2-Day: Intensive ACT Training: Acceptance & Commitment Therapy

Daniel J. Moran, PhD, BCBA-D,

is the former president of the Association for Contextual Behavioral Science (ACBS), the international ACT organization with over 8,000 members worldwide. He co-authored the first case conceptualization manual for Acceptance and Commitment Therapy entitled ACT in Practice (New Harbinger) and served on the first ACT training committee.

As a recognized ACT trainer in the ACBS community, Dr. Moran has an engaging training style that has led him to be an invited keynote speaker for many events in the last decade. He has also been featured on The Oprah Winfrey Network, TLC, and The Discovery Channel discussing the treatment of many clinical disorders and has published several articles and book chapters, including publications with CBT pioneer Albert Ellis and ACT pioneer Steven Hayes.

Dr. Moran founded the MidAmerican Psychological Institute, a clinic in Chicagoland, and continues to supervise therapists and treat patients in that organization. His passion is for applying the ACT principles in important areas outside of the clinic, such as the boardroom or construction sites. He established Pickslyde Consulting in order to bring mindfulness and value-directed commitment skills to the workplace in order to improve safety, innovation and leadership. Dr. Moran has utilized ACT in work implementations and clinical training sites on six continents and in all 50 of the United States.
 

1. Demonstrate effective use of the six core processes of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) to help clients advance psychological flexibility.
2. Employ clinical techniques for increasing psychological flexibility in clients using ACT.
3. Utilize acceptance approaches with avoidance problems to strengthen a client’s willingness to have emotions.
4. Apply clinical skills to help client effectively handle automatic cognitions.
5. Utilize effective ACT exercises in therapy to aid clients with developing new skills to engage in the present moment and move past struggles.
6. Assess and clarify a client’s values in order to develop an effective treatment plan and avoid potential clinical problems.
7. Integrate ACT into different therapeutic styles and methods as an approach to managing symptoms.
8. Create committed action plans for clients with anxiety disorders to improve level of functioning.
9. Use metaphors to undermine language-based avoidance repertoires to improve client engagement.
10. Utilize clinical strategies to develop an ACT-based behavior therapy plan as it relates to treatment outcomes.
11. Perform emotional, behavioral willingness and exposure techniques with clients to reduce experiential avoidance.
12. Apply ACT techniques to the treatment of specific disorders including depression, anxiety, trauma and personality disorders.

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

Limitations of the Research and Potential Risks

• Children and adolescents
• Acute, florid hallucinations
• Catatonic depression
• Individuals with an adverse reaction to mindfulness exercises

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