CBT: Exposure exercise

Exposure Exercise

Describe the situation:

• Which situation did you practice with during the exposure exercise? 
• How long did you practice? 
• How was the fear before the exposure exercise? 
• How was the fear during the exposure exercise? 
• How is the fear after the exposure exercise?

Answer the following questions: 

1. Did you experience sufficient anxiety during the exposure exercise? 
2. Were you willing to truly engage in the exposure exercise and experience fear? 
3. Did you not give in to avoidance or safety behaviors?

If the answer is "yes" to all three questions: you can reflect on the exposure exercise.

If the answer is not "yes" to all three questions: that's okay! Try to understand why this is the case. The advice is to continue practicing. You can adjust your exercise slightly, so you can answer "yes" to these questions. This way, you can learn from your exposure exercises.

Reflection:

• How did the exposure exercise go? 
• What was your catastrophic expectation? In other words, what was the worst thing you thought could happen? 
• Did this catastrophic expectation come true? 
• If the outcome was negative, was it as bad as you expected, and how did you deal with it? 
• What did you learn from this exercise? What conclusion can you draw about your catastrophic expectation? 
• How can you hold on to what you have learned?