Experiment with this list

[Guest guest]

Hi all,This is my observation - I haven't really done a good control experiment on this.  But, I think this list has been really bad for me.  A lot of it may be that it's a group of depressed anxious or embittered people.  And that might not be a good thing.  Also it may be that the list is dominated by just a few people and some of these people have an axe to grind.  Or they feel anger and embitterment and what to spread that anger and embitterment to others.

I would be very curious to see a control study of the efficacy of participating in this list.In some ways I'm puzzled.  Studies have shown efficacy of ACT and ACT is one of the evidence based therapies.  So it may be that ACT would be a big help too me if I just stick to the other ACT resources and exclude this list.  And I will now experiment with that.

My observation now is that REBT for me is much more efficacious.  Now there might be some things I can take from ACT to improve REBT.  The diffusion.  The mindfulness too.  But I think I have to find better mindful exercises for me.  I'm very ADHD and the sitting and breathing exercises are not all that good for me.  Vigorous exercise helps me become more mindful.  I do yoga but I prefer the more vigorous flow types than the types that hold ananas.  When I go about my business I practice mindfulness.  For example while driving.  Most people are not mindful when driving and race up to stop at traffic lights instead of trying to go with flow and maybe time the lights.

I'm curious about the studies and if there is anything about what kind of people benefit from ACT and from CBT and REBT.  Maybe there something about me where REBT works better.And I found positive psychology to be a wonderful resource.  It is such a big and active area in psychology right now.  Everything from the flow work by Csikszentmihaly to Selgiman's Posttraumatic growth to Fredrickson's Broaden-and-Build, is all such good stuff.

One thing about flow.  Albert Ellis often talked about having an absorbing interest.  Csikszentmihaly work on flow is very similar to Ellis idea of absorbing interest.  I have always thought of ACT's values and committed actions as similar to this.  But now I think there are some differences.  The flow or absorbing interest is really something outside of yourself.  It may reflect your values, but I think being absorbed in something that is more outside of yourself may give you something different than the ACT values and committed actions.  When I read you guys' stuff on this, it just seems to self-absorbed or something and sometimes creepy.  For this flow stuff, think more outside of yourself - maybe think something more altruistic - a contribution coming from you to the world outside of yourself.  Check out Csikszentmihayly's works on flow.

But I'm really grateful to the professionals on this list and will experiment with ACT resources excluding this list and I love REBT and positive psychology and so of course do a lot with that.  I'll drop back in next year sometime to see how this list is going and see if the same people still dominate the list or if it changes.

Cheers!