Full Course Description
Module 1: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Step-by-Step
Program Information
Objectives
- Use the six core processes of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) to help clients advance psychological flexibility.
- Incorporate the role of psychological flexibility in ACT and list clinical techniques for increasing it.
- Utilize acceptance approaches with avoidance problems to strengthen a client’s willingness to have emotions.
- Implement clinical skills for helping clients to defuse from language obstacles.
- Utilize exercises in therapy with clients like, contacting the present moment, to aid clients with developing flexibility to engage in the present moment and let go of their struggles.
- Analyze how a client’s unclarified values can lead to clinical problems in relation to assessment and treatment planning.
- Integrate ACT into different therapeutic styles and methods as an approach to managing symptoms.
- Create committed action plans for clients with anxiety disorders to improve level of functioning.
- Use metaphors to undermine language-based avoidance repertoires to improve client engagement.
- Implement emotional and behavioral willingness techniques with clients to reduce experiential avoidance.
- Integrate ACT techniques into treatment for specific disorders including depression, anxiety, trauma and the personality disorders.
- Demonstrate how ACT incorporates elements of exposure therapy to reduce experiential avoidance.
Outline
The ACT Model
- The nature of human suffering
- “Healthy normality” is a myth
- Language: The double-edged sword
- Undermine unhelpful thoughts
- Aiming for psychological flexibility and why
- The ACT hexagon model
Acceptance
- Strengthening a willingness to have emotions
- The opposite of acceptance is experiential avoidance
- Experiential avoidance throughout the lifespan
- Why acceptance is important
- Case example: Teenage shyness & hoarding
Defusion
- Look at thoughts rather than from thoughts
- Deal with automatic thoughts
- The power of words
- The problem with cognitive fusion
- Address CBT-based disputation techniques with defusion
- “Taking your mind for a walk” exercise
- Case example: Eating disorders & social phobia
Perspective-Taking
- Understand the “Self” in ACT
- Self-as-content, self-as-perspective, self-as-context
- Observer self-exercise
- Deal with identity issues
- Case examples related to PTSD & childhood sexual trauma
Mindfulness
- Contacting the present moment
- Why being in the here-and-now is critical for mental health
- Relationship between mindlessness and psychopathology
- Meditation, mindfulness and mindful action
- Exercises for mindful action
- Case example: Anger, personality disorders, alcoholism
Values Work
- The positive side of language
- Identifying core values
- Differentiate values and goals
- Writing values-based treatment goals
- The ethics of values clarification
- Establishing the life line
- Case example: Heroin addiction, bipolar disorder
Committed Action
- Define “commitment” objectively
- Integrate evidence-based therapy with ACT
- Develop ACT-based behavior therapy treatment plans
- Improve behavioral activation with ACT
- Accelerate exposure therapy with ACT
- Case example: Depression, agoraphobia
Pulling It All Together
- Hexaflex model for psychological flexibility
- Ask the “ACT Question” for self-help and case conceptualization
- Inflexahex model: Diagnosis from an ACT approach
- Case example: Obsessive-compulsive disorder
Incorporate ACT into Your Own Approach
- Social skills training
- Applied Behavior Analysis
- Inpatient treatment programs systems
- Exposure and ritual prevention
- Behavioral activation
- Parent management training
- Executive coaching
The Mindful Action Plan
- ACT simplified
- Passengers on the bus: The classic ACT group exercise
- How ACT can make you a better therapist
Copyright :
07/07/2016
Session 1 | Facing the Struggle
MODULE 2: In-Session Demonstrations
Program Information
Objectives
Session 1: Facing the Struggle
- Apply the core theory and principles of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) used in clinical practice.
- Analyze how "creative hopelessness" lays the groundwork for Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT).
Session 2: Control & Acceptance
- Prepare clients to accept their thoughts and feelings, and modify their need to control or eliminate them.
- Integrate ACT “eyes closed” techniques into your sessions with powerful effects.
Session 3: Cognitive Defusion
- Apply cognitive defusion used within clinical practice.
- Anticipate common pitfalls with cognitive defusion, and apply methods for recognizing and remedying them.
Session 4: Mindfulness, Self & Contact with the Present Moment
- Formulate “eyes-closed” exercises you can integrate into clinical practice.
- Generate examples of how to facilitate awareness of the “observing self” with clients.
Session 5: Values & Action
- Discriminate between the ACT concepts of values and goals
- Modify ACT techniques for increased effectiveness with adolescents
Session 6: Psychological Flexibility
- Articulate ways to adapt ACT in brief-therapy settings and situations.
- Formulate how to help clients get the most benefit from exposure therapy within the ACT Paradigm.
Outline
Overview of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy
- Define the six core processes of ACT
- Discuss treatment techniques used in ACT
Withdrawn client role play
- Examine why metaphors can be helpful for clients
- Focus positively on what therapy is for
- How to handle the client’s lack of interest in feelings and emotions
Concluding remarks from the presenter
- How to perform informed consent
- Approaches to handle the process of “facing the struggle”
Copyright :
01/01/2007
Session 2 | Control and Acceptance
MODULE 2: In-Session Demonstrations
Program Information
Outline
Overview of control and acceptance
- Face the struggle to create something new
- Learn to embrace avoided sensations
Role play topics
- Use the classic ACT metaphor to provide new possibilities
- Detect when the cognitive system sets in
- Learn to recognize familiar patterns with the client
Concluding remarks from the presenter
- Set up acceptance goals with the client
- Make sure to be patient while using ACT
Copyright :
01/01/2007
Session 3 | Cognitive Defusion
MODULE 2: In-Session Demonstrations
Program Information
Outline
Overview of cognitive defusion
- Allows for flexible responses
- The difference between ACT and CBT
Learning through role play
- Apply defusion methods to clients
- Learn how to dig through client resistance
- Turn words into just sounds
- Discover how to program the mind
Wrap up with the speaker
- Things to keep in mind when using defusion techniques
- The human mind and the human life connection
Copyright :
01/01/2007
Session 4 | Mindfulness
MODULE 2: In-Session Demonstrations
Program Information
Outline
Overview of mindfulness, self, and contact with the present moment
- How to begin sessions with mindfulness exercises
- Eliminate irrelevant chatter from the session
Learn through role play
- Distinguish between content and context
- Dealing with clients that aren’t open to talking about emotions
- Trying an “eyes closed” exercise
Wrap up with the speaker
- Moment-to-moment situations
- Connecting acceptance and diffusion into a mindfulness approach
Copyright :
01/01/2007
Session 5 | Values and Action
MODULE 2: In-Session Demonstrations
Program Information
Outline
Overview of values and action
- Define the most important components of ACT
- Understand the meaning of values
Learning through role play
- Distinguish between choices and logical judgments so values aren’t heavily fused with judgment
- Determine what the client holds as important
Concluding with the speaker
- All components of ACT are interconnected
- Connecting pain-values to the ACT approach
Copyright :
01/01/2007
Session 6 | Psychological Flexibility
MODULE 2: In-Session Demonstrations
Program Information
Outline
Overview of psychological flexibility
- Define psychological flexibility
- Integrating ACT into normal back and forth therapy
Role plays with different therapists
- Robin Walser works with a woman that is having a hard time letting go of her children, whom are in their thirties, for fear that serious issues will come up
- Kirk Strasol’s client is worried about her disabled veteran brother
- Stephen Hayes talks with Troy, an obsessive compulsive disordered client that worries about contamination
ACT wrap up
- Focus on functions and processes that fit personalized models
- ACT is not just a technique, but a set principles organized into a model that explain what makes being a human is so hard
Copyright :
01/01/2007