Suffering is a basic fact of life for humans. But suffering is not just about pain, psychological or otherwise. It's much more than that. Humans don't just have pain; they agonize over their painful memories, uncomfortable emotions, difficult self-evaluations. They worry about them, they dread them, they engage in all myriads of activities to avoid them.

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy is about the problem of human suffering, and it’s also about much more than that. It’s about reaching beyond suffering to the larger purpose of people's lives and helping them get active in really living. ACT is centered on such questions as “What do you really want your life to be about?” or “If you lived in a world where you could have your life be about anything, what would it be?"

ACT (said as one word, not the letters) is a new cognitive-behavior therapy that has gained increasing attention in recent years. ACT emphasizes such processes as mindfulness, acceptance, and values in helping clients overcome obstacles in their lives. A basic assumption of ACT is that suffering is a normal and unavoidable part of human experience and that it is actually people's attempts to control or avoid their own painful experiences that leads to much long-term suffering and what doesn't work in people's lives. ACT helps people learn ways to let go of the struggle with pain, be more mindful, get clarity on what really matters to them, and to commit to living full, vibrant lives. The goal of therapy is not to eliminate certain parts of one's experience of life, but rather to learn how to experience life more fully, without as much struggle, and with vitality and commitment.

ACT is considered an empirical psychotherapy in that its practitioners and researchers are dedicated to the development of science and empirical evaluation of its effects. ACT has, as of May 2006, been evaluated in over 24 randomized clinical trialsfor a variety of client problems. ACT has also been adapted to create a non-therapy version of the same processes called Acceptance and Commitment Training. This training process, oriented toward the development of mindfulness, acceptance, and values skills in nonclinical settings, such as businesses or schools, has also been investigated in a handful of research studies with good preliminary results.

ACT is based on a behavior analytic account of language and cognition called Relational Frame Theory (RFT). RFT now has over 80 studies supporting its basic tenants and implications and has been researched for over two decades. RFT holds that while language has been key in allowing us to dominate the planet and create amazing levels of wealth and security, it also has a dark side. Basic properties of language seem to lie behind much of the suffering that humans experience. ACT, the applied technology resulting from RFT, attempts to help people circumvent language in those areas of life where it is less helpful, and strengthen the most useful aspects of language in the domains where it tends to be most helpful.

Training in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

Fall, 2007 - Portland Workshops:

Utilizing Acceptance and Mindfulness in Your Practice: Perspectives from Acceptance and Commitment Therapy
Saturday, October 27th, 9:00 AM - 4:00 PM
This workshop is a practical workshop focused on helping therapists integrate mindfulness and acceptance processes into their practices. The workshop includes watching video of ACT sessions focused on these processes, case conceptualization, and opportunities for practice. This workshop goes far beyond simply teaching clients how to meditate, but rather how to weave these ways of being into each moment of your therapy practice. ...for more information

Core Skills and Competencies Workshop: Helping Clients be more Values Directed and Committed.
(Jason Luoma, PhD) – 5.5 hours, Fall/Winter 2007-- not yet scheduled
This workshop is a practical introduction to methods for helping clients identify and choose their values and shift into action. It includes chances to watch videos of actual ACT sessions, exercises, role plays, as well as an overview of how values and commitment processes are the change-focused complement to acceptance and mindfulness.

Vijay Shankar is also running some ACT and mindfulness workshops in the local area: You can find info on his workshops here: www.lifequal.net

If you are interested in the second workshop, please indicate that via the form below. Let me know that you are interested int the unscheduled workshop or if you would like to sign up for a general email list for local workshops on ACT and mindfulness. Registration for the first workshop is now open.

Online Workshops in ACT

I will be soon organizing another online workshop on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. The workshop will be conducted via videoconferencing. I am considering running both a beginner's and advanced online workshop. If you are interested in participating, please contact me about your interest and I will put you on the mailing list.

• To see the brochure for the previous workshop, check out this link.
• Here is a link to webcams and headsets that I recommend for use in the workshop.

You can check be put on the email list to be alerted for future online workshops by requesting that below:

Portland - ACT peer consultation group

We have successfully organized an ACT peer consultation group for professionals in the Portland area. We have now been meeting since November, 2005. Meetings are usually once a month on Friday at 3:30-5:30pm and are free. Sessions range from open consultation on cases from an ACT perspective, role plays, video watching, or focused discussion on particular topics that the group is interested in. The sessions have been really wonderful and meaingful so far. Attendance is open to any therapists and students who are interested in learning ACT. Just send me an email at email@drluoma.com if you are curious or want more informaton abut places and times.

