- Beautiful Mind
- Pretty much the whole thing. The main character, John Nash (Nobel Prize winner in economics), has schizophrenia and despite active hallucinations and delusions, he chooses NOT to be on antipsychotic medication (side effects are blunted affect and he isn't as clear in his genious mathematical ability). Nash chooses to just let his hallucinations be present and not to let his behavior be guided by belief in them as literal "truth". In turn, they follow him around for the rest of his life; a vital life full of meaningful experiences with his wife and his work.
- ACT Principles: acceptance, willingness, defusion, choice and valued action.
A Beautiful Mind - Comment submitted by Steven Hayes on February 12, 2006.
We all have our little girls following us around, hallucination or no. We need to learn to acknowledge them and then, sad though it is, to learn to be silent if it is costing us what we value to do otherwise.
You could do a lot worse when asked to explain ACT that simply to say "it is teaching folks how to do A Beautiful Mind thing with their own struggles"
- S
Steven C. Hayes, University of Nevada