Workshop at ACBS World Conference 2022, San Francisco

Attend my workshop session “Doing More But Never Doing Enough: Help your clients unhook from productivity anxiety and strive skillfully”

Many high-performing clients report being more “productive” than ever, but still feel like they aren’t doing enough. Hooked by productivity anxiety, clients get caught in vicious striving cycles that leave them feeling dissatisfied, emotionally and physically depleted, and acting in ways that are out of alignment with their values. Drawing from research on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Compassion Focused Therapy (CFT), and the contemplative teachings of “Wise Effort,” this workshop will guide practitioners to help clients shift from unworkable striving toward values-based, compassionate action. Participants will learn the signs of productivity anxiety and the common sociocultural, biological, attentional, motivational, cognitive, self, behavioral, and affective processes that keep clients stuck in doing more but never feeling like they are doing enough. Participants will learn metaphors, embodiment practices, experiential exercises, and short writing assignments to engage processes that support skillful, compassionate striving.

Educational Objectives: 

1. Describe the role that experiential avoidance and attachment play in maintaining productivity anxiety and be able to diagram these processes as unworkable striving cycles.
2. Describe biological and sociocultural factors that influence unworkable striving.
3. Apply metaphor, embodiment practices, and experiential exercises to increase client’s skillful, values-based, and compassionate striving cycles.