Are Values Enough?

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) has garnered strong empirical support across a wide range of psychological challenges, including depression, anxiety, addiction, and somatic health problems. Research supports ACT’s ability to promote psychological flexibility, helping individuals act in alignment with overarching values rather than being ruled by momentary emotions or thought patterns (A-Tjak, 2015). ACT’s key emphasis is on acceptance of difficult thoughts and feelings toward staying present in the here-and-now, so that we can shift attention toward engaging in committed actions aimed at what matters most to us.

Yet, while ACT seems to greatly enhance client capacities to relate more skillfully to difficulty, many clients struggle to translate its emphasis on values to real-world behavior change. It seems that values, while aspirational, are too lofty, too cognitive, and too far removed from the here-and-now to motivate clients when faced with actual difficulty and strong emotion.

It is my experience, and that of others (see Damasio, 1995; Baumeister et al., 2007; or Lowenstein et al., 2011) that values, while predictive of what shapes long-term decisions, may be too detached from our visceral, here-and-now experience to motivate immediate action. This seems to be intuitively true for many of us. For example, imagine that you recently experienced the loss of a close friend, and that you also have a strong personal value social connection and universalism. ACT might encourage us to accept the loss and reach out to others or engage in activities that promote connection. And yet, in the depths of your grief, the value of "connection" might feel distant and unattainable. In fact, attempting to move toward connection may only lead to a sense of paralysis as you wrestle with your own values while feeling unable to move forward due to your profound sense of grief.

It seems to me and many others that ACT misinterprets the primary driver of human behavior. While values provide a framework for long-term goals, it is emotion—not cognition or ideals—that truly motivates us. Emotions are not just reactive; they act as internal signals that help us navigate decisions (Damasio, 1995) and highlight core longings and needs. For instance, when someone faces anxiety about a job interview, the value of "professional growth" may seem distant, while the emotion of fear provides immediate feedback—signaling a need for safety or reassurance. In this case, fear, not values, becomes the more practical guide for action, and following the emotion itself, feeling into the fear, and taking care of ourselves in the fear, actually allows us to be most able to move toward our values.

Once we defuse from unhelpful thought patterns, the next step is to examine the data our emotions provide rather than to too quickly move toward the self-as-context or detachment from self in the service of our values. The emotions themselves carry vital information about our needs and boundaries (Panksepp, 1998). For example, a client who values integrity may struggle with anger in their workplace, where they feel disrespected by a colleague. ACT might encourage them to accept their anger without judgment and then to behave in line with their value of integrity, perhaps by maintaining professionalism and addressing the situation calmly. However, the intense feeling of anger may be signaling something immediate: their boundaries have been violated. By attuning to this emotion, the client can recognize a need for assertiveness and self-protection. Rather than suppressing the anger to adhere to their values, they might instead choose to first experience and validate their anger, which might allow them to addres the issue in a way that honors both their emotional experience and their value of integrity. The anger helps them act in a way that ensures their boundaries are respected moving forward.

ACT’s framework seems to get a lot right about human thinking and how cognitive processes can lead any of us feeling stuck. Yet, its’ values-based theory of committed action may need to integrate a deeper understanding of how emotions motivate behavior to be truly effective. An emotion-informed ACT approach is one that involves not just defusing from thoughts and identifying values, but also attuning to the emotional signals that guide immediate, authentic behavior. In this way, when we are faced with a difficult decision, rather than only asking "What value do I want to embody?" we might also ask, "What is my body telling me right now?" By listening to our emotions in addition to our values, we may find a more sustainable, practical, and ultimately more human form of motivation.