Acceptance and Commitment Therapy: An Experiential Approach to Behavior Change

✍ Scribed by Steven C. Hayes, Kirk D. Strosahl, Kelly G. Wilson

• Publisher: The Guilford Press
• Year: 1999
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 321
• Edition: 1
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Most therapists and clients believe that a more vital life can be attained by overcoming negative thoughts and feelings. Yet despite efforts to achieve this goal, many individuals continue to suffer with behavior disorders, adjustment difficulties, and low life satisfaction. This volume presents a unique psychotherapeutic approach that addresses the problem of psychological suffering by altering the very ground on which rational change strategies rest. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) focuses in particular on the ways clients understand and perpetuate their difficulties through language. Providing a comprehensive overview of the approach and detailed guidelines for practice, this book shows how interventions based on metaphor, paradox, and experiential exercises can enable clients to break free of language traps, overcome common behavioral problems, and enhance general life satisfaction.

✦ Table of Contents

ACCEPTANCE AND COMMITMENT THERAPY......Page 2
About the Authors......Page 8
Preface......Page 10
Contents......Page 14
Part I: The Problem and the Approach......Page 18
1. The Dilemma of Human Suffering......Page 20
2. The Philosophical and Theoretical Foundations of ACT......Page 30
3. The ACT Model of Psychopathology and Human Suffering......Page 66
Part II: Clinical Methods......Page 98
4. Creative Hopelessness: Challenging the Normal Change Agenda......Page 104
5. Control Is the Problem, Not the Solution......Page 132
6. Building Acceptance by Defusing Language......Page 165
7. Discovering Self, Defusing Self......Page 197
8. Valuing......Page 221
9. Willingness and Commitment: Putting ACT into Action......Page 252
Part III: Using ACT......Page 282
10. The Effective ACT Therapeutic Relationship......Page 284
11. ACT in Context......Page 298
References......Page 306
Index......Page 315