What is ACT?
Excerpt from Chapter 1 of Acceptance & Commitment Therapy for Anxiety Disorders
by Georg H. Eifert, Ph.D. & John P. Forsyth, Ph.D.
The purpose of life is not to be happy - but to matter, to be productive, to be useful, to have it make some difference that you have lived at all.
–Leo Rosten
Introduction: Where We Have Been
Over the last 40 years, behavior therapy has led the development of empirically derived and time-limited psychological interventions to assist those suffering from anxiety and fear-related problems.
Most of these interventions now exist in the form of manuals and have been remarkably successful. Yet, all is not well. Despite some impressive short-term gains, we are still far from producing overwhelming success rates in terms of long-term recovery and prevention of relapse. Indeed, many time-limited cognitive-behavioral interventions for anxiety-related disorders appear to produce equally time- limited treatment gains (Foa & Kozak, 1997a). And, despite numerous theoretical and conceptual advances in understanding the etiology and maintenance of anxiety related disorders, we still lack agreement on the critical variables that may be involved, and do not yet agree on how best to approach the problem (Rapee, 1996).
Cognitive-Behavioral Therapies for Anxiety
For better or for worse, cognitive-behavior therapies (CBT) have become the treatments of choice for the anxiety disorders. Such treatments focus heavily on symptom alleviation as a therapeutic goal, are matched to specific DSM defined anxiety disorders, and are set within a mastery and control framework. The chief therapeutic goal of such interventions is to teach clients more effective ways to gain control over their anxiety, fear, and related symptoms. Again, this is precisely what clients have come to expect from therapy, and a posture that most clients are all too familiar with by the time they enter therapy. That is, clients have tried this or that to master and control their anxiety and fear, and often without much success. Now, they expect therapists to provide them with new, “better,” gold-plated strategies to do essentially more of the same, hoping that such strategies will be more workable than those they have tried in the past. As we will suggest, this mastery and control agenda is unnecessary, and may even be counterproductive.
Thoughts and emotions need not be managed to live a valued and meaningful life. Human experience tells us as much. Management and control of our internal private world is not a necessary prerequisite for living a meaningful life.
If this all sounds like a slam against cognitive-behavior therapies, it is not. Rather, our intent is to suggest ways that we can improve upon existing CBT interventions while retaining those components of CBT that have clearly proven effective such as exposure exercises and strategies to counteract avoidance behavior. Helping clients to improve their life situation, however, may require that we rethink the mastery and control change agenda within standard cognitive-behavioral therapies for anxiety disorders.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is a unique behavior therapy approach that aims to address human concerns about anxiety and fear in a mindful compassionate way, while encouraging people to pursue what really matters to them. In a nutshell, ACT is about helping clients to accept themselves and others with compassion, choosing valued directions for their lives, and committing to action that leads them in those directions. ACT teaches clients that it is okay to have whatever unwanted thoughts and feelings their mind and bodies comes up with and, rather than struggling with them, it teaches them new ways of relating with them as experiences to be had.
ACT has two major goals: (1) fostering acceptance of unwanted thoughts and feelings clients experience and whose occurrence or disappearance they cannot control, and (2) commitment and action toward living a life that they value. This is why ACT is about acceptance and it is about change at the same time. Applied to anxiety disorders, clients learn to accept and live with their unwanted thoughts, worries, bodily sensations, and other feelings and take charge and move their lives in directions that they value.
ACT is not just short for Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. The ACT acronym also nicely captures the three core steps or themes of this approach––Accept thoughts and feelings, Choose directions, and Take action:
1. Accept Thoughts and Feelings: Accept and embrace your thoughts and feelings, particularly the unwanted ones (anxiety, pain, guilt, inadequacy). The idea is for clients to accept what they already have anyway and end their struggle with unwanted thoughts and feelings by not attempting to eliminate or change them, by not acting upon them, and by ultimately letting them go. Through various mindfulness exercises clients learn to live with their critical evaluative mind.
2. Choose Directions: This step is about helping clients to choose directions for their lives by identifying and focusing on what “really matters” and what they value in life (“what do you want your life to stand for?”). It is about helping clients to discover what is truly important to them and then making an important choice. It is about choosing to go forward in directions that are uniquely theirs and accepting what is inside them, what comes with them, and what accompanies them along the way.
