Cognitive Restructuring- Violence

To fully understand violence and the angry feelings that lead to it, one has to know the four key root causes of anger. Even more than just that, one has to go to the deepest sense of who we are, our personal way of being.

People fit in one of two catagories; one is responsive and the other is resistant. A responsive individual is open and kind to those around them; but, a resistant individual is closed off and rude. Resistant, self-deceived criminals commit violent crimes from the deepest sense of who they are.

-Resistant people commit violence in their hearts and minds long before their hands do.

-The sign of violence is not a hit, but a way of being.

-Being violent is a choice.

-Nonviolence, just like violence, goes deeper than behavior. It's a way of being.

-Self-deceived violent people separate themselves from the feelings of themselves and those around them.

-In the resistant way of being, "I hurt other people by marginalizing their reality and treating them as an object. In this process I elevate myself."

-Resistant individuals allow this thought pattern into their lives, "I batter for power without mercy or kindness."

-When children are violated, future generations are devastated.

-"When I violate others, I produce a violence in them that justifies me in violating them"

-In the resistant way of being, "I invite problems into my life, not solutions."

-In the violent way of being, "I portray myself in ways that justify me and makes the wrong I do seem right."

-Resistant people inhibit the flow of life's energy, repel other people, and live selfish lives.

-Violence springs from the very essence of who I am, and who I am destroys me.

Violence in society comes about because of the citizen's way of being. To intervene in violent behavior, a person must leave his or her resistant ways and become responsive. This involves an entire change of being.

Any program that does not approach people at their deepest level is going to fail. Anger management and behavior modification techniques are just surface fixes that don't penetrate deep enough to create life-long changes. Cognitive restructuring, when done correctly, is a proven intervention that allows men and women to become "self aware" and thus more eager to change their personal way of being. Cognitive restructuring is not force but an invitation to change. It intervenes at the deepest level where lasting changes can take place.

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