ACT for anxiety
Skills for working with OCD, social anxiety, panic disorder, GAD, and phobias
Discover how to effectively use acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) when working with anxiety in this in-depth, skills-focused 6 hour workshop. Gain practical tools to assess and conceptualise anxiety-based disorders, target core fears, and support your clients in pursuing psychological flexibility. Dive deeply into ACT-based exposure therapy, learning how to design, implement, and adapt exposure exercises for clients both in-session and in their daily lives. With specific focus areas like treating OCD, social anxiety, panic disorder, generalised anxiety disorder (GAD), and specific phobias, the workshop combines live demonstrations, experiential exercises, and real-play to enhance your confidence in helping clients face their fears, reduce avoidance, and build purposeful, values-driven lives.
Background to the workshop
Anxiety, including social anxiety, panic and GAD, alongside OCD are among the most pervasive challenges mental health professionals encounter, yet they are often accompanied by deeply ingrained avoidance behaviours and unhelpful cognitive patterns. Traditional treatment methods can sometimes overly focus on symptom reduction, neglecting the underlying processes that sustain these conditions. ACT offers a fresh perspective by targeting the processes of psychological inflexibility that fuels anxiety. Through acceptance and values-based action, ACT enables clients to move towards a life that is rich and meaningful, even in the presence of anxiety. This workshop is designed to bridge the gap between theory and application, empowering therapists to address these complex presentations with confidence and clarity.
What you will gain from this workshop
- A clear framework for assessing and conceptualising various anxiety presentations and OCD using the ACT model
- Skills to identify and address the core fears that fuel different anxiety presentations, including OCD, social anxiety, panic disorder, GAD, and phobias
- Guidance on using ACT-based tools to help clients develop psychological flexibility and reduce avoidance behaviours
- Practical strategies to implement ACT-based exposure therapy, including:
- How to plan effective exposure exercises collaboratively with clients
- How to adapt exposure for specific conditions like OCD, social anxiety, and panic disorder
- How to conduct interoceptive exposure for panic-related symptoms
- How to integrate values work into exposure exercises to sustain motivation and progress
- The ability to integrate ACT processes like acceptance and defusion into exposure work
- Techniques to help clients practice psychological flexibility in-session, setting the stage for successful between-session activities
- Tools for effectively debriefing exposure exercises and addressing moments when clients feel stuck or resistant
- Step-by-step instruction on teaching psychological flexibility to clients
- Insight into common challenges and solutions when using ACT for anxiety and OCD, ensuring you feel equipped to handle client and therapist discomfort around exposure work
About this workshop
The workshop will be led by Dr Michael Twohig, a world-renowned expert in ACT for anxiety and OCD. Dr Twohig brings a wealth of clinical expertise and research insights, offering participants cutting-edge strategies underpinned by decades of experience in treating anxiety disorders. Over two days, this workshop blends theory with hands-on practice to ensure a rich and interactive learning experience. Through mini-lectures, live clinical demonstrations, and role-play exercises, you’ll see ACT principles in action and have ample opportunity to practise applying them to clinical scenarios. Experiential exercises will allow you to explore the nuances of ACT-based exposure therapy, including planning and implementing exposures for specific anxiety disorders such as OCD, phobias, and panic disorder. You’ll also learn how to guide clients through psychological flexibility in-session and tailor between-session exercises to their individual needs. By the end, you’ll have a toolkit of ACT-based skills and interventions ready for immediate use in your practice.
Who will benefit from this workshop?
This workshop is ideal for psychologists, therapists, and mental health professionals working with clients experiencing anxiety disorders or OCD. It is particularly suited to those with a foundational understanding of ACT who want to deepen their skills, as well as practitioners seeking to integrate ACT-based exposure therapy into their existing approaches. Whether you’re new to treating anxiety or looking to refine your techniques with a process-oriented framework, this training will provide the knowledge and confidence to address even the most complex presentations.
A basic working knowledge of ACT is recommended. If you’re new to ACT, we offer a free on-demand introduction to ACT workshop to help you prepare.
Continuing education credits are available both for attending the live workshop and for completing the workshop by viewing the recording of the live event.
APA psychologists: This program is sponsored by Contextual Consulting and is approved for 6 CE credits for psychologists.
Nationally certified counselors: This workshop is available for 6 credit hours. Contextual Consulting Ltd. has been approved by NBCC as an Approved Continuing Education Provider, ACEP No. 7578.
To find out more, including attendance requirements and how to access your certificate, go to our continuing education information page.
If you have disability and require adjustments or accommodation, please email us at admin@contextualconsulting.co.uk to discuss your needs and we will do our best to help you.
Booking cancellation
The registration fee will be refunded minus a administration charge if cancellations are received at least two weeks before the workshop date.
Cancellations within two weeks of the event date are charged the full registration fee, other than in exceptional circumstances that can be verified.
Event cancellation
In the event of cancellation of the course outside of our control we will not be held accountable for travel and/or accommodation costs incurred. However, the workshop fees will be refunded.
All workshops will be subject to minimum delegate numbers being met; in the event that a workshop should be cancelled delegates will be given no less than 2 months’ notice.
Replacing delegates
If a delegate is unable to attend and a replacement is nominated there may be a charge depending on the individual circumstances, this will be advised at the time. Please contact the us to request a replacement of delegates at least a week before the workshop date.
Contextual Consulting is committed to the identification and resolution of potential conflicts of interest in the planning, promotion, delivery, and evaluation of continuing education. Potential conflicts of interest occur when an individual assumes a professional role in the planning, promotion, delivery, or evaluation of continuing education where personal, professional, legal, financial, or other interests could reasonably be expected to impair their objectivity, competence, or effectiveness.
There was no commercial support for this event. None of the planners or presenters for this educational activity have relevant financial relationship(s) to disclose with ineligible companies whose primary business is producing, marketing, selling, re-selling, or distributing healthcare products used by or on patients.
By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:
- Describe the core principles of acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) as they apply to anxiety disorders and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).
- Identify key psychological inflexibility processes (e.g., experiential avoidance, cognitive fusion) that contribute to anxiety and OCD and formulate targeted interventions.
- Demonstrate the use of ACT-consistent exposure strategies, including how to collaboratively design, implement, and adapt exposure tasks within a values-based framework.
- Integrate ACT processes such as acceptance, defusion, values clarification, and committed action into exposure therapy to enhance therapeutic impact and client motivation.
- Facilitate in-session psychological flexibility through experiential exercises, metaphors, and therapist modelling to prepare clients for meaningful between-session practice.
- Evaluate and respond to common barriers and therapist challenges in ACT-based exposure work, including client resistance, therapist discomfort, and ethical considerations.