Armah A Quick Guide
Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) is an extension of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) that focuses on thoughts, mindfulness, and behavioral strategies to help individuals align their lives with their values. ACT aims to cultivate openness, self-awareness, and an active approach to life, helping individuals disengage from unhelpful thoughts and behaviors to overcome psychological distress and improve mental well-being.
What is acceptance and commitment therapy?
You may have heard about cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) which is one of the most popular and evidence-based therapeutic approaches. Acceptance and commitment therapy is an extension of that. Likewise, it focuses on the language of thoughts, mindfulness, and behavioral strategies to help people live life in line with their values.
This is because a lot of times, human beings tend to get so engrossed in their thoughts that they start believing them even if they are not true. They start seeing the world through the distorted perspective of their mind and eventually, it starts to affect their behavior. On a long-term basis, they may stop living the life they always dreamed of.
This may contribute to them feeling dissatisfied, frustrated, and unfulfilled. Some of them may also believe that their life has no meaning or value. Naturally, as a result, they experience psychological distress and a range of other mental health problems. For example, depression, suicidality, anxiety, stress, somatic conditions, etc. Here, acceptance and commitment therapy conducted by a trained professional can help a person disengage from their thoughts when they are unhelpful.
Aims of acceptance and commitment therapy
The aim of ACT is to help a person become open, aware, and active.
Cultivating an attitude of openness
This involves looking at life with curiosity and being willing to explore the challenges and brings. Instead of avoiding difficulties and things you cannot control, one tries to accept everything the way it is. For example, a person who values a developing meaningful relationship with friends and family may not contact them regularly or even socialize with others in general because it requires emotional investment. An attitude of openness may help him see every chance of staying in contact with others as an opportunity to build his relationships.
Becoming more self-aware
Self-awareness means knowing your internal state including how you think, feel and behave and linking it with the external world. In other words, the person tries to live outside their head in the world and works to strengthen their connection with it. For example, a person who is anxious and full of doubts may either ruminate on the past or constantly worry about what will happen in the future. This entanglement in thoughts and emotions may dictate his behavior. Becoming more self-aware will help him understand and relate to emotions and thoughts in a new way. Such that they have less effect on how he lives his daily life.
Facing life with an active approach
Many times we tend to avoid facing emotions, and thoughts and showing behavior that is difficult. As a result, we end up living a life of avoidance and lost opportunities due to our passive approach. Acceptance and commitment therapy helps a person to be more active in their life and take charge of it by doing things that are actually important.
Doing the above is not always easy. As it involves going against our natural tendencies and patterns of avoidance. However, consistent practice of experiential exercises of acceptance and commitment therapy makes this easier. It helps one to live a life that truly matters.
Watch: [The Catch-All Nature of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy | Steven C. Hayes | Big Think]
We hope the above article was useful for you in briefly understanding the basic idea of acceptance and commitment therapy.