Alice's Story, Overcoming Depression

To visually show and explain how automatic thoughts, intermediate beliefs, and core beliefs are connected, let's consider the example of Alice, a young woman facing depression and self-doubt.

For a complete picture, let's talk a bit about her personal and social history:

Alice grew up in a broken family in a small town. Her father left for another woman when she was just 6 years old. Her relationship with her mother was complicated: her mother, a nurse, constantly found reasons to criticize and rarely praised her daughter.

After her parents' divorce, there was no communication between them, and Alice felt like she was on a minefield, trying to please both. In his new family, her father had two sons and a daughter. He spent a lot of time with them, going out to nature on weekends and even engaging in sports with them. Alice involuntarily felt jealous and envious.

During her school years, Alice became a top student, partly out of a desire to earn her mother's approval, who set good grades as the norm. Alice graduated from university with honors in marketing. She is now 23 years old, unmarried, and childless. In search of work and stability, she decides to consult a psychologist due to depression.

Alice's depressive disorder was triggered by the difficulties in finding a job after university. She led a less active social life and spent most of her time in a depressed state, convinced that she would fail at everything.

Now, let's consider how all three levels of her thinking interact in Alice's communication with the psychologist:

Alice, please recall a situation when you last experienced intense negative emotions.

It was yesterday. I was looking at job listings and saw the perfect job — a creative company, flexible hours, good salary. But I froze and couldn't send my resume.

What stopped you?

I thought that they wouldn't hire me anyway because it's too difficult for me. I can't handle it (automatic thought).

What does the thought that you can't handle this job mean to you?

That I can't perform the tasks at a high level, and that making mistakes is terrible (intermediate belief).

How would you describe a person who fails at something if they make mistakes?

They are worthless, a loser.

And if you fail at something, make mistakes, and take on something you can't handle, what does that make you?

I am a failure (core belief).

More content in our app

You're only seeing a portion of the content. In the app, you'll find numerous interactive articles. Additionally, there are psychological tests to track your mood dynamics, a daily planner, an automatic thought journal, and much more!

Now we see how all three levels of Alice's destructive thinking are structured.

It's important to understand that Alice was not born with these beliefs. They were established at different times in her life and under various circumstances. This means they can and must be changed.

The process of change begins with working on automatic thoughts. Once Alice learns to question them and prove their destructiveness, thus reducing their credibility, it is possible to move on to the next layer — intermediate beliefs.

By shaking the faith in them, we can reach the core beliefs and change them into more adaptive and beneficial ones.