Each month we highlight some practical resources for therapists interested in compassion. Our aim here is to provide a brief overview and offer you a few resources where you can find out more information if these ideas are of interest to you. This Month’s Tool: The Berkeley Greater Good Science Center’s Compassion Page This page … Read more
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and its related theory of language and cognition, Relational Frame Theory (RFT), outline three ways of thinking about the self. Self as process refers to the ongoing awareness of one’s experience and the description of thinking, behaving, feeling, and sensing. Self as content (i.e., the conceptualized self) involves describing and evaluating … Read more
Every month, we scour the scientific literature for interesting studies that have practical implications for therapists working with shame, self-criticism, or compassion. Below are a few of our favorites for this month: At ACT with Compassion, we aim to help people to form warmer, more secure relationships with themselves (e.g., via increased self-compassion) and with … Read more
Case conceptualization with highly shame-prone and self-critical clients may often be thought of as case re-conceptualization. That is, clients with high degrees of shame and self-criticism often arrive in therapy with their own conceptualization of their problems, one that is often driven by fusion with the story that they are broken, damaged, incompetent, stupid, or … Read more
Each month we highlight some practical resources for therapists interested in compassion. Our aim here is to provide a brief overview and offer you a few resources where you can find out more information if these ideas are of interest to you. This month’s tool: Compassionate letter writing exercise Writing a letter to one’s self … Read more
Have you ever felt unsure about how to help a client? Have you felt powerless to change a difficult situation in a client’s life? Have you ever worried that you were doing a client more harm than good? While those may be painful thoughts to have for you as the therapist, they may actually be … Read more
Every month, we scour the scientific literature for interesting studies that have practical implications for therapists working with shame, self-criticism, or compassion. Below are a few of our favorites for this month: Prosocial behavior mitigates the relationship between stress and health and mood difficulties When you think of a typical stress response, what is the … Read more
Every month, we scour the scientific literature for interesting studies that have practical implications for therapists working with shame, self-criticism, or compassion. Below are a few of our favorites for this month: New software suggests that altering the emotional tone in a recording can affect people’s emotional state The authors of this study created a … Read more
In our previous Tool of the Month posts, we have written about two assessment measures we often give clients who are struggling with shame and self criticism, the Forms of Self-Criticising/Attacking and Self-Reassuring Scale (FSCRS) and the Fears of Compassion Scale. This month we highlight another self report measure, the Self Compassion Scale, Short Form … Read more
A number of standardized assessments exist that may be useful in working with highly self-critical and shame prone clients. These measures can be used for obtaining initial normative assessments as well as tracking change in therapy over time. Some of these measures may even have predictive utility. For example, the hated-self subscale from the Forms … Read more