ABSTRACT
Cognitive or cognitive-behavior therapy is probably the fastest growing field of the vast general area of behavior therapy and in some ways is taking over this field. Rational-emotive therapy in its general form is synonymous with cognitive-behavior therapy, and in its more elegant or specific form provides a comprehensive theory of personality change. Meditative techniques, are not necessarily spiritual—which the dictionary defines as "of the spirit or soul, often in a religious or moral aspect, as distinguished from the body; not corporeal; sacred, devotional, or ecclesiastical; spiritualistic or supernatural." Meditation may well be more potentially harmful than many other techniques largely for the reason just given: its common tie-up with spirituality and antiscience. One of the goals of Western psychology and psychiatry can well be that of aiding scientific and unmasking antiscientific meditation. Meditation completely divorced from "transcendentalism" or "religiosity" may be a productive, although probably always limited, form of psychotherapy.
