Workshop - Sunday, 27 June (7:45am EST)
Meg McKelvie, Ph.D., Private Practice, Debbie Sorensen, Ph.D., Private Practice
Who among us does not yearn to belong? The longing to be loved, seen, valued and included is not just a current day experience, but part of our evolutionary history and survival as a species. To be part of a group, to belong, meant our individual and collective survival (Hayes, 2019).
In our connection-starved and increasingly isolated culture, we can become entangled with the conceptualized self, attempting to gain group membership and social connection by presenting ourselves as special, smart, or in need of great care. We can become unknowingly trapped inside our mismanaged yearning to belong, making it increasingly difficult to create healthy social connection (Hayes, In Press).
Drawing from A Liberated Mind, we will use experiential exercises, expressive writing, and small group work to drop below self-story and contact a sense of belonging from the inside out. We will practice body centered mindfulness, perspective taking, being more fully ourselves in the moment, and letting go of our self-stories to cultivate a healthy sense of belonging, transcendence, and an interconnected sense of we.
Educational Objectives:
1. Explain the yearning to belong in CBS terms, including the relationship between pain and values related to our yearning to belong.
2. Identify clinical signs of a mismanaged yearning to belong and apply the psychological flexibility model to guide responding to experiential avoidance, self-stories and self-limiting content about belonging.
3. Develop compassion-based writing and experiential practices to cultivate belonging that allow us to cut through unhelpful content.
