Dancing around the hexaflex: Using ACT in practice  2

Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) can be slippery to describe. It’s an approach that doesn’t aim to change thought content, but instead to help us shift the way we relate to what our mind tells us. It’s also an approach focused on workability: pragmatic and context-specific analysis of how well a strategy is working to achieve being able to do what matters. Over the next few posts I want to give some examples of how non-psychologists (remember ACT is open for anyone to use it!) can use ACT in session. Self as context From my experience, this process is possibly the least well understood of the ACT hexaflex processes. This is my interpretation, drawn from listening to people like Kevin Vowles, Lance McCracken, Steven Hayes and Kirk Strosahl. Essentially this process is about stepping back from assumptions and requirements of socially constructed ideas of who we should be. It reflects the ability to see another perspective without having to take that perspective as your own. I see it has having two facets: (1) who am I being in this moment? and (2) what other perspectives might I be able to understand in this moment? When I’m working with someone living with pain I often see a deep sense of shame and alienation from what the person views as their sense of self. I might see grief and anger about what the person must do in everyday life. Things like having to move slowly, take medications, stop doing things they love, and follow administrative proce...
Source: HealthSkills Weblog - Category: Anesthesiology Authors: Tags: ACT - Acceptance & Commitment Therapy Chronic pain Coping strategies Pain conditions Professional topics Science in practice acceptance and commitment therapy Clinical reasoning Occupational therapy Therapeutic approaches Source Type: blogs