Essential Skills Agenda: Module 3 | State 1 work: The Top of the Triangle of Experience Working with Defense and Anxiety
9:00 AM – 1:30 PM ET
Day 1
9:00 – 9:30 AM
I: Course Overview and Orientation
9:30 – 11:15 AM
II: Working with Defense and Anxiety
- Triangle of Experience – the AEDP Central Representational Schema and its Categories
- Defense
- Anxiety
- Core Affective Experience
- Self-at-Worst and Self-at-Best Versions of the Triangle
11:15 – 11:30 AM
III: Break
11:30 AM – 1:30 PM
IV: Working with Defense and Anxiety – Continued
- Defining Defenses
- Types of Defenses
- Function of Defenses
- AEDP Techniques for Softening Defenses; Bypassing Defenses; Putting Defenses to the Side
- The Somatic Experience of Defense
- Using Parts Work
- Cost/benefit Analysis of Defenses and Their Consequences
- Relinquishing the Defenses
- Bypassing Defenses
- The Protective/Adaptive Nature of Defenses
- Affirming Defenses and the Important Role They Played in the Past
- Restructuring Defenses
Day 2
9:00 – 9:55 AM
I: Review Prior Day Learning and Role-play
9:55 – 10:00 AM
II: Directions for Experiential Exercises
10:00 – 11:00 AM
III: Small Group (Quad) Experiential Exercises Therapist/Client Role Play to Practice Interventions to
Reduce or Bypass Defenses
Defense Restructuring
11:00 – 11:15 AM
IV: Break
11:15 AM – 12:45 PM
V: Small Group Experiential Exercises / Role-Plays Continued
12:45 –1:30 PM
VI: Large Group Processing of Role-play experience
Day 3
9:00 – 9:30 AM
I: Working With Defense and Anxiety – Review of Day 2 and Overview of Day 3
9:30 – 11:15 AM
II: STATE 1: The top of the Triangle of the Experience: Working With Defense and Anxiety – Continued
- Defining Anxiety
- Implicit Origins of Anxiety
- The Signal Function of Anxiety
- Anxiety in the Mind and Body
- Voicing Anxiety
11:15 – 11:30 AM
III: Break
11:30 AM – 1:30 PM
IV: STATE 1: The Top of the Triangle of the Experience: Working With Defense and Anxiety – Continued
- Defense Combined With Anxiety
- Dysregulation
- Undoing Aloneness
- Social Engagement as a Way to Reduce Fear and Anxiety
- Self-Regulation
- New Experience That Emerges When Anxiety Decreases
Day 4
9:00 – 9:55 AM
I: Review Prior Day Learning
9:55 – 10:00 AM
II: Directions for Experiential Exercises
10:00 – 11:00 AM
III: Small Group (Quad) Experiential Exercises Therapist/Client Role Play to Practice Interventions for Regulating Anxiety
11:00 – 11:15 AM
IV: Break
11:15 AM – 12:45 PM
V: Small Group Experiential Exercises / Role-Plays Continued
12:45 – 1:30 PM
VI: Large Group Processing of Role-play experience
