Therapists’ Guide to Acceptance and Commitment Therapy: Essential Skills and Strategies for Moving Clients from Rigidity to Resilience

CPD

Planning Committee Disclosure - No relevant relationships

All members of the PESI, Inc. planning committee have provided disclosures of financial relationships with ineligible organizations and any relevant non-financial relationships prior to planning content for this activity. None of the committee members had relevant financial relationships with ineligible companies or other potentially biasing relationships to disclose to learners.  For speaker disclosures, please see the faculty biography.

Handouts

Speaker

Wyatt R. Evans, PhD, ABPP Related seminars and products

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Wyatt R. Evans, PhD, ABPP, is a licensed and board-certified psychologist who specializes in moral injury theory, assessment, and interventions. He is a staff psychologist with the VA North Texas Health Care System and assistant professor at UT Southwestern Medical Center. Dr. Evans’ expertise in posttraumatic stress, resilience, and recovery comes from his training and work in military treatment facilities, veterans affairs hospitals, and PTSD research institutions. He is lead author of The Moral Injury Workbook and founded the Moral Injury Special Interest Group of the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies (ISTSS). Dr. Evans has consulted with healthcare providers and administrators as well as organizations supporting emergency managers and first responders to support the recognition, prevention, and treatment of moral injury.

Speaker Disclosures:
Financial: Dr. Wyatt Evans maintains a private practice and has employment relationships with the United States Army Reserve, the University of Texas, the VA North Texas Health Care System, William Woods University, Central Texas College, Vanthcs, and UT Southwestern Medical Center. He receives royalties as a published author. Dr. Evans receives a speaking honorarium and recording royalties from PESI, Inc. He has no relevant financial relationships with ineligible organizations.
Non-financial: Dr. Wyatt Evans is a member of the American Board of Professional Psychology, the American Psychological Association, the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies, the Association for Contextual Behavioral Science, and the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies. He is an examiner for the American Board of Behavioral and Cognitive Therapy. Dr. Evans is a reviewer for several peer review journals, for a complete list contact PESI, Inc.

Additional Info

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Objectives

1. Develop an ACT-based case conceptualisation utilising process-based models. 
2. Distinguish effective, change-based from unworkable, control-based processes. 
3. Articulate the engagement of the acceptance process. 
4. Choose ACT interventions designed to increase connection to a culturally relevant, personally resonate sense of self. 
5. Select ACT interventions designed to facilitate freedom from internal barriers (i.e., thought, feelings) and facilitate. empowerment to values-based action. 
6. Utilise evidence-based, therapeutic processes of change, including cognitive defusion, psychological acceptance, and values clarification.

Outline

• The roots and reasons for ACT … in a nutshell
• What it’s all about: Psychological flexibility
• ACT-based case conceptualisation
• Evidence-based processes of change

• The costs and unworkability of absolute control
• Creative hopelessness
• Example: 312 years of suffering
• Practice: Tug-o-war

• Engage and empower the self
• Flexibly contact the here/now as well as the there/then
• Example: Trapped in trauma
• Practices: Observer self, self-statements & breathing meditation

• Willingness as the way, acceptance as the action
• Defusing from limiting language
• Examples: Perfectionists, professionals, failures & losers
• Practice: Holding lightly, having a though, the lemon & more

• Clarify, cultivate, and converge on values
• Do what works to do what matters
• Examples: Waiting to feel like it & what’s love (in context)?
• Practice: Values card sort & committed action planning/monitoring

• When to choose acceptance over change, and vice versa
• Deconflict CBT and ACT skills
• Examples: Distorted cognitions, disruptive emotions & dangerous behaviour
• Practice: Levering language to expand exercises and foster flexibility

• Do what works to do what matters
• Context specificity
• Troubleshooting difficult cases
• Limitations of the research and potential risks
• An invitation to ACT

Target Audience

• Counsellors
• Addiction Counsellors
• Social Workers
• Psychologists
• Case Managers
• Therapists
• Marriage & Family Therapists
• Other Mental Health Professionals