A Liberated Mind: How to Pivot Toward What Matters

by Steven C. Hayes

Those randomly assigned to receive the four hours of ACT training missed on average only a half a day of work over the entire six months—a 99 percent reduction in sick leave use. The participants given the usual medical treatment had 15.1 medical visits during that time; the ACT participants had 1.9 visits—an 87 percent reduction. Pain and stress went down in both groups equally, but what is important is that the ACT participants had reductions in pain and stress while going to work, whereas the medical-treatment-as-usual participants had so many work absences that they were now headed toward a lifetime of disability, just as the government feared when it identified them as “high risk.”