3. Take Action: This step is about committed action and involves taking steps toward realizing valued life goals. It is about making a commitment to action and changing what can be changed. The therapist encourages clients to behave in ways that move them forward in the direction of their chosen values. In this stage of ACT, clients learn that there is a difference between them as a person, the thoughts and feeling they have about themselves, and what they do with their lives. We will describe this process in detail as it is fundamental to ACT work, regardless of the clinical presenting problem.
The philosophy of ACT is somewhat similar to the serenity creed that many people love: “Accept with serenity what you cannot change, have the courage to change what you can, and develop the wisdom to know the difference.” Most people find that it is much easier to agree with the serenity creed than to do what it says. The reason is that often people simply do not know what they can change and what they cannot change. As a result, they do not know how to apply this profound statement in their daily lives and become frustrated with it. ACT teaches people to put the serenity creed into action.
ACT accepts the ubiquity of human suffering and does not seek to reduce pain or to produce a particular positive feeling. It is not about producing quick fixes, or about using culturally sanctioned “feel-good” formulas and methods to reduce suffering. ACT seeks instead to reduce suffering by increasing people’s vitality and ability to do what they want to do with their lives. This is what the ACT approach is all about: Accept and have what there is to be had (anxiety, anger, joy, memories, the whole package) while also staying committed to do what needs to be done to live a fulfilled rich life guided by chosen values. People can choose to do things they enjoy and value regardless of what it is that they think or feel. Anxiety need not stand in the way of doing. If anxious clients start to move down this path, they are likely to feel more anxiety at first. Eventually they will probably feel more enjoyment and less pain and anxiety. If that happens, it is considered a welcome by-product of therapy – it is not an explicit goal of ACT.
---------- Post added at 07:58 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:50 PM ----------
What is Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) ?
by Dr. Richard Blonna, author of Stress Less Live More
Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) is a form of psychotherapy based on cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) and relational frame therapy (RFT). You don't have to understand the theories ACT is based on, however, to be able to use it in dealing with your stress.
An underlying premise of ACT is that stress and mental suffering occur when you become rigid and inflexible in your thinking and get stuck in a rut. ACT refers to this as becoming "psychologically inflexible." ACT helps you become more psychologically flexible, get unstuck, and behave in ways that support your goals and what you value in life. Getting unstuck and developing greater psychological flexibility starts with understanding the relationships among your self-talk (the inner dialogue that goes on in your mind when you're confronted with a potential stressor), your emotions, and your behavior.
ACT looks at the usefulness of your thoughts, emotions, and behavior in specific situations, or "contexts," that relate to your values and goals. To help determine what's useful and what isn't, ACT asks you to consider this basic question: Are these thoughts, and feelings helping me act in ways that are consistent with my values and goals? If your answer is yes, you can accept them and continue to move forward. If the answer is no, you can dismiss those thoughts because they don't help you live out your values and goals.
You probably realize by now that a lot of thinking goes on during a stress transaction. In addition, you understand that your thoughts about a potential stressor actually determine whether or not it becomes an actual stressor. ACT will help you become more mindful of your thoughts and feelings about potential stressors. In addition it will help you assess whether these thoughts and feelings are helpful or not in terms of managing your stress. Lastly, ACT will help you learn how to manage unhelpful thoughts and emotions. ACT doesn't require that you spend months or years analyzing why you think and feel the way you do. Instead, ACT will teach you how to accept what you are thinking and feeling while living a meaningful and productive life.
The two main components of ACT are acceptance and commitment. Each plays a key role in helping you stay true to your values as you take steps to meet your goals...ACT is based on helping you live a life that's consistent with what you value and the goals you set for yourself.
Acceptance has three aspects: (1) becoming more mindful of your thoughts, emotions, and actions; (2) understanding how your thoughts, emotions, and actions support or oppose your values and goals; and (3) understanding how trying to eliminate or avoid painful thoughts, feelings, and actions is impossible and actually increases your suffering.
Commitment refers to sticking to your plans while coexisting with your pain and suffering. The commitment component of ACT helps you commit to actions that are consistent with your values and goals. It shows you that you don't have to eliminate your painful thoughts and feelings in order to move forward and get on with your life.
