Acceptance & Commitment Therapy (ACT) is a contemporary form of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) that has shown much promise in helping clients with a wide range of emotional and behavioral difficulties.  ACT introduces a comprehensive model of therapy including a creative set of metaphors and experiential exercises to help clients (a) move away from unworkable change strategies, (b) make healthy contact with thoughts, feelings, and other private reactions they have feared and avoided, (c) re-connect with their deepest values to set a direction for change and to motivate change, and (d) experience their struggles differently and in a manner that permits them to move forward with their lives now.  This one-day training will introduce participants to this exciting form of therapy.  The instructor will describe the ACT model and explain how it compares to and differs from traditional CBT.  The instructor will give an overview of the rapidly-growing body of research on ACT and its processes.  Attendees will learn to conceptualize client problems from an ACT perspective and how to apply basic ACT interventions.  Attendees will be invited to participate in a variety of exercises to help experience ACT processes and to better understand their clients’ perspectives and struggles.  Lastly, attendees will leave this training with many resources should they wish to further develop their proficiency with ACT.

About the Presenter
Joel Guarna, Ph.D.

Dr. Joel Guarna is a licensed psychologist in the state of Maine.  He earned his PhD from Bowling Green State University in 2000 and trained at the Boston Consortium in Clinical Psychology as a predoctoral intern and postdoctoral fellow.  Dr. Guarna later served as a staff psychologist in the Department of Veterans Affairs Healthcare System in Boston.  During this time, he provided individual, couples, and group treatment to veterans with co-occurring substance use and mental health disorders.  He directed an intensive outpatient program for veterans with addictions at the Brockton VAMC.  He provided training and supervision to psychologists-in-training and psychiatry residents as a Clinical Instructor of Psychology in the Department of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School.  Dr. Guarna began work in private practice in 2005 and now manages his own practice, White Pine Behavioral Health LLC, in Portland, Maine.  Dr. Guarna’s areas of interest and specialization include Cognitive-Behavioral Therapies (CBT), Acceptance & Commitment Therapy (ACT), mind/body health and mindfulness-based therapies, and treatment of anxiety and mood disorders, trauma and PTSD, and addictions.  He was introduced to ACT in 1999 and has attended and given numerous talks and trainings on ACT over the past several years.

Learning Objectives

1. Attendees will learn the basic ACT model of human suffering including the roles of experiential avoidance and cognitive fusion.

2. Attendees will learn the six ACT core processes.

3. Attendees will learn the similarities and differences between ACT and other cognitive-behavioral therapies and understand the bases for these comparisons.

4. Attendees will learn to conceptualize client problems from an ACT perspective and learn ACT interventions based on these conceptualizations.

5. Attendees will learn how to employ values work to engage clients and energize their work in therapy.

6. Attendees will learn specific acceptance and cognitive defusion interventions they can begin using immediately.