ACT and RFT in Relationships: Helping Clients Deepen Intimacy and Maintain Healthy Commitments Using Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and Relational Frame Theory

298 Pages·2014·1.678 MB·English

by  JoAnne Dahl PhD, Ian Stewart PhD, Christopher Martell PhD, Jonathan S Kaplan PhD, Robyn D Walser PhD

“This is a fascinating account of love from the perspective of
modern behavioral analysis. This book will get you thinking
about yourself, your partner, and love in ways that you probably
haven’t thought of before. It brings scientific illumination to the
candle lights of intimacy.”
—Andrew Christensen, PhD, is professor of psychology
at UCLA, a cofounder of integrative behavioral couple
therapy, and author of Reconcilable Differences

ACT RFT
& in
relationships
Helping Clients Deepen Intimacy and
Maintain Healthy Commitments Using
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy
and Relational Frame Theory
JoAnne Dahl, PhD
Ian Stewart, PhD
Christopher Martell, PhD
Jonathan S. Kaplan, PhD
C P
ONTEXT RESS
An Imprint of New Harbinger Publications, Inc.
Publisher’s Note
This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the
subject matter covered. It is sold with the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in
rendering psychological, financial, legal, or other professional services. If expert assistance or
counseling is needed, the services of a competent professional should be sought.
Distributed in Canada by Raincoast Books
Copyright © 2013 by J oAnne Dahl, Ian Stewart,
Jonathan Kaplan, & Christopher Martell
New Harbinger Publications, Inc.
5674 Shattuck Avenue
Oakland, CA 94609
www.newharbinger.com
Cover design by Amy Shoup
Acquired by Melissa Kirk
Edited by Will DeRooy
All Rights Reserved
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data on file
Printed in the United States of America
15 14 13
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 First printing
Contents
Foreword v
Acknowledgments ix
1 Introduction to Romantic Love 1
2 The Roots of Our Approach 21
3 Relational Frame Theory 41
4 Acceptance and Commitment Therapy 73
5 Language Traps and Self-as-Content 103
6 Psychological Rigidity 131
7 Valuing Intimate Relationships 153
8 Self-Compassion 183
9 Couples Therapy 217
10 Summary and Conclusions 245
References 255
Index 269

Foreword
Dear reader,
About twice a year, my husband and I take a long road trip to
visit my brothers and their families. They always take the time
to spruce up the guest room and light a candle for our arrival.
After the fun of greeting everyone, my husband and I move our
suitcases into the guest room. Each time, as I swing the door
open, I am greeted with a warm and welcoming sign that hangs
right above the bed: “If there is anything better than to be loved,
it is to be loving.” The sign is plain and unpretentious—s imple
white letters on a dark background, signed by no one. Yet its
message settles in easily, like gentle snow falling on the winter
ground. Creating the stuff of this message in your clinical
work— to be loving is what this book is about.
As coauthor of The Mindful Couple: How Acceptance and
Mindfulness Can Lead You to the Love You Want, as well as a
longtime practitioner and trainer of acceptance and commit-
ment therapy (ACT) and a participant in the ACT and rela-
tional frame theory (RFT) community, I am delighted to
introduce this coherent and thoughtful book that marries
behavior analytic science and love. The authors provide the
ACT and RFT in Relationships
reader with a way forward in the challenging yet fulfilling enter-
prise of couples and relationship counseling.
I first met JoAnne Dahl in mid- 2004 at an Association for
Contextual and Behavioral Science conference. She immedi-
ately struck me as someone whose work was grounded in com-
passion and primarily concerned with the “ways” of love and
relationship. But she also struck me as a person interested in
science’s role in these matters, working seriously to develop rel-
evant clinical knowledge through her position as associate pro-
fessor in the department of psychology at the University of
Uppsala in Sweden.
And she has joined others of similar character to write this
book. One of them is Ian Stewart, a faculty member in the psy-
chology department at the National University of Ireland,
Galway and a longtime associate and friend, as well as a bril-
liant researcher who has brought his talents in understanding
relational frame theory to this endeavor. There are many times
when I have been truly grateful for his diligence in helping
others to understand the RFT analysis of human language.
Christopher R. Martell, a professor at the University of
Washington in Seattle, brings fundamental knowledge to this
book with his expertise in behavioral activation. He is an expert
in this intervention, training people to embolden themselves by
taking action linked to values.
And last but surely not least is author Jonathan S. Kaplan, a
clinician and adjunct professor who writes and shares his impor-
tant work on television and radio, and has been featured in O,
The Oprah Magazine as well as on BBC News and MSNBC.
He is invested in cultivating peace, purpose, and presence
through his work— a fitting way to round out the contributions
to and development of this book.
vi
Foreword
While reading ACT and RFT in Relationships, I regularly
returned to and considered the notion of intimacy. The word
itself is related to the word familiar, meaning “well- known.”
Finding a way to be well- known in a relationship, with all of the
fear, dread, and secrets that can accompany this— as well as the
promise— is a unique challenge for human beings. It is often
difficult for us to be fully present to our own emotional experi-
ence, let alone to open ourselves up and share that experience
with another. Indeed, the prospect of being well- known is, for
some, the very barrier to love.
However, Drs. Dahl, Stewart, Martell, and Kaplan walk the
reader through a set of processes that create just the space in
which intimacy in relationship is possible. The truly notewor-
thy feature of this book— and the basis of its utility— is the
authors’ theoretical understanding of ACT and RFT and their
application to the creation of deep and meaningful relation-
ships. The authors do not take the conventional path, which
generally explores love and intimacy as parts of a plan for self-
improvement leading to a felt positive state. Rather, they provide
a behavior analytic conceptualization of love, linking this very
human issue to a sound theoretical and scientific approach and
a thorough understanding of human language and cognition.
Do not be scared away by this distinctive part of the book. The
behavior analytic approach forms the backbone of a technology
that will guide him or her in the use of the intervention while
promoting maximum flexibility in the therapy room.
In part 1, the authors introduce functional contextualism,
basics in behavior analysis, the origins of love, and the problem
of language as it relates to human relationship. Each concept is
presented in a digestible fashion and linked to the exploration
of love and intimacy in human connection. The reader will find
vii