Excerpt from Chapter 1 of Acceptance & Commitment Therapy for Anxiety Disorders
by Georg H. Eifert, Ph.D. & John P. Forsyth, Ph.D.
The purpose of life is not to be happy - but to matter, to be productive, to be useful, to have it make some difference that you have lived at all.
–Leo Rosten
Introduction: Where We Have Been
Over the last 40 years, behavior therapy has led the development of empirically derived and time-limited psychological interventions to assist those suffering from anxiety and fear-related problems.
Most of these interventions now exist in the form of manuals and have been remarkably successful. Yet, all is not well. Despite some impressive short-term gains, we are still far from producing overwhelming success rates in terms of long-term recovery and prevention of relapse. Indeed, many time-limited cognitive-behavioral interventions for anxiety-related disorders appear to produce equally time- limited treatment gains (Foa & Kozak, 1997a). And, despite numerous theoretical and conceptual advances in understanding the etiology and maintenance of anxiety related disorders, we still lack agreement on the critical variables that may be involved, and do not yet agree on how best to approach the problem (Rapee, 1996).
Cognitive-Behavioral Therapies for Anxiety
For better or for worse, cognitive-behavior therapies (CBT) have become the treatments of choice for the anxiety disorders. Such treatments focus heavily on symptom alleviation as a therapeutic goal, are matched to specific DSM defined anxiety disorders, and are set within a mastery and control framework. The chief therapeutic goal of such interventions is to teach clients more effective ways to gain control over their anxiety, fear, and related symptoms. Again, this is precisely what clients have come to expect from therapy, and a posture that most clients are all too familiar with by the time they enter therapy. That is, clients have tried this or that to master and control their anxiety and fear, and often without much success. Now, they expect therapists to provide them with new, “better,” gold-plated strategies to do essentially more of the same, hoping that such strategies will be more workable than those they have tried in the past. As we will suggest, this mastery and control agenda is unnecessary, and may even be counterproductive.
Thoughts and emotions need not be managed to live a valued and meaningful life. Human experience tells us as much. Management and control of our internal private world is not a necessary prerequisite for living a meaningful life.
If this all sounds like a slam against cognitive-behavior therapies, it is not. Rather, our intent is to suggest ways that we can improve upon existing CBT interventions while retaining those components of CBT that have clearly proven effective such as exposure exercises and strategies to counteract avoidance behavior. Helping clients to improve their life situation, however, may require that we rethink the mastery and control change agenda within standard cognitive-behavioral therapies for anxiety disorders.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is a unique behavior therapy approach that aims to address human concerns about anxiety and fear in a mindful compassionate way, while encouraging people to pursue what really matters to them. In a nutshell, ACT is about helping clients to accept themselves and others with compassion, choosing valued directions for their lives, and committing to action that leads them in those directions. ACT teaches clients that it is okay to have whatever unwanted thoughts and feelings their mind and bodies comes up with and, rather than struggling with them, it teaches them new ways of relating with them as experiences to be had.
ACT has two major goals: (1) fostering acceptance of unwanted thoughts and feelings clients experience and whose occurrence or disappearance they cannot control, and (2) commitment and action toward living a life that they value. This is why ACT is about acceptance and it is about change at the same time. Applied to anxiety disorders, clients learn to accept and live with their unwanted thoughts, worries, bodily sensations, and other feelings and take charge and move their lives in directions that they value.
ACT is not just short for Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. The ACT acronym also nicely captures the three core steps or themes of this approach––Accept thoughts and feelings, Choose directions, and Take action:
1. Accept Thoughts and Feelings: Accept and embrace your thoughts and feelings, particularly the unwanted ones (anxiety, pain, guilt, inadequacy). The idea is for clients to accept what they already have anyway and end their struggle with unwanted thoughts and feelings by not attempting to eliminate or change them, by not acting upon them, and by ultimately letting them go. Through various mindfulness exercises clients learn to live with their critical evaluative mind.
2. Choose Directions: This step is about helping clients to choose directions for their lives by identifying and focusing on what “really matters” and what they value in life (“what do you want your life to stand for?”). It is about helping clients to discover what is truly important to them and then making an important choice. It is about choosing to go forward in directions that are uniquely theirs and accepting what is inside them, what comes with them, and what accompanies them along the way.
