The 9 Best CBT for Depression Techniques

Recovering from depression is hard work and can often feel overwhelming! Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, or CBT, for depression has proven to help bring positive long-term change and bring hope to people who struggle with depression.

As a mental health therapist, I love teaching people different CBT techniques to help bring them out of their darkest times. This post is ALL about CBT for depression.

Understanding Depression?

Depression is more than just feelings of sadness. Sadness and grief are normal human experiences in response to an external event, typically a loss. Depression lasts longer than a typical period of sadness or grief and has other symptoms associated with it, such as difficulty getting out of bed, dissociation, and lack of interest or pleasure in usual activities.

Depression is the brain’s way of managing overwhelm, like extreme grief, loss of control in one’s life, intense feelings of shame, or chronic anxiety. The brain and body begin to shut down to keep you from feeling these unmanageable sensations, but it takes the positive sensations, like joy and motivation, along with it.

Getting your brain and body to “turn back on” and start functioning normally is a long process, but it is possible! Following these 9 CBT for depression techniques can help get you back to normal.

CBT for Depression: Collect Information

Technique #1: Mood Monitoring

Before making changes, it’s important to collect information about yourself. The first technique, mood monitoring, is simply keeping a log of your moods throughout the day. Even if you are feeling sadness or numb all day, make a note of when you feel a little bit better, or when you feel worse.

Keeping this log can give you information on what types of things impact your mood. If you notice any changes, note what was happening at the time that might have adjusted your mood.

Technique #2: Thought Record

The next technique is keeping a thought record. Similar to monitoring your mood, a thought record can give you a lot of information on how you are viewing your reality. To keep a thought record, make a note at certain intervals during the day, or when you notice a shift in mood, about your thoughts at the time. For example, “I’m feeling angry, and my thought is that nobody is helping me.”

It could also be helpful to journal during the day (click here for journal prompts) to collect information about your thoughts.

Technique #3: Cognitive Triangle

The cognitive triangle is one of the key techniques in CBT. The cognitive triangle (click here for an example), identifies the connection between thoughts, mood, and behavior. If you’ve followed the first two techniques, you’re already collecting thoughts and moods, so now you just need to identify how they are related!

Our thoughts typically drive our moods (or vice versa), which then drives how we behave. By identifying this, we can work to change our thinking patterns, or at least change how we choose to behave, reducing the negative cycle of depression.

CBT for Depression: Preparation

Technique #4: Problem Solving

Once you’ve collected information about yourself and your depression patterns, the next step is preparing or planning for change. The CBT for depression technique, Problem Solving, is a great way to identify what choices you want to make next.

For problem solving, you begin by writing out the problem, brainstorm all of the different solutions, pick a solution that you want to try first, prepare for obstacles, and then take action. Notice that all solutions might not work, so you may have to try a couple of different solutions before finding what works. (Click here for a problem solving worksheet)

It’s likely that you experience a lot of problems that contribute to depression. This technique helps to break it down and focus on one at a time.

Technique #5: Goal Setting

Goal setting is also great for breaking down the recovery process into smaller steps. Looking at where you want to be and where you currently are could feel discouraging. Creating realistic, step-by-step goals can make this more manageable.

Take a look at what areas of your life you would like to change. Identify the ultimate goal, and then break it down into baby goals. For example, “I want to be able to exercise more, but I can hardly get out of bed.” Start by getting up and walking around the house for 10 minutes every day. Then slowly build up from there.

Once you identify your goal, identify when you will do it, how you will do it, and possible obstacles along the way. (Click here for a goal setting worksheet)

Technique #6: Scheduling

Scheduling is another CBT for depression technique that prepares you for action. Start by looking at your current schedule and what your day looks like. Next, identify which goals you want to add to your schedule, or what you would like to achieve. Some people schedule out daily goals, while others might prefer to look at the whole week.

Scheduling is perfect for depression because if you wait until you feel like doing it, you will never do it. Depression takes away motivation, so having something on your schedule and treating it like it’s not an option will help you start to take positive steps toward recovery.

CBT for Depression: Action

Technique #7: Thought Challenging and Reframing

As shown by the Cognitive Triangle, your thoughts can have a direct impact on your mood and how you experience reality. After you have become aware of your thoughts, you can start practicing thought challenging and reframing.

Thought challenging is a CBT for depression technique that has you identify the thoughts contributing to depression, such as “I haven’t done anything,” and challenging them with statements like, “I did do something. I got up and took a shower today.” Identify the thoughts that contribute most to your depression and write down challenge statements. Whenever you think these negative thoughts, you will have a list ready to challenge them.

Reframing is a similar technique. However, instead of saying a challenging statement, you change your perspective. This is good when you are mind-reading or future telling. For example, if you have the thought, “She doesn’t talk to me because she thinks I’m a loser,” you can reframe it to, “She doesn’t talk to me, but it’s probably because she’s busy.” You take the information that you know is true, “She doesn’t talk to me,” and change the part that you are making up.

These techniques won’t automatically make you feel better, and they might even feel like you are lying to yourself. Over time, however, your automatic thoughts should start changing to a more positive perspective.

Technique #8: Deep Breathing

Deep breathing is a great tool for regulating your emotions. It is likely that once you start to turn your emotions and body back on, you will start to feel the things that your brain was trying to avoid, like anxiety or sadness. Learning how to breathe through emotions can be helpful to manage potential overwhelm.

Breath changes with every emotion you feel, and breath when you are sad or anxious tends to be short and quick. Try checking in with your breath several times throughout the day. If you notice short breathing, try taking deep breaths, until you feel your belly expand, and then slowly release the air back out. Do this for several rounds of breath until it starts to feel more natural.

(Click here for a breathing meditation to help calm the mind)

Technique #9: Behavioral activation

The last CBT for depression technique, and possibly the most important, is behavioral activation. Your reality is created by experiences. If you are feeling depressed, and you engage in depressive behaviors, you will continue to feel depressed.

Behavioral activation means to do behaviors or experiences that make you feel good. This will likely be the opposite of what you want to do, because depression will tell you to stay numb. However, taking small steps to feel better will increase positive experiences, which will then give your more energy to take more steps to feel better.

Identify things that help you feel a little bit better, like taking a walk around the block, waking up and journaling, or calling a friend. Try to plan to do some of these things every day. Put it in your schedule and treat it like it’s part of your job. The more you engage in positive activation, the more your brain and body will follow along.

Start feeling better today!

These steps aren’t easy, but they are doable. Start with one thing at a time and give yourself grace when you struggle. I hope learning about CBT for depression was helpful! What is your favorite technique? Leave a comment below!