Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART)
What is Accelerated Resolution Therapy?
Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART) is a unique approach to psychotherapy. ART is unique because the ART Therapist guides the client to replace the negative images in the mind that cause the symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress with positive images of the client’s choosing. This is done quickly, most often within one session! Once the negative images have been replaced by positive ones, the triggers will be gone. Nightmares and repeated intrusive thoughts will stop.
ART is also unique in that it combines the enormous power of eye movements to allow voluntary changes in the client’s mind with well-established therapies like Gestalt, Psychodynamic Therapy and Guided Imagery. Within the ART protocol, the eye movements, along with other ART enhancements, make these therapies work much faster and more effectively.
With these therapies, combined with ART’s eye movements and other ART enhancements, many mental health problems other than Post Traumatic Stress can also be resolved quickly. Among the things ART can deal with are OCD, Eating Disorders, Generalized Anxiety and Generalized Depressive Disorders. ART can deal with traumas often associated with Dyslexia but also go beyond that to improve reading!
How Does ART Therapy Work?
That eye movements are calming and therapeutic is evidenced-based. It has been shown that they produce theta waves in the brain. Theta waves have been connected to creativity, intuition, and daydreaming. These brain waves are often present during meditative states.
One of the special aspects of ART is that when clients replace their negative images with positive ones they don’t need to talk to the therapist about any details of the trauma. This is because ART is procedural, though creative; and the client is really in control of the process, while the ART Therapist is a helpful guide. This makes the therapy easier on the client and easier on the therapist.
Although some traumatic experiences such as rape, combat, or loss of a loved one can be very painful to visualize, early in the ART session the client has already rapidly moved beyond the place where they are stuck in these past experiences and is making positive changes of their choice. ART sessions are calming for the client and very often joyful, especially at the end, for both the client and the therapist.
What can Accelerated Resolution Therapy Treat?
Some issues that have been quickly and effectively treated by Accelerated Resolution Therapy include:
- Anxiety
- Depression
- Phobias
- Panic Attacks
- Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
- Post-Traumatic Stress (PTS)
- Addictions/Substance Abuse
- Performance Anxiety
- Family Issues
- Victimization/Poor Self Image
- Victimization/Sexual Abuse
- Relationship Issues/Infidelity
- Codependency
- Grief
- Job-Related Stress
- Pain Management
- Memory Enhancement
- Dyslexia Anxiety
What to Expect from Therapy?
Put simply, you will get out of therapy what you put into it. It’s not a magic solution that will solve all your problems. It may involve you doing some real work and being completely honest with yourself and your therapist. Sometimes facing our truth is the hardest thing of all – but from that discomfort can come healing and growth.
Insight’s therapists are available for in-person, online, or telephone counselling at several locations in Alberta. Contact us to learn more.
[1] Taken from acceleratedresolutiontherapy.com
[2] https://acceleratedresolutiontherapy.com/what-is-art/
