Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Dummies

Learn to: - Engage fully with your here-and-now experience - Create distance from unhelpful thoughts - Make room for painful feelings - Engage fully in your life despite anxiety, depression, stress, OCD and psychosis Harness ACT to live the life you want to live Do you want to change your relationship with the painful thoughts and feelings that are holding you back? With this down-to-earth guide, you'll discover how to identify negative and unhealthy modes of thinking and apply Acceptance and Commitment Therapy principles to create a healthier, richer and more meaningful existence with yourself and others. - Transform your life – find out how to apply ACT to your everyday life to help reduce the impact of stress, accept love, nurture relationships, cope with anger and manage pain - ACT for your health – discover how Acceptance and Commitment Therapy is used to support complex mental health difficulties, such as addiction, psychosis, depression and anxiety - Keep an open mind – get familiar with the basic ideas underpinning ACT and find lots of exercises to practice the core skills that help us be open, aware and active—and how to apply these practices to your life - Principles and perspectives – learn about the theory and concepts behind ACT and how it's providing new insights into human consciousness, mental health and the mind Open the book and find: - Advice on living a life with meaning - How to use ACT understand our true 'selves' - Ways to manage anger and stress with ACT - Guidance on using ACT when living with chronic pain - How to use ACT to treat addiction and mental distress - The best ways to increase defusion and acceptance - Top tips for living mindfully

Freddy Jackson Brown is a clinical psychologist and has worked in the NHS for over 20 years. Duncan Gillard is a Senior Educational Psychologist and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy practitioner. He provides psychological services to children, young people, families and school-based professionals.

Foreword xiii
Introduction 1
Part I: Getting Started with Acceptance and Commitment Therapy 5 Chapter 1: Introducing ACT 7 Chapter 2: Understanding that a Little Unhappiness Is Normal 17 Chapter 3: Developing Psychological Flexibility 29 Chapter 4: Living a Life with Meaning 45 Chapter 5: Moving Forward with Committed Action 57 Chapter 6: Overcoming Barriers to Living a Meaningful Life 67 Chapter 7: Being Present through Mindfulness 81 Chapter 8: Understanding Your 'Selves' 93
Part II: ACT Principles and Perspectives 107 Chapter 9: Counting the Cost of Avoiding Yourself 109 Chapter 10: Linking the Human Mind and Consciousness 119 Chapter 11: Tracing the Origins of ACT and Relational Frame Theory 129
Part III: ACT for Everyday Life 145 Chapter 12: Overcoming Work-Related Stress 147 Chapter 13: Looking at Love and Relationships through an ACT Lens 159 Chapter 14: Dealing with Problem Anger 173 Chapter 15: Helping You Live with Chronic Pain 187
Part IV: Mental Health Issues from an ACT Perspective 197 Chapter 16: Addressing Anxiety with ACT 199 Chapter 17: Beating Depression with Acceptance and Committed Action 211 Chapter 18: Dealing with Addiction 225 Chapter 19: Recovering from Psychosis 237
Part V: The Part of Tens 247 Chapter 20: Ten Brief Exercises to Help You Live More Mindfully 249 Chapter 21: Ten Tips for Value-Based Living 257 Chapter 22: Ten Ways to Overcome Fusion and Experiential Avoidance 265 Appendix: Further Sources 273
Index 277