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ACT, or acceptance commitment therapy, is a widely-used psychotherapy technique that can help people overcome a variety of issues that come from negative thoughts and how they respond to them. Here are some tips that can make it easier for you to accept what’s happened in your life so that you can focus on making changes that benefit you.
Practice Mindfulness
Mindfulness is a powerful tool and a key component in countless mental health strategies because it’s effective, but it’s an extremely important part of ACT.
The act of practicing mindfulness involves being in the present moment and taking in your thoughts, feelings, as well as your immediate surroundings. A common issue people have is that they tend to dwell or ruminate on negative thoughts rather than not respond to them at all.
———————————————————————————————– Try online therapy and get 15% off from our partner, BetterHelp. ———————————————————————————————–When you are being mindful, you are acknowledging that these thoughts, feelings, and sensations exist, and you simply accept them without placing a label on them or judging them. When we stop placing importance on these parts of our being, they can become less bothersome and weaken their control over our lives.
Don’t Try To Change The Past
Related to the previous section regarding rumination and dwelling, people often get stuck in the past and what they could have done to change things that could’ve made their current situation possibly better.
In the ACT method, patients are instructed to try to let go of the past and instead focus on what they can do to improve the present and the future. One of the first ways to start letting go is by simply accepting that it happened, and there’s nothing that can be done to alter this event.
This doesn’t mean that you need to be okay with the specific event happening, such as being a victim of violence of any kind, but rather, you must find ways of coping with it so that you can move on and regain control over your life.
Reflect On Your Emotions
In addition to ruminating, people who experience any sort of negativity in their lives have a natural inclination to try to avoid or push away their thoughts and feelings because they make them uncomfortable.
Even though this does provide a temporary sense of relief, you’re still avoiding the issue at hand, and more often than not, it comes back again and will continue to bother you. Even if they aren’t the same repetitive thought, you can probably spot some patterns in your behaviors if you look back far enough.
To start accepting yourself and, therefore, starting making positive changes, try to recall times when you felt uncomfortable and perhaps, intense emotions and think about how they made you feel then and now. How did you respond to them? If you’ve identified any unhelpful behavior patterns, you can now work to fix them rather than repeat them time and time again.
More Resources For Acceptance & Commitment Therapy
———————————————————————————————– Try online therapy and get 15% off from our partner, BetterHelp. ———————————————————————————————–Now that you have an understanding of how to start accepting your thoughts, feelings, and emotions and deal with them productively, it’s time to start committing to reaching your goals, and the best way to do this is with the assistance of a therapist.
To find more information about acceptance and commitment therapy, visit BetterHelp to read more about this effective method of improving your mental health and how you can find a therapist who understands ACT and its techniques so they can aid you in finding self-improvement.
Conclusion
Acceptance is challenging, but having a plan in place, it gets easier over time. Hopefully, you have a better idea of how people can learn how to come to terms with how they think and feel from some of these strategies. In most cases, the best way to accept is to not do anything at all and just acknowledge everything around you, even if it would ordinarily cause you discomfort. By doing this and not relying on old behaviors, like avoidance, negative thoughts and feelings will loosen their grip over you.
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The post How To Put the “A” in Acceptance & Commitment Therapy (ACT) appeared first on The Good Men Project.
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