Cognitive therapy focuses on how thoughts, beliefs, and interpretations influence anxiety — and how changing your response to those thoughts can reduce anxiety over time. For people with anxiety disorders, the issue usually isn’t lack of insight or intelligence. It’s that the brain overestimates danger, underestimates coping, and treats uncertainty as a threat.
Cognitive therapy for anxiety can help you:
Worry often feels productive — but in anxiety disorders, worry can function as a compulsion that temporarily reduces distress while keeping anxiety stuck.
In this role-play video, Dr. Debra Kissen demonstrates the difference between mindful attention and worry as a compulsive response to anxiety. You’ll see how these two internal responses may look similar on the surface, but have very different effects on the anxious brain.
In this video, you’ll learn:
The CBT Downward Arrow technique is a powerful tool used in evidence-based therapy to help identify the deeper, often unspoken beliefs driving anxiety and depression.
In this video, Dr. Debra Kissen, Clinical Director of Light On Anxiety, explains how the Downward Arrow works and why it’s so effective for uncovering core fears such as:
You’ll learn:
At Light On Anxiety, we provide comprehensive, evidence-based treatment for GAD that is individualized, collaborative, and grounded in cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) with an exposure-forward approach. We begin with a thorough assessment to understand how worry shows up in your life, what maintains it, and how it impacts daily functioning. From there, we develop a clear treatment plan tailored to your needs.
Our approach to GAD includes:
When clinically appropriate, we also integrate additional supports:
No. While cognitive therapy involves discussion, it’s active and skill-based. At Light On Anxiety, cognitive therapy is used to build awareness, flexibility, and choice — not to endlessly analyze problems or talk your way out of anxiety.
Cognitive therapy helps reduce anxiety over time, but the goal isn’t to eliminate anxious thoughts altogether. The goal is to change your relationship with those thoughts so they no longer control your decisions or limit your life.
Cognitive therapy is most effective when paired with behavior change and exposure. At Light On Anxiety, cognitive therapy supports exposure-based treatment by helping you understand anxiety patterns, reduce mental avoidance, and move toward what matters — even when anxiety is present. If you are hesitant to engage in exposure therapy we will take tiny but meaningul baby steps with you to help you proceed forward at a pace that works for you.
That’s very common in anxiety. Knowing a thought is irrational doesn’t automatically reduce anxiety. Cognitive therapy helps bridge the gap between insight and change by teaching you how to respond differently when anxious thoughts show up.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) at Light On Anxiety has been proven to reduce anxiety within the first 3 months of treatment.
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