Are You in the Business of Helping People Change?
Are you a physician, psychologist, social worker, life coach or some other helping professional? Then you are in the business of changing people for the better. The change usually means your client (or patient) needs to change behaviors. Getting people to change used to be hard, now it's much easier...
Welcome to the ACT Matrix
An simple yet powerful diagram that helps you quickly get to powerful life change while building a solid therapeutic relationship.
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Two Lines
The ACT Matrix is just two lines with two arrows. These crossed lines are easy to look at. One of the powerful things about the matrix is that it gives people something meaningful to look at while you are having a conversation with them.
LEARN MOREA Few Simple Words
Are added to the two lines. Senses, Mind, Toward and Away. Thus the vertical line represents noticing the difference between sensory and mental experiencing. The horizontal is about noticing the diference between how it feels to more toward who's important versus how it feels to move away from something like fear.
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MASTER THE THERAPEUTIC RELATIONSHIP
Then We Add Four Questions
- Who's Important to You?
- What Yucky Stuff Shows Up and Get in the Way?
- What are your favorite away moves?
- What could you do to move toward who's important to you?
Noticing
Finally we add noticing in the middle. Noticing is very powerful. By learning to notice the different parts of the matrix, behavior change can show up easily.
LEARN MOREStart the Relationship This Way...
Notice that the matrix to the right has only one question...
Who's important to you?
You want to start this way because it primes us to think about who's important instead of what's wrong.
While this is probably counter to what you have learned, e.g., "What brings you here?"
Asking, "Who's important to you?" establishes your relationship as a collaboration about progressing toward people instead of moving away from some thing.
Framing "What's Wrong"
as a nuisance... Something a nuisance that gets in the way of moving toward important people.
'Framing' refers to the human ability to reframe, or to see things from more than one point of view.
Most people show up to your office framing "yucky stuff" as bad stuff that needs to be gotten rid of. That's okay, but a more constructive frame is that the yucky stuff gets in the way of relationships.
In your therapeutic relationship you might still be focused on taking care of some yucky stuff, but it's in the service of moving toward who's important.
Favorite Away Moves
Start by asking about what the person already does to move away from the yucky stuff, their favorite away moves. We all move away, and readily admit you do away moves too. This normalizes the away moves and helps you collaborate with the person.
At least some of the current away moves are not working for the person. That's why they came to see you. That's okay, you also have away moves that don't work.
BTW: The use of "Favorite" is another reframe.
Master the Therapeutic Relationship
What Could You Do?
This orients the relationship toward the future and brings it back to moving toward who's important.
Ultimately your client will feel better about progressing toward relationships.
Ultimately you will feel better about helping people move toward relationships.
Noticing What Works
Noticing what works is the key to living a valued life. This includes noticing away and toward moves that work to move you toward what you want your life to stand for.
It's also VERY important to notice the difference between sensory and mental experiencing. The human mind can fool us.
A big part of the therapeutic relationship is gently helping people realize the gift of using the five senses instead of relying on what the mind tells us.
"Dear Dr, Polk It has been 2 years since I came across your creative way of doing ACT. At the time I read your first book. Ever since I've been watching your clips in the ACT Matrix Academy. A few months ago I bought your second book. Then everything fell into its right place. So, basically this is a thank you email. I have learned so much from your attitude and work, though we have never met. There is one more thing that I learned from you - the act of giving. I am writing a free guiding book for parents in Hebrew (nearly finished). I think that every parent and teacher should get know the matrix perspective. All of the psychologists that I supervise are familiar with this perspective. I wonder whether you might want to add your preface to the book. Best, Yossi"