The ACT Matrix
A four-quadrant sorting worksheet from acceptance and commitment therapy. Clients sort their experience into who and what matters, the unwanted inner experiences that show up, the things they do to move away from those experiences, and the things they do to move towards what matters.
About this resource
The ACT Matrix, developed by Kevin Polk and Benjamin Schoendorff and colleagues, presents the ACT model as a simple diagram with two crossing lines. The vertical line separates five-senses experience (the outside world and observable behaviour) from mental experience (thoughts, feelings, memories, urges). The horizontal line separates moving towards what matters from moving away from unwanted inner experience. The result is four quadrants that a client can fill in about almost any situation in a few minutes. At the centre sits the person doing the noticing.
The matrix is a point-of-view exercise rather than a technique. Its purpose is to help clients notice the difference between actions taken to escape or control inner discomfort and actions taken in the service of what they care about. Repeatedly sorting experience this way builds psychological flexibility: the ability to notice thoughts and feelings, hold them lightly, and choose behaviour based on values. Because it uses no jargon and involves no argument with the client's thoughts, it suits people who find traditional cognitive work adversarial and people who are ambivalent about therapy.
The professional version adds guidance on drawing the matrix collaboratively, on the 'workability' question that follows the sorting (how has moving away worked in the short and long term?), and on using the completed matrix across sessions as a shared map to return to.
How to use it
- Draw the matrix on paper or a whiteboard with the client. Start bottom right: who and what matters to you? Then bottom left: what unwanted inner experiences show up and get in the way? Then top left: what do you do to move away from those experiences? Then top right: what do you do, or could you do, to move towards who and what matters?
- Keep the pace conversational. The matrix is filled in through questions, not lectures. Accept whatever the client offers without correcting it.
- Once the four quadrants have content, ask the workability question about the top-left quadrant: how well have these away moves worked in the short term, and in the long term? Let the client draw their own conclusion.
- Point to the centre and ask the client to notice that they are the one who can see all four quadrants. This introduces the observing self without needing to name it.
- Ask the client to notice, between sessions, whether each action they take is a towards move or an away move. Noticing is the assignment; changing behaviour is not required yet.
- Return to the matrix in later sessions. Most ACT processes (defusion, acceptance, values, committed action) can be introduced by pointing to the relevant quadrant.
References
- Polk, K. L., & Schoendorff, B. (Eds.). (2014). The ACT Matrix: A New Approach to Building Psychological Flexibility Across Settings and Populations. New Harbinger.
- Polk, K. L., Schoendorff, B., Webster, M., & Olaz, F. O. (2016). The Essential Guide to the ACT Matrix: A Step-by-Step Approach to Using the ACT Matrix Model in Clinical Practice. New Harbinger.
- Hayes, S. C., Strosahl, K. D., & Wilson, K. G. (2012). Acceptance and Commitment Therapy: The Process and Practice of Mindful Change (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.
