When someone verbally attacks us, we can disarm the attack by finding and agreeing with the truth in their criticism. As soon as we join an attack on ourselves, the attack ends. We and our attacker are both standing on the same side now: there’s simply nobody left to be attacked.
A subscriber to our weekly online seminar All Things CBT recently posted a question I hear regularly: How can we disarm an attack in which there is simply no truth? In this audio clip my colleague Lee Harrington MD and I respond to this important question, beginning with a description of how verbal disarming parallels physical disarming practiced in many Eastern martial arts. Leigh and I invite you to sit in on our discussion.
Join The Conversation