Values are the bread-and-butter of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, and one of the elements of the model most easily borrowed by therapists working in other psychotherapeutic modalities. Pausing to explore a client’s personal values can provide a guiding light in a wide variety of therapies, as well as help overcome impasses in treatment with clients who are ambivalent or feeling stuck.
In this video, Dr. Russ Harris offers his insights on values-based thinking, highlighting the important distinction between values and goals, and discussing why values are so useful in the pursuit of a fulfilling, meaningful life.
What are values from an ACT perspective?
Russ describes values as your heart’s deepest desires for how you want to behave as a human being. More broadly, values are the signposts by which we determine how to live. They might include our personal morals and ethics (for example, honesty, courage, or integrity), but may also be related to what we enjoy (things like pleasure, beauty, or fun), our interests and passions (like knowledge, creativity, or exploration), or how we want to connect to others (for example, cultivating a spirit of kindness, being loving, or demonstrating loyalty).
As Russ points out, values can almost always be expressed in one or two words. In contrast, more detailed ideas usually reflect a goal or a rule. For example, “being a good parent” might be something a client identifies as important to them, but it doesn’t reflect a specific value. Unlike rules and goals, values create the opportunity for committed action (another important tenet of the ACT model) in a much wider range of circumstances.
This matters from a clinical perspective because rules don’t typically offer a clear pathway to meaningful behaviour change. In the case of the parenting example, connecting to underlying values like patience, generosity, or presence with their children gives the client something they can implement straight away and across a wide range of circumstances.
What’s the difference between values and goals?
While values describe how we want to behave, goals are specific things we want to have, achieve, complete, or attain. If you think of your life as a trip you’re taking, your goals are like the destinations on your itinerary, the places on the map that you’re trying to get to. Values, on the other hand, are more like the compass that you use to get yourself there. They are a relevant part of the whole journey, keeping you headed in the right direction.
Why does ACT focus on values rather than goals?
While goals are obviously important, ACT tends to focus much more on values for a number of reasons. Starting a conversation with clients about their values is an accessible, pragmatic way to help them begin cultivating greater self-awareness. It also ensures that the therapy remains client-centred, rather than defaulting into a one-size-fits-all vision of wellbeing or functionality. This is of particular relevance to clients from minority groups, including those experiencing neurodiversity (for more on this topic, see ACT for ADHD, or ACT for Autism). )
For therapists working with clients who are stuck, ambivalent, demoralised, or caught up in perfectionism, reorienting to an awareness of their values provides a path to movement and emotional freedom that can be put into place immediately, without the contingencies often associated with goal-oriented strategies.
Russ points out three more ways that values-based work can improve clients’ lives:
Values inspire. Many clients presenting for therapy have lost access to any meaningful sense of what they want from life, or have never given it any thought in the first place. But when clients are given the opportunity to get in touch with their values, they have a chance to be moved from within by their own wholehearted ideas about the kind of person they want to be and by the impact they want to make in their time on Earth.
Values motivate. Building a rich, meaningful life is hard work (or as Russ would say, hard yakka!). Committed action often requires that clients step outside their comfort zone, tolerate difficult feelings, and overcome long-held patterns of stagnation and avoidance. Being connected to their values, to their deeper sense of purpose, can give them the motivation and fortitude to stick it out when things get difficult or uncomfortable.
Values create fulfilment and meaning. Living a values-based life provides the sense of meaning and purpose that comes from a deep, genuine clarity about what is important. ACT differentiates this kind of fulfilment from happiness, as something that can offer more consistent and enduring benefits for the individual. The felt sense that comes from living in alignment with their values can also offer clients a meaningful pathway to a stronger and more positive sense of self.
From values to committed action
Once clients are clear on their values, they are then in a stronger position to take committed action. Goals can come back into the picture as the vehicle through which values can be expressed, rather than as an ultimate benchmark of success in themselves. Clients are then positioned to find ongoing satisfaction from how they move through the world, or how they travel along their journey, regardless of whether they ultimately arrive at any particular destination.
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