In my (reasonably limited) reading of Albert Ellis, I find his ideas very ego-centric. How does it make me feel, what does it mean for me, etc. Despite his protestations, I suspect that may be one of the reasons he had so many issues with religion over the years.

As an educator with 25 years experience, I find it essential for students to have a wider view of their actions than just the impact on themselves.

I know this is a simplistic distilling of Dr Ellis' views, but the more I read, the more this is reinforced.

Thanks, Giulio, but I will not be following your advice on this one.

Thank you rational_debate for your comment. Ellis' ABC Theory of Emotional Disturbance is useful in my experience to help students explain why they act and feel as they do particularly in challenging situations and to help them learn how to manage extreme unhealthy emotions like depression, anxiety and anger. His theory is based on ideas expounded by Epictetus in 100 AD that events of themselves don't make us act and feel as we do but rather it is the way we interpret our experience which determines how we might feel and act in a given situation. Jack Horner is used in this instance to illustrate how the belief that he can be 'good' or 'bad' because he has done 'good' or 'bad' is not a healthy belief. Many children I counsel have issues to do with self worth because they equate what they 'do' with who they 'are'i.e. 'I am a bad person for doing something bad.' Ellis in my opinion promotes the view that setting goals for ourselves and pursuing them is a useful thing to do but understand you don't always get what you want, to respect others unconditionally as you go and to take disappointment seriously, but not too seriously. I think this philosophy is expressed by Buddha (We are what we believe and all that we are springs from our thoughts) by Jesus Christ (As man thinketh so is he)and many others e.g. Henry Ford 'If you think you can or think you can't you're right.'

Some are told that they are unworthy, others are told that they are conditionally-worthy, now we have a third group who are told that they are unconditionally-worthy: I fail to see why the one is better than the others!

The problem is that we fill our minds with useless junk, preoccupying ourselves and our children with nonsense ideas such as "worthiness". It's best to forget about such notions altogether and get on with our lives - getting different ideas will only fill our minds and our childrens' minds with more junk.

Surely Buddha did not mean that if you believe that you are a purple grasshopper than you are a purple grasshopper!

The verse "As man thinketh so is he" is not by Jesus, but from Proverbs (23:7), itself a poor translation to a cryptic Hebrew verse that can be understood in many ways, to do with a bad man who offers you to dine with him - check for yourself how the different bible-translations completely diverge about this verse!

Socrates' ultimate value of self-knowledge is exactly that - know thyself, truly find and experience directly who and what you are, rather than fill your mind with more and more useless ideas ABOUT who and what you are. Even should, supposedly, those ideas happen to be true, you still wouldn't have a tiny bit of knowledge of yourself, you would still only be fed with ideas - and you are not an idea!