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“Psychological flexibility is the ability to adapt to a situation with awareness, openness, and focus and to take effective action, guided by your values.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“In ACT, our main interest in a thought is not whether it’s true or false, but whether it’s helpful; that is, if we pay attention to this thought, will it help us create the life we want?”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“The more we try to avoid the basic reality that all human life involves pain, the more we are likely to struggle with that pain when it arises, thereby creating even more suffering.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“Thus, evolution has shaped our brains so that we are hardwired to suffer psychologically: to compare, evaluate, and criticize ourselves, to focus on what we’re lacking, to rapidly become dissatisfied with what we have, and to imagine all sorts of frightening scenarios, most of which will never happen. No wonder humans find it hard to be happy!”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“Basically, expansion means making room for our feelings. If we give unpleasant feelings enough space, they no longer stretch us or strain us.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: Stop Struggling, Start Living

“Commitment” means that when you do (inevitably) stumble or get off track, you pick yourself up, find your bearings, and carry on in the direction you want to go.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“one in ten adults will attempt suicide, and one in five will suffer from depression.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“It’s a sense more of resignation than of acceptance, of entrapment rather than freedom, of being stuck rather than moving forward.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“Adopting this definition means you can be successful right now, whether or not you’ve achieved your major goals.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“Donna learned quickly that there’s no point in beating yourself up when you screw up or fail to follow through. Guilt trips and self-criticism don’t motivate you to make meaningful changes; they just keep you stuck, dwelling on the past. So after each relapse, Donna came back to the basic ACT formula: A = Accept your thoughts and feelings and be present. C = Connect with your values. T = Take effective action.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“But wanting to get rid of something is quite different from actively struggling with it.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“Accept it. Take effective action to improve it.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“A = Accept your thoughts and feelings and be present. C = Connect with your values. T = Take effective action.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“THINKING VERSUS OBSERVING”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“Therefore, it makes sense to put your life’s energy mainly into action and attention.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“Another way of putting this is that your thinking self produced some thoughts, and your observing self observed them.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“This particularly tends to happen with depression and anxiety. With anxiety you tend to get hooked by stories about the future, about things that might go wrong and how badly you’re sure to handle them.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“A major concept in ACT is the idea of “workability.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“Mindfulness Meditation”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: Stop Struggling, Start Living

“So what would life be like if you were to let go of self-esteem altogether;”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“to find happiness, we try to avoid or get rid of bad feelings, but the harder we try, the more bad feelings we create. It’s”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: Stop Struggling, Start Living

“you” are a combination of the thinking self, the physical self, and the observing self. They”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“Creating a Life Worth Living”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“A value is a direction we desire to keep moving in, an ongoing process that never reaches an end.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“As the great philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche once said, “He who has a why to live for, can bear almost any how.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“The “But My Values Conflict with Each Other” Demon”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“The most important thing is sailing toward shore.”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“Myth 1: Happiness Is the Natural State for All Human Beings”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“Myth 2: If You’re Not Happy, You’re Defective”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT

“The Illusion of Control”
― Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living: A Guide to ACT