‘Inspiring the Deepest Kindness: ACT, Self-Care, and Self-Compassion’

Swansea University is pleased to host a two day workshop delivered by Professor Kelly G. Wilson, Ph.D., University of Mississippi and sponsored by UK Society for Behaviour Analysis. Type 2 BACB credits available.

What is Acceptance and Commitment Therapy?

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is an evidence-based treatment with over 130 randomised clinical trials. ACT is grounded in emerging clinical science that demonstrates the broad utility of mindfulness and values in human wellbeing. ACT is a hybrid therapy, bringing together aspects of mindfulness, Gestalt therapy, and humanist-existential thought, all organised under a contemporary contextual behavioral framework. The paradox upon which ACT is founded is that radical acceptance of what cannot be changed empowers us to recognise and change the things that we can. The ACT approach is about embracing necessary suffering in order to make more committed, life-affirming choices and live in accordance with deeply held personal values.

Day 1 will focus on self-care and self-compassion from an ACT Perspective from 9.30am – 4.30pm

The modern world has eliminated many sources of suffering. We seldom die from cholera or smallpox. In the developed world we die from the stressors: obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, and cerebrovascular disease. We drink, eat poorly, and are often chronically sleep deprived. We stress out. We stress about war, the economy, work, relationships, the past, and the future. We stress about our ability to tolerate stress! All this stress takes a toll on our bodies, but not just our bodies.

This workshop will briefly introduce well-established life-style factors that contribute to depression, anxiety and many other forms of mental illness. It will introduce small changes by which every person, no matter how ill, no matter what circumstance, can begin a steady program of harm reduction that makes more abundant living possible.

Health care is stressful work. Health care workers need a life hack too! This will not be an abstract examination of factors. This work will show how these life-style changes can destress both healthcare workers and their clients. Day one of this workshop will not be a mere academic endeavor. It will examine the special place of self-care in the Acceptance and Commitment Therapy model and will be experiential from start to finish.

Day 2 will focus on the Application of the ACT Model to Addiction and Co-Occurring Disorders from 9.30am – 3.30pm

Day two will bring the tools acquired on day one, along with the full ACT model, to bear directly on clients with addiction and co-occurring psychological disorders. ACT provides a trans-diagnostic model. It will introduce new worksheets and interviews that can be used with a wide variety of client difficulties. The workshop will be experiential in focus and will provide a set of tools and skills that participants will be prepared to use immediately following the workshop. It will show how the interface between mindfulness and values work in ACT can promote life enhancing change and powerful therapeutic alliance.

The Presenter

Kelly G. Wilson, Ph.D., is an Professor of Psychology at the University at Mississippi and directs the University of Mississippi Center for Contextual Psychology. He is Past President of the Association for Contextual Behavioral Science, Representative-at-Large of the Society for a Science of Clinical Psychology, and is one of the co-developers of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. Dr. Wilson has devoted himself to the development and dissemination of ACT and its underlying theory and philosophy for 25 years, publishing 54 articles, 36 chapters, and 10 books including Acceptance and Commitment Therapy 2ed, Mindfulness for Two: The Place of Mindfulness in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, and his most recent effort The Wisdom to Know the Difference: An Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Workbook for Overcoming Substance Abuse.  He has central interests in the application of behavioral principles to understanding topics such as purpose, meaning, values, therapeutic relationship, and mindfulness.  Dr. Wilson has presented workshops in 32 countries, and has participated as co-investigator in a wide range of research projects in the U.S. and around the world.

Full Rate – £250
Reduced Rate – £210 for Swansea University Staff, ABMU staff, UK SBA members, ACBS members, BABCP members
Student Rate – £160

Register here