Therapy Approaches
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy in Edmond, Oklahoma
Make room for what is here. Move toward what matters.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, often called ACT, helps you respond more flexibly to difficult thoughts and feelings while taking meaningful steps guided by your values. The goal is not perfect control over your inner experience. It is greater freedom in how you choose to live alongside it.
Understanding ACT
You do not have to win every struggle inside your mind before you can live.
Thoughts and feelings can become more powerful when all your energy goes toward avoiding, arguing with, or controlling them. ACT offers another option: notice what is showing up, make room for what cannot be changed in this moment, and choose your next step with intention.
This does not mean tolerating harm or pretending pain is acceptable. It means building more choice in how you respond.
Psychological flexibility
Open up. Be present. Do what matters.
ACT brings these directions together so difficult internal experiences do not have to decide every move.
Allow your experience to be here
Notice this moment with curiosity
Take action connected to your values
What sessions may include
Practice a different relationship with what shows up.
ACT may include reflection, experiential exercises, metaphors, mindfulness skills, and practical commitments. Your therapist will shape the work around your needs, readiness, culture, and goals.
Make room
Practice allowing thoughts, feelings, sensations, and memories to be present without requiring them to disappear first.
Step back
Notice the mind at work and create space between having a thought and automatically treating it as a command or fact.
Come back
Reconnect with the present moment so you can respond to what is happening now rather than only to what your mind predicts.
Move with purpose
Choose small, workable actions that express the values you want to carry into everyday life.
Values are a direction
Goals can be completed. Values can keep guiding you.
A goal might be having an important conversation. A value might be honesty, connection, or courage. ACT helps you clarify the qualities you want to bring to your choices, including when the outcome is uncertain or discomfort comes along.
ACT may support
More room to choose what comes next.
Insurance Plans We Accept
Care that feels supportive from the very first step.
Acuity Counseling is in-network with several major insurance plans, helping make quality mental health care more accessible.
Book an Appointment
Choose who feels right for you.
Our therapists blend compassion with real, evidence-based tools to help you feel seen, supported, and empowered to grow.
Online across Oklahoma · In person in Edmond
Select a therapist to view appointment times
Whitney Hake
MCP, LPC-S, NCC
- In person
- Online
- Insurance accepted
Julie Siberts
M.Ed., LPC-Candidate, NCC
- In person
- Online
- Insurance accepted
Not sure who to choose? The booking window can help you compare availability. You can also contact Acuity directly.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy FAQs
Questions about flexibility, values, and committed action
What is Acceptance and Commitment Therapy?
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, often called ACT, is an approach that helps you relate more flexibly to difficult thoughts and feelings, clarify what matters to you, and take workable actions guided by your values.
Does acceptance mean approving of what happened or giving up?
No. Acceptance in ACT does not mean liking, approving of, or resigning yourself to pain or unfair circumstances. It means practicing a more open response to internal experiences that are already present so they do not have to control every choice you make.
Will ACT try to make negative thoughts disappear?
ACT does not require you to eliminate difficult thoughts before moving forward. Therapy may help you notice thoughts as mental events, create some distance from them, and decide whether following them supports the life and relationships you value.
What are values in ACT?
Values are ongoing qualities of living that matter to you, such as connection, honesty, creativity, learning, care, or courage. They are different from goals because they can guide many choices rather than being completed once.
What concerns may be supported with ACT?
ACT may be used while supporting anxiety, depression, grief, burnout, identity concerns, life transitions, relationship difficulties, work-related stress, and other experiences where difficult thoughts or feelings are narrowing your choices. Your therapist will determine how ACT fits your individualized care.
Can ACT be provided online?
Yes. Acuity may use ACT during in-person sessions in Edmond or online therapy when you are physically located in Oklahoma. Your therapist will help determine whether the approach fits your needs and goals.
