018: Ask David — Overcoming the Fear of Death

Feeling Good Podcast | TEAM-CBT - The New Mood Therapy

David Burns, MD

Clinical, Therapy, Anxiety, Psychotherapy, Depression, Health & Fitness, Cognitive, Mentalhealth, Mental Health, Behavior, Education, Self-improvement, Psychology, Relationships, Addiction, Happiness, Personalgrowth

4.4 • 856 Ratings

🗓️ 9 January 2017

⏱️ 11 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

David and Fabrice address this question submitted by a listener:

Dear Dr. Burns,

I read Feeling Good twenty years ago. It was a wonderful relief and help to me. Your book has helped me live a better and balanced life. The best part was passing the knowledge on to my daughter. I thought I read a wonderful description of how to handle death anxiety in the book. I was describing it to a friend, but could' find it in the book.

Is it in another book?

Your reply would be considered an act of generosity.

Thank you! Mary

Existential Therapists believe that the fear of death is universal and is at the root of most emotional problems. Dr. Burns argues that the fear of death is actually quite rare, but does occasionally occur and is extremely treatable. In this podcast, David’s describes his quick, three-part “cure” for the fear of death.

Oddly, every patient he treated in this way insisted at the end of the session that it didn’t help. And even stranger is the fact that 100% of them returned the next week and announced that they actually had been cured and were, in fact, no longer afraid of death!

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello and welcome to the Feeling Good podcast.
0:12.4	I am your host, Fabrice Knight.
0:14.7	And joining me here in the Murrieta Studios is Dr. David Burns.
0:19.0	Hi, David.
0:20.0	Hi, Fabrice.
0:23.8	Dr. David Burns has been a pioneer in the development of cognitive therapy, and he is the creator of the new team therapy. He is the author of
0:30.2	Feeling Good, which has sold over 5 million copies in the United States, and has been translated into
0:35.5	over 20 languages. He is an emeritus adjunct clinical professor of psychiatry at the Stanford University School
0:43.0	of Medicine.
0:44.6	It looks like we're going to do another Ask David today, and we have an email here from
0:50.8	Mary.
0:52.1	And here's what Mary says. She said, I read Feeling Good 20 years ago.
0:58.6	It was a wonderful relief and helped to me. Thankfully, I have never suffered from any mood or other
1:04.8	mental disorders. The book has helped me live a better and balanced life. The best part was passing the knowledge on to my daughter.
1:14.5	I thought I read a wonderful description of how to handle death anxiety in the book.
1:19.4	I was describing it to a friend but couldn't find it in the book.
1:22.8	Is it in another book?
1:24.6	Your reply would be considered an act of generosity.
1:27.3	Thank you.
1:29.1	Great. Well, that's a good question. That's Mary, is it?
1:31.8	That's Mary, yes.
1:32.6	Yeah. Well, thank you, Murray, for that question. Actually, the chapter you're looking for
	...

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