But before you consider using these techniques, it is important for you to remember that they aren’t meant to be a substitute for treatment by qualified mental health professionals. This technique is used in cognitive therapy but there is of course much more to cognitive therapy than monitoring your mood and thought. Also, it is true that many people may benefit from another approach.
If you find that the techniques described here get you so far and then you become stuck or they simply don’t work, then it might be better to ask your doctor to refer you to your local community mental health team.
Take some time to think about your problem. It could be described in a general term such as feeling depressed or anxious, or you could describe it in that sense that you’ve got a certain phobia or obsessive-compulsion. These labels have their uses, but don’t reveal very much about how the problem affects you.
To help deal with the problem, it can be a useful technique to split it up into behaviour, feelings and thoughts. You’ll usually find that you can link them: certain behaviours will go with or even create certain thoughts and feelings.
The behaviours could be things you might like to do but just can’t, or things you want to stop yourself from doing, such as a compulsion, a habit or an addiction. It is important to be clear that these are very real things that you want to change.