Break My Heart

[DISCLAIMER]

As one could imagine, when providing care for mental, emotional, and behavioral health (collectively “mental health”), predominately using Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), I often work with so-called broken hearts. Describing this term, one source states:

A broken heart (also known as heartbreak or heartache) is a metaphor for the intense emotional stress or pain one feels at experiencing great loss or deep longing. It is often greatly associated with grief and mourning especially following the death of a loved one. The concept is cross-cultural, often cited with reference to unreciprocated or lost love.

Regarding this matter, I think of the song “Break My Heart” by rapper and singer Rod Wave, from his debut EP Jupiter’s Diary: 7 Day Theory (2022), which contains a sample of the track “Love Me More” by singer Sam Smith. Lyrics of Rod Wave’s song include:

I got stabbed in my back and crossed so many times

I don’t know who to trust, think everybody lyin’ (Lyin’)

I be finna give up, ‘cause I’m so tired of tryin’ (Tryin’)

Crawl under a rock, and isolate my mind (Mind)

[…]

I said, “Girl, where you going?” (Where you going, love?)

“You can’t stay a little while longer?” (Why you going, love?)

The real from the fake and the fake from the flawed (And the fake—)

Gettin’ harder to tell ‘em apart (Apart)

And it breaks my heart, (My heart), and it breaks my heart (It really breaks my heart)

And it breaks my heart, and it breaks my heart (It really breaks my heart)

You really broke my heart, I—, why you break my heart? (You break my heart)

Break my heart (You break my heart), yeah, it broke my heart, and it breaks my heart (Break my heart)

When working with new clients, I remain mindful of how they may hold an unhelpful perspective about heartbreak, as thematically expressed by Rod Wave. Therefore, I teach a helpful REBT tool which addresses this matter. Now, I’ll share this technique with you.

REBT uses the ABC model to illustrate that when an undesirable Action occurs and you Believe an unhelpful narrative about the event, it’s your unfavorable assumption, not the occurrence itself, that causes an unpleasant Consequence. This is known as distress or disturbance.

Noteworthy, with virtually any undesirable Action that occurs, it’s your unfavorable Beliefs which cause unpleasant distress or disturbance (Consequence). Given this framing of self-distress and self-disturbance, it’s worth noting that one REBT source states (page 71):

REBT conceptualizes [distress] as healthy even though it is intense. Other approaches to therapy have as their goal the reduction of the intensity of negative emotions. They take this position because they do not keenly differentiate between healthy negative emotions (distress) and unhealthy negative emotions (disturbance).

Now, REBT keenly distinguishes between healthy distress and unhealthy disturbance. Healthy distress stems from your rational beliefs about a negative activating event [Action], whilst disturbance stems from your irrational beliefs about the same event.

Complete elimination of distress is highly unlikely in an impermanent and uncertain world wherein people conceptually suffer, struggle, and battle with, or merely experience hardship. Still, individuals often make matters worse for themselves by disturbing about such instances.

In particular, there are four predominate irrational beliefs which people often use to distress or disturb themselves: global evaluations, low frustration tolerance, awfulizing, and demandingness. When contemplating these unproductive scripts, think of the acronym GLAD.

Additionally, from a psychological standpoint, people distress or disturb themselves using a Belief-Consequence (B-C) connection. Of course, this isn’t to suggest that in the context of the naturalistic or physical world there is no Action-Consequence (A-C) connection.

From an A-C view, clogged arteries (Action) may figuratively break your heart (Consequence), as heart disease is reportedly the leading cause of death for people in the United States. Yet, from a B-C perspective, a failing romantic relationship doesn’t literally break your heart.

For example, your intimate partner decides to leave you (Action), you Believe, “Life is over [G], this is intolerable [L], as I hate horrible experiences [A], and I mustn’t be left alone [D],” and with this unaccommodating view you then experience metaphorical heartbreak (Consequence).

Addressing how people upset themselves with unhelpful attitudes, the ABC model incorporates Disputation of unproductive philosophies of life in order to explore Effective new beliefs. Whereas rigid beliefs cause self-disturbance, flexible beliefs result in an un-disturbed condition.

As referenced above, REBT distinguishes between negative and healthy, and negative and unhealthy outcomes. Now, take a moment to contemplate whether or not it’s sensible to experience a positive and healthy or even unhealthy result if your intimate partner leaves you.

Personally, your psychological state may be called into question if the person who you love leaves, and you then experience positive and healthy satisfaction or positive and unhealthy mania associated with your perception of the undesirable event. That’s plain wacky!

Therefore, I’d encourage someone like Rod Wave to consider negative and healthy distress (e.g., disappointment) versus negative and unhealthy disturbance (e.g., depression) if an intimate partner chose to leave. Fortunately, people have options in this regard.

In particular, when practicing REBT, I use personal responsibility and accountability (collectively “ownership”). For improved understanding, responsibility is defined as the quality or state of being responsible, such as a moral, legal, or mental accountability.

Here, “responsible” is defined as liable to be called to account as the primary cause, motive, or agent, and being able to answer for one’s conduct and obligations—something, such as the demands of conscience or custom, that obligates one to a course of action.

Also, “accountable” is defined as subject to giving an account—a statement explaining one’s conduct. Accountability is defined as the quality or state of being accountable, especially regarding an obligation or willingness to accept responsibility or to account for one’s actions.

When providing psychoeducational lessons on REBT, a psychotherapeutic modality which arguably requires that one preferably should take personal ownership in order to reduce self-distress or self-disturbance, I lean heavily on both responsibility and accountability.

This is because I maintain that people have personal agency (a person’s ability to control one’s own reactions to activating events which are beyond one’s own dominion, especially when one’s response is limited by someone or something else). This is a matter of self-empowerment.

Now, I invite you to consider empowerment versus disempowerment. If you can’t control or influence whether or not your intimate partner decides to leave, then you can take personal ownership of your outcome. Thus, you decide whether or not you’ll have a broken heart.

For my part, healthy distress in the form of disappointment is preferable to unhealthy disturbance relating to depression. The former is a tolerable inconvenience, yet the latter regards heartache. As no such A-C connection causes your outcome, you control how you’ll react.

If you’re looking for a provider who tries to work to help you understand how thinking impacts physical, mental, emotional, and behavioral elements of your life, I invite you to reach out today by using the contact widget on my website.

As the world’s foremost hip hop-influenced REBT psychotherapist, I’m pleased to try to help people with an assortment of issues from anger (hostility, rage, and aggression) to relational issues, adjustment matters, trauma experience, justice involvement, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety and depression, and other mood or personality-related matters.

At Hollings Therapy, LLC, serving all of Texas, I aim to treat clients with dignity and respect while offering a multi-lensed approach to the practice of psychotherapy and life coaching. My mission includes: Prioritizing the cognitive and emotive needs of clients, an overall reduction in client suffering, and supporting sustainable growth for the clients I serve. Rather than simply trying to help you to feel better, I want to try to help you get better!

Deric Hollings, LPC, LCSW

Photo credit, fair use

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