Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) is a gold standard talking therapy used around the world. In 2021 almost 2 million CBT appointments were made in England alone.  

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) recommends CBT as the first choice of treatment for many mental health difficulties. It has a clear evidence base, with therapeutic approaches that are designed and tested to ensure they are as effective as possible.  

CBT can help you to notice thoughts, feelings, behaviours and bodily sensations and to understand the links between them. It can give you the tools to adopt more helpful ways of thinking and behaving, in order to improve your state of mind. 

Unlike some other talking therapies, CBT looks at what is happening in the here and now. The focus is on helping you to feel better as quickly as possible. CBT targets patterns of thoughts and behaviours that are maintaining your difficulties and keeping you stuck.

It is sometimes helpful to explore the origins of current difficulties (and CBT techniques can be used to do this). However, many people are unsure, or cannot accurately remember, how their difficulties began. Therefore discussion of past experiences is not always helpful and some people actually find it unhelpful.