Lemon, Lemon, Lemons - Exercise - An exercise in defusion to help with cognitive restructuring

This exercise involves three steps:

1. Ask the client to say a simple noun, such as “lemon” out loud once or twice, and notice what shows up psychologically – what thoughts, images, smells, tastes or memories come to mind.

2. Then, ask the client to repeat the word over and over out loud as fast as possible for approximately thirty seconds – until it becomes just a meaningless sound.

3. Next ask the client to pick an evocative judgement word that they use when they judge themselves harshly (e.g., idiot, fat, selfish, loser, etc.) and have them repeat the above two steps (e.g., ask them to notice what shows up psychologically when they say the word and then get them to repeat it rapidly for approximately thirty seconds and then reflect upon what shows up psychologically at that point.

Try it and let me know what you think?