dead person to move on. )
— An conversation between you and your past self
— A conversation between your “dark” self and your “light” self
— A conversation between your “emotional” self and your “rational” self
— A conversation between you and an ideal friend
— A conversation between you and an ideal lover
— A conversation between you and an ideal parent
— A conversation between you and your future self
— An alternate reality where certain choices were made by you or others were different
— An conversation between a mature version of Warrior/Magician/King/Lover of you and a shadow version
Examples
Here are some of my favourite finished Catharsis scripts.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Y0rVqwL_QzObYRpp1R9yGaPN2UpHCbMzuxXnzS6Lzk0/edit
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1aly0gYauKtJVGkC3QuNGJSzdwHrObIqVPCgvSBhIQRc/edit