Phone Consultation

I also do phone consultation in ACT for people interested in learning ACT who do not have any local contacts. If you are afraid you can't afford it, please call me and we can discuss it. I work on a sliding scale. The first consultation is free for anyone interested in learning ACT. I was once in the position of not having anyone in my local area who could provide supervision in ACT for me when I was interested. My only choice at the time was to move to Reno to learn it. So I have would like to help those people out who are in the position of wanting to learn but don't know anyone nearby with expertise. My phone number is 503-260-8424.

Other Training opportunities by other ACT trainers can be found here.

Books on ACT

	Get Out of Your Mind and Into Your Life: The New Acceptance and Commitment Therapy is the first self-help book written by Steven Hayes, the primary originator of the ACT approach. This book is a great introduction to ACT for both professionals and non professionals. It has a lot of exercises and worksheets that allows you to work through the ACT process experientially on your own.
	Acceptance & Commitment Therapy for Anxiety Disorders: A Practitioner's Treatment Guide to Using Mindfulness, Acceptance, And Values-Based Behavior Change Strategies is one of the newer books on ACT and shows some of the practical and theoretical developments that have occurred since the first book was written. This is book is less technical than "the '99" book and is a great place for practitioners to begin as an introduction to ACT.
	The first book-length treatment of ACT was published in 1999 and is called Acceptance and Commitment Therapy : An Experiential Approach to Behavior Change. This is the most basic text for the ACT therapist and outlines the approach in much detail and depth. It provides an overview of the theory behind the approach, the underlying philosophy from which it flows, and the general framework for its application..
	A Practical Guide to Acceptance and Commitment Therapy is the first edited book devoted to ACT. Chapters focus on theory, core competencies, case formulation, affective disorders, anxiety disorders, PTSD, substance abuse, psychosis, multi-problem patients, children and families, stress/workplace, medical settings, chronic pain, and groups.
	Acceptance And Commitment Therapy For Chronic Pain is a new book focusing on the application of ACT to chronic pain specfically and also includes some information working with professionals using ACT.
	Act on Life Not on Anger: The New Acceptance & Commitment Therapy Guide to Problem Anger is another self-help book on ACT. I haven't read it yet, but have had a couple clients say it was quite helpful. The authors are experienced ACT therapists and authors.
	Living Beyond Your Pain: Using Acceptance & Commitment Therapy to Ease Chronic Pain is a self-help book on ACT focused on chronic pain. I haven't read it yet, so don't have a sense of how good it is. The authors are experienced ACT therapists and authors though.

Websites Relevant to ACT

*****This website is temporarily the home for LearningACT.com while it is under construction*****

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Website --- www.contextualpsychology.org/act

• This is the main website for those interested in ACT. It has many, many resources for therapists, such as treatment manuals (there are 12 on this page free for downloading by members), assessment tools, and research on ACT, amongst many other resources. This website forms the central hub of a large online community for therapists and researchers using ACT. For those not expert in the web, this is an interactive website where members of the website have the ability to add and modify the website (kind of like wikipedia). As a result, many members have added a large variety of pages to the site.
• Anyone can participate in the website. If you want to use the full interactivity of the website, you have to join ACBS. Only members of ACBS can add webpages, have their own blogs, or download files. In fact, you won't even see all the downloadable files unless you are logged into the website and have your membership active. A membership for one year for professionals is $40, which gives you access to materials that are worth much more than that if you are interested in ACT.

Relational Frame Theory Website --- www.contextualpsychology.org/rft

Association for Contextual Behavioral Science --- www.contextualpsychology.com

• The Association for Contextual Behavioral Science is a newly formed organization with currently around 500 members that is dedicated to "advancement of functional contextual cognitive and behavioral science and practice so as to alleviate human suffering and advance human well being." Most of the members are therapists and researchers of ACT and other third wave behavior therapies.

Other Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Resources

• 15 minute guided mindfulness meditation -- a dowloadable .mp3 audio file of a that you can give to clients.
• ACT case conceptualization process and form.
• ACT homework handouts that can be used by therapists who have the book Acceptance and Commitment Therapy : An Experiential Approach to Behavior Change.
• Workshops: ACT workshops are presented regularly at the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies, Association for Behavior Analysis, and University of Nevada, Reno. Information on upcoming workshops can be found on the calendar on the home page of www.contextualpsychology.org. Trainers are all around the world. A list of trainers is posted on the ACT website.
• Suggested training resources in ACT