Mastering the Anxiety Game in Clinical Practice: Rapid Change for the Anxious Mind

CPD

Handouts

Speaker

Reid Wilson, Ph.D. Related seminars and products

Director

Anxiety Disorders Treatment Center

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Reid Wilson, Ph.D., is a licensed psychologist who directs the Anxiety Disorders Treatment Center in Chapel Hill and Durham, NC. He is author of the just-released Stopping the Noise in Your Head: The New Way to Overcome Anxiety and Worry and the classic self-help book Don't Panic: Taking Control of Anxiety Attacks. He is co-author of Stop Obsessing! How to Overcome Your Obsessions and Compulsions, as well as Anxious Kids, Anxious Parents: 7 Ways to Stop the Worry Cycle and Raise Courageous & Independent Children.

Dr. Wilson is a Founding Clinical Fellow of the Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA) and Fellow of the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies (ABCT). In 2014, he was honored with the ADAA’s Jerilyn Ross Clinician Advocate Award - the highest national award in his field. He designed and served as lead psychologist for American Airlines' first national program for the fearful flier and currently serves as the expert for WebMD’s Panic and Anxiety Community.

 

Speaker Disclosures:

Financial: Reid Wilson is the director at the Anxiety Disorders Treatment Center. Dr. Wilson is an adjunct associate professor of psychiatry at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine. He receives a speaking honorarium from PESI, Inc. Reid has no relevant financial relationships with ineligible organizations.

Non-financial: Reid Wilson is a Founding Clinical Fellow of the Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA); and Fellow of the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies (ABCT).
 

Objectives

1. Instruct a client in logically dismantling the common dysfunctional frames of reference of an anxiety disorder or OCD.
2. Teach clients to implement a new, internally-consistent paradoxical frame of reference in order to alleviate symptoms of anxiety.
3. Implement the “moment-by-moment” therapeutic strategy with clients who are exposed to threatening situations.
4. Integrate both motivational and instructional self-talk cues to enhance exposure with clients.
5. Articulate the clinical benefits of utilizing an arousal-congruent intervention to treat anxiety disorders.
6. Appraise how to activate “approach” emotions toward anxious uncertainty during exposure.

Outline

Get Things Done Briefly

• The new data on rapid gain in treatment
• The Key: Promote change by transforming beliefs
• How to challenge resistance and the “getting rid of” pendulum problem
• Why provoking symptoms is better therapy than tolerating them

The Four Paradoxical Strategies
1. Step Back – Detachment and the Stepping Back Process

• Detach from the anxiety-provoking topic
• Change signals into noise
• Step back to gain perspective in the moment
• Generalized anxiety: “Maybe it’s this and not that”

2. Want It – Voluntarily Choosing the Experience

• Use the power of paradox to train the amygdala
• Use interoceptive exposure to modify beliefs
• Elevate a competing emotional attitude
• Choose awkward, clumsy, embarrassed, and insecure

3. Step Forward – Stepping Toward the Threat

• Move clients from defense to offence
• Persuade clients to provoke doubt and distress
• The “seeking out” strategy
• The “only do what you want to do” stance

4. Be Cunning – Talk to Anxiety

• The 3-step formula: Personify, Externalize, and Simplify
• Welcome doubt and distress through the front door
• The “act as though” principle

Doing the Work

• The logic and power of self-talk cues during performance
• Two forms of self-talk: Motivation & commands
• The benefits of moment-by-moment goals
• Generate and debriefing behavioral experiments
• Play with anxiety: How to score points

Target Audience

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