DtS Counselling | Peterborough, ON

My Approach | Time-Tested Wisdom, Clinically Applied

The philosophy behind the therapy, and why it matters for you.

Here’s something most therapists don’t tell you: the foundations of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy are rooted in ancient philosophy.

Aaron Beck and Albert Ellis, the founders of CBT, drew directly from Stoic thinkers when building the framework. The core premise, that it’s not events themselves that disturb us but the meaning we assign to them, has been tested across twenty centuries of human experience before it ever entered a clinical setting.

"It is not events that disturb people, it is their judgments concerning them."

Epictetus, Enchiridion

That’s not a modern therapist’s insight. That’s a former slave, writing two thousand years ago, describing the exact mechanism CBT is built on.

Stress-Tested Across Every Human Circumstance

Marcus Aurelius ruled the most powerful empire in the world. He also spent years in a military tent, navigating betrayal, watching people he loved die, leading wars he didn’t choose. His private journal, now known as Meditations, kept returning to one idea: you can’t control what happens to you, only how you respond

Around the same time, Epictetus was teaching the same philosophy from the opposite end of the social order, with no power, no status, no freedom of movement. Two men, nothing in common except the conclusion they both arrived at. That’s part of why it’s held up for two thousand years. It works regardless of what you’re carrying.

The Circle of Control

One of the most practical tools in CBT and DBT is the circle of control, distinguishing clearly between what you can influence and what you can’t, and learning to invest your energy accordingly. Epictetus opens his own handbook for living with exactly this distinction. Some things are up to us: our judgments, our responses, our effort. Everything else, outcomes, other people’s behaviour, circumstance, isn’t. The task isn’t to stop caring about outcomes. It’s to stop
letting them be the measure of your stability.

This isn’t about pretending things don’t hurt or don’t matter. It’s about building the kind of resilience that holds regardless of what you’re facing.

What This Looks Like in a Session

You don’t need to know anything about Stoicism to work with me. Most clients come in dealing with anger, anxiety, or a sense of being stuck, and we start exactly there. Over time you might notice the tools we use have a philosophical backbone. Working on assertiveness draws on what is and isn’t within your control in a relationship. Working on anger draws on the gap between the provocation, which you didn’t choose, and the response, which you did.

Some clients get curious about the history and go further with it, Meditations is a surprisingly readable book, as it was simply a personal journal, not a textbook. Others stick entirely with the clinical tools and let the philosophy stay in the background. Either way works.

This Approach May Be a Good Fit If You:

• Want practical tools alongside space to be heard
• Are tired of reacting in ways you don’t respect and want to understand why
• Deal with anger, frustration, or reactions that feel bigger than the moment
• Know what you should do differently and keep not doing it
• Want to understand why the work works, not just follow a technique
• Are ready to do something different, not just feel better temporarily

Ready to explore what this could look like for you?