Essential Skills Agenda: Module 3 State 1 work: The Top of the Triangle of Experience Working with Defense and Anxiety
12:00 – 3:30 PM EST

Day 1

12:00 – 12:30 I: Course Overview and Orientation

12:30 – 2:15 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

2:15 – 2:30 III: Break

2:30 – 4:30 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

12:00 – 12:55 I: Review Prior Day Learning and Role-play

12:55 – 1:00 II: Directions for Experiential Exercises

1:00 – 2:00 III: Small Group (Quad) Experiential Exercises Therapist/Client Role Play to Practice Interventions to
Reduce or Bypass Defenses
Defense Restructuring

2:00 – 2:15 IV: Break

2:15 – 3:45 V: Small Group Experiential Exercises / Role-Plays Continued

3:45 – 4:30 VI: Large Group Processing of Role-play experience

Day 3

12:00 – 12:30 I: Working With Defense and Anxiety – Review of Day 2 and Overview of Day 3

12:30 – 2:15 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

2:15 – 2:30 III: Break

2:30 – 4:30 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

12:00 – 12:55 I: Review Prior Day Learning

12:55 – 1:00 II: Directions for Experiential Exercises

1:00 – 2:00 III: Small Group (Quad) Experiential Exercises Therapist/Client Role Play to Practice Interventions for Regulating Anxiety

2:00 – 2:15 IV: Break

2:15 – 3:45 V: Small Group Experiential Exercises / Role-Plays Continued

3:45 – 4:30 VI: Large Group Processing of Role-play experience