ACT: Where Awareness Becomes Progress

Acceptance & commitment therapy, commonly abbreviated ACT, offers a proven psychiatric treatment model born of cognitive and behavioral therapy roots. The evidence-based therapy method teaches situational awareness without ownership: how to effectively notice and process our thoughts without letting them own us. Through PHP and IOP programming at Real Recovery, adult male clients (18+) are encouraged to identify self-destructive thoughts and emotions which may be inhibiting recovery and are taught coping strategies in their pursuit of freedom from substance use habits.

Mindfulness – a key component to successful acceptance & commitment therapy – offers clients an opportunity to distance themselves from mental suffering and pursue active, wholesome recovery. Thoroughly integrated into our clinical programming, mindfulness complements ACT in pairing awareness with a deep realization of the current moment, without allowing past events or future possibilities to influence the present.

Effective in treating a variety of mental health issues, acceptance & commitment therapy helps our clients foster long-term mental health recovery and substance use relapse prevention.

Acceptance, Direction, Action

When the mind prevents us from moving forward, acceptance & commitment therapy helps address emotions and identify a path to progress. Through three main components – acknowledgement of life’s consequences, identification of directional value and commitment toward action – ACT helps replace damaging thought patterns with positive, productive resolve.

Accepting the Past

It’s true with acceptance & commitment therapy and it’s true in life: progress doesn’t happen by accident. Pursuing a brighter future means accepting the good – and the bad – that comprises the past. ACT offers a path forward, one that allows you to:

  • Accept the past for what it is

  • Value past successes and mistakes without allowing them to influence the future
  • Realize the importance of life taken one day at a time
  • Find happiness in the same thought patterns that before caused frustration
  • Identify and guard against destructive feelings

Make no mistake: acceptance & commitment therapy makes no attempts to stop negative thoughts and feelings from coming to the surface. In fact, it’s important that we learn to embrace a full spectrum of emotion. Rather, ACT helps clients foster an appreciation for life’s hardships and a real excitement about everything to come.

Charting the Present

After developing a deep respect for past difficulties, and learning the role that life’s challenges play in shaping our future, acceptance & commitment therapy helps teach clients how to enjoy the present. This means owning the direction your life is heading, and basing daily decisions on perceived value and continued freedom. As clients receive ACT, they learn that charting the future means:

 

  • Learning to judge potential decisions based on the value behind each
  • Acting independently of potentially destructive thoughts and feelings
  • Changing behaviors to change the outcome
  • Reorienting the thought process to better navigate life’s opportunities
  • Developing real gratitude for loved ones who help guide your future

ACT lays the foundation for a brighter day, after teaching clients to separate past feelings and hardship from present decisions.

 

Pursuing the Future

Acceptance & commitment therapy helps restore a sense of balance and control into clients’ lives. While discerning more productive daily decisions, clients also learn how to pursue the future they know they deserve. Among other important habits, ACT teaches future-oriented adults the following lessons:

  • Setting quantifiable, measurable future goals
  • Pursuing the future without compromising the present
  • Involving loved ones in future plans without reengaging in toxic relationships
  • Integrating daily, action-based strategies that pay real dividends over time

ACT offers adult male clients real command over their own lives; after learning to make productive choices on a daily basis, clients find themselves pursuing future plans that quickly resemble their own goals.