The Compassionate Mind by Gilbert

[Guest guest]

I'm reading The Compassionate Mind by Gilbert and am quite drawn to his ideas about generating alternative ways of thinking about our thoughts and emotions. He advocates going from "old brain/mind" passions and emotions to "new brain/mind" ways of thinking.Here is an excerpt that summarizes his approach:Key to the CBT approach is to look at our thoughts and emotions as theories, or as one construction, experience or viewpoint created by the brain from among many possibilities. We’ve seen that the threat/self-protection system operates on a ‘better safe than sorry’ principle and therefore it will pull us towards threat-focused thinking. The idea is to learn to generate alternatives because we understand that these will balance our minds and help us to flourish, grow, prosper and develop wisdom. We don’t want to be caught up in ‘old brain/mind’ passions and emotions. We want to be able to choose how and which emotions texture our lives. So we generate alternatives by asking our ‘new brains/minds’ to do some work by considering some questions.Gilbert, (2009-06-01). The Compassionate Mind (p. 336). Constable. Kindle Edition. My question is: Is the book, in general, and the above approach ACT-consistent. His mention of CBT is a red-flag for me.BTW, he does mention ' ACT work in the section of the book that describes recent developments in psychology.Thanks,Bill