3. Take Action: This step is about committed action and involves taking steps toward realizing valued life goals. It is about making a commitment to action and changing what can be changed. The therapist encourages clients to behave in ways that move them forward in the direction of their chosen values. In this stage of ACT, clients learn that there is a difference between them as a person, the thoughts and feeling they have about themselves, and what they do with their lives. We will describe this process in detail as it is fundamental to ACT work, regardless of the clinical presenting problem.
The philosophy of ACT is somewhat similar to the serenity creed that many people love: “Accept with serenity what you cannot change, have the courage to change what you can, and develop the wisdom to know the difference.” Most people find that it is much easier to agree with the serenity creed than to do what it says. The reason is that often people simply do not know what they can change and what they cannot change. As a result, they do not know how to apply this profound statement in their daily lives and become frustrated with it. ACT teaches people to put the serenity creed into action.
ACT accepts the ubiquity of human suffering and does not seek to reduce pain or to produce a particular positive feeling. It is not about producing quick fixes, or about using culturally sanctioned “feel-good” formulas and methods to reduce suffering. ACT seeks instead to reduce suffering by increasing people’s vitality and ability to do what they want to do with their lives. This is what the ACT approach is all about: Accept and have what there is to be had (anxiety, anger, joy, memories, the whole package) while also staying committed to do what needs to be done to live a fulfilled rich life guided by chosen values. People can choose to do things they enjoy and value regardless of what it is that they think or feel. Anxiety need not stand in the way of doing. If anxious clients start to move down this path, they are likely to feel more anxiety at first. Eventually they will probably feel more enjoyment and less pain and anxiety. If that happens, it is considered a welcome by-product of therapy – it is not an explicit goal of ACT.
---------- Post added at 07:58 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:50 PM ----------
What is Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) ?
by Dr. Richard Blonna, author of Stress Less Live More
Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) is a form of psychotherapy based on cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) and relational frame therapy (RFT). You don't have to understand the theories ACT is based on, however, to be able to use it in dealing with your stress.
An underlying premise of ACT is that stress and mental suffering occur when you become rigid and inflexible in your thinking and get stuck in a rut. ACT refers to this as becoming "psychologically inflexible." ACT helps you become more psychologically flexible, get unstuck, and behave in ways that support your goals and what you value in life. Getting unstuck and developing greater psychological flexibility starts with understanding the relationships among your self-talk (the inner dialogue that goes on in your mind when you're confronted with a potential stressor), your emotions, and your behavior.
ACT looks at the usefulness of your thoughts, emotions, and behavior in specific situations, or "contexts," that relate to your values and goals. To help determine what's useful and what isn't, ACT asks you to consider this basic question: Are these thoughts, and feelings helping me act in ways that are consistent with my values and goals? If your answer is yes, you can accept them and continue to move forward. If the answer is no, you can dismiss those thoughts because they don't help you live out your values and goals.
You probably realize by now that a lot of thinking goes on during a stress transaction. In addition, you understand that your thoughts about a potential stressor actually determine whether or not it becomes an actual stressor. ACT will help you become more mindful of your thoughts and feelings about potential stressors. In addition it will help you assess whether these thoughts and feelings are helpful or not in terms of managing your stress. Lastly, ACT will help you learn how to manage unhelpful thoughts and emotions. ACT doesn't require that you spend months or years analyzing why you think and feel the way you do. Instead, ACT will teach you how to accept what you are thinking and feeling while living a meaningful and productive life.
The two main components of ACT are acceptance and commitment. Each plays a key role in helping you stay true to your values as you take steps to meet your goals...ACT is based on helping you live a life that's consistent with what you value and the goals you set for yourself.
Acceptance has three aspects: (1) becoming more mindful of your thoughts, emotions, and actions; (2) understanding how your thoughts, emotions, and actions support or oppose your values and goals; and (3) understanding how trying to eliminate or avoid painful thoughts, feelings, and actions is impossible and actually increases your suffering.
Commitment refers to sticking to your plans while coexisting with your pain and suffering. The commitment component of ACT helps you commit to actions that are consistent with your values and goals. It shows you that you don't have to eliminate your painful thoughts and feelings in order to move forward and get on with your life.
