Dr. Albert Ellis has died.

  Dr. Albert Ellis, the grandfather of cognitive-behavioral therapy, died on July 24, 2007 at his home in New York City with his wife, Debbie, by his side.  He was 93 years old.

Dr. Ellis had been severely ill for the past year, spending much of that time in a rehabilitation center and hospital emergency rooms.
 

Dr. Ellis began his career in psychology in the 1940's,  earning a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Columbia University.  He subsequently was trained in, and practiced, Sigmund Freud's psychoanalysis.

Dr. Ellis was well-known for his strong preference for efficiency, and he found psychoanalysis to be a very inefficient approach to psychotherapy.  However, he discovered that when he took a more instructive / directive approach with his patients, that improved more quickly.  When he asked his patients to complete therapeutic tasks between sessions, they improved even more quickly.

Basing his therapeutic approach on the idea that our thoughts cause our feelings and behaviors (not unconscious conflicts or one's past),Ellis introduced Rational Therapy in 1955.  In subsequent years, Ellis named his approach Rational Emotive Therapy, then in the 1990's, Rational Emotive Behavior. Therapy.

In 1959, Albert Ellis established the Institute for Rational Living, a non-profit organization with the mission to advance and popularize REBT and to provide low-cost counseling to the public. In 1964, he used his personal funds to purchase a six-story mansion on 65th Street in Manhattan. This building housed what came to be called the Albert Ellis Institute.

Dr. Ellis was well-known for his use of profanity, and was proud of the fact that he was the first psychologist to use the "F" word publicly at an American Psychological Association convention.  However, his use of profanity (which served to get one's attention and make his statements memorable) often gave those who heard it the wrong impression about him.  As a matter of fact, he was very kind, supportive, and quite a humanitarian.

Dr. Ellis lived frugally in an apartment on the top floor, supporting the institute's mission by donating all his personal income to the institute's operation. For almost 50 years, the world's most famous living psychologist took only a $12,000 a year salary for himself, plus living accommodations and a promise of lifetime medical care. He could have been a millionaire many times over had he kept the income from his best-selling books and thousands of therapy sessions.

Dr. Ellis was also well-known for his atheism.  However, in relation to religion and God, Albert Ellis called himself a probabilistic atheist, meaning it is impossible to be 100 percent certain there is no God. Many people considered him spiritual for his tireless contributions to others. In later years, he wrote and spoke about similarities between REBT and aspects of Buddhism, with both philosophies teaching unconditional acceptance of life.

Dr. Ellis practiced and taught REBT for over 50 years, and he authored over 75 professional and self-help cognitive-behavioral therapy books.

Dr. Ellis received the highest awards from professional societies, including recently the New York State Psychological Association's Lifetime Distinguished Service Award. In a 1982 survey, American and Canadian psychologists rated Albert Ellis as having more influence on psychology than Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung or B.F. Skinner.  He also received the National Association of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapists' Outstanding Contributions to CBT Award.  Dr. Ellis sought and was awarded the NACBT's Certified Rational Addictions Therapist credential.

The National Association of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapists is very proud of the fact that Dr. Ellis was one of its first advisors.  He supported the NACBT when it was formed in 1995 and provided extremely valuable advice.  We will be forever grateful for his service to the NACBT and for starting the movement we now call cognitive-behavioral therapy.  But most of all, we will miss Al.