ACT: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy

In ACT, the goal is not to eliminate the difficult feelings, but to accept what life has provided and move forward in a meaningful way. A core goal of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy is a concept called “psychological flexibility,” which allows us to be adaptive and malleable as new thoughts and emotions arise. We began practicing this when we started sitting with our feelings, and ACT provides further tools to continue this work. A central tenet of ACT is experiencing emotions and feelings with compassion and acceptance for ourselves.

Because Acceptance and Commitment Therapy marries behavioral therapies like CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) with mindfulness practices, this can be a particularly effective framework from which to approach our relationship with alcohol. Perhaps in the previous journaling exercise, alcohol was one of the things pulling you away from acting in accordance to your values. A commitment to align with your stated values by reducing or removing alcohol might be one of the possible “next right steps” for you. If you have already removed alcohol from your life, this practice can be helpful to reaffirm that commitment.