2.9 The LE’GO Exercise

Learning Objectives:

• To engage participants in experiencing the self as an observer
• To enhance participants’ awareness of the self as context, or the holder of experiences
• To promote awareness of the continuity of the embodied self while allowing a more flexible relationship with the contents and identities of the self
• To enhance psychological flexibility related to an openness towards the concept of self

Materials:

• Bucket of small building blocks (10-15 pieces per participant)
• Paper Plates (one per participant)
• Water-based markers

Time Required: 45 minutes

Activities & Instructions

Set-up:

Participants sit in a large horseshoe shape; co-facilitators sit across from each other at the open-end of the horseshoe.

Instructions to Participants

1. Introduction – “This exercise helps us explore our sense of self, or our sense of who we are.”
2. Distribute paper plates and then the building blocks – “Please write down your name on the face of your paper plate. Once you have done that, please take a handful of building blocks and put them on your plate. Throughout this exercise, please make sure all your building blocks are inside your plate. Do not share any pieces with or take any pieces from others.”
3. Guided meditation about the recent past – Facilitator leads a guided meditation about the recent past and notices the continuity of self. Facilitator says,

• “Please put down your plate on the floor. If you are willing, please close your eyes or lower your gaze to focus on a point in front of you. We will just spend a few moments becoming aware of the present moment and our breath.” (Pause x 10 seconds.)
• “Now let’s think back to something that happened to you last summer – whatever comes to your mind is fine. See if you can recall that event as clearly as you can … Notice where you were and who you were with … Notice what you were seeing … hearing … smelling… doing … feeling … or thinking … Notice that it was you who was there, noticing all these things and experiencing all these things … See if you can notice that there is a sense of continuity between the ‘you’ back then and the ‘you’ that is here, right now, recalling all of these …”
• “Let us return to our breath and the present moment … whenever you are ready, you may open your eyes.”

4. Recreate the recent past with building blocks – Facilitator invites the participants to create what they recalled and says:

• “Please pick up your plates and use your building blocks to reconstruct the experience you just recalled. You will have about 3 minutes. When you are done, you can set it down on the floor.” (Facilitator keeps time.)
• “… Please stop building even if you have not already finished. Whatever stage you are at, take a moment to just observe what you have created. and set it down on the floor.” (Facilitator pauses for 10 seconds)
• “You may take one last look at your creation (pause). Now, pick up the plate and let’s pull the pieces apart… notice any thoughts or feelings that shows up for you when you are taking them apart. When you finish pulling all the pieces apart, please put your plate of building blocks on the floor.”

5. Guided meditation about the distant past and notice the observer self – Facilitator begins the second guided mediation by saying,

• “We will now do a second meditative exercise. If you are willing, please close your eyes or lower your gaze to focus on a point in front of you. We will just spend a few moments to become aware of the present moment and our breath …” (Pause x 10 seconds.)
• “Now cast your mind a bit farther back and recall another event – this time from your younger years as a teenager
  … Notice what you were doing and who you were with … Notice all that you were seeing… hearing… smelling… doing… thinking… or feeling … Notice what you wore and how you looked … Perhaps, your hairstyle was quite different back then … Different things might have been important to you back then … yet, in spite of the differences, it was still you that was there … there was a part of you back then observing all that … you are the continuation of the back then teenager ‘observer, you are here now recalling and observing you in the past …” (Pause.)
• “Allow yourself to bring back those experiences to the present … and let us return to our breath and the present moment … whenever you are ready, you may open your eyes.”

6. Recreate the distant past with building blocks – Facilitator provides instructions and says,

• “And now I would invite you to use your building blocks to reconstruct your teenage event. You will have 3 minutes to do this. When you are done, you can set it down on the floor.” (Facilitator keeps time and rings the bell after 3 minutes)
• “… Please stop building even if you have not already finished. Whatever stage you are at, take a moment to just observe what you have created and set it on the floor.” (Facilitator pauses for 10 seconds)
• “You may take one last look at your creation (pause). Now, pick up the plate and let’s pull the pieces apart… notice any thoughts or feelings that shows up for you when taking them apart. When you finish pulling all the pieces apart, please put your plate on the floor.”

7. Guided meditation about the remote past – Facilitator begins the third guided meditation by saying,

• “Now cast your mind even farther back and recall another event in the summer – this time from your childhood years, when you were 4 or 5 years old … Notice what you were doing and who you were with … Notice all that you were seeing, hearing, doing, thinking, and feeling … Notice that your role then was quite different from your role now… Notice that your little body then was very different back then … and probably every single cell in your body has been replaced now by a different cell … yet, notice that the ‘you’ that was there back then is the same ‘you’ that is here right now, recalling all this … ‘you’ have never been me or someone else … ‘you’ have been ‘you’ your whole life…”
• “Allow yourself to bring back that story to the present … and let us return to our breath and the present moment … whenever you are ready, you may open your eyes.”

8. Recreate the remote past with building blocks – Facilitator provides instruction and says,

• “Now I invite you to use your building blocks to reconstruct your childhood event. You will have about 3 minutes. When you are done, you can set it down on the floor.” (Facilitator keeps time.)
• After 3 minutes, facilitator says “… Please stop building now, please stop even if you have not already finished.”
• After everyone stops building with their childhood experiences, facilitator says, “Now please take one last look at your last creation, remember what feelings came up for you when you were building it, and then let’s take a deep breath, and pull the pieces apart. Notice any thoughts or feelings that shows up for you during this process.”
• Facilitator wait for everyone to take their building blocks apart, then facilitator continues, “Now let’s debrief about the exercise we just went through.”

Debriefing and Sample Scripts:

Debriefing Question:

“We have finished building and taking apart the final story from the past. Would anyone like to share their experience of doing this exercise?”

Probes:

• “What did you notice about ‘you’ throughout the three stories?”
• “What was the same about each of these 3 “you” and what was different about these 3 “you” that you remember from three different periods in your life?”

Debriefing Theme #1: Being weighed down by self-concepts

• “We can easily confuse our ‘self’ with ideas and concepts about ourselves. We can become fused with thoughts like “I am no good” and “I am unlovable”, which can haunt us again and again.”
• “If we look at the plate, it holds the pieces of building blocks, but it has never been affected by these pieces. Similarly, we are the person with these thoughts and stories, but these thoughts and stories are not us – they do not define us in any way. We do not have to buy into them or even fret over them when they show up.”

Debriefing Theme #2: Loss of sense of self

• “If we define ourselves by our self-descriptions, roles, or stories, even positive ones, we can become quite vulnerable. When changes occur, we may feel completely lost. If you define yourself by your job, what happens when you retire or lose your job? If you define yourself as being the role of a family member, what happens when you lose your loved ones?
• “Even though being dedicated to our roles and values help us function, actually defining ourselves by what we do, or our roles may make us less able to deal with change and loss.”

Debriefing Theme #3: Being weighed down by past events and memories

• “Behind some of our negative self-concepts, sometimes there may be an origin story. We may have experienced loss that are deeply painful or regrettable. We may have experienced stigma that is traumatic and disempowering. We can become fused with past events, feeling forever diminished by them.”
• “If we realize that we are the plate and not the building blocks, these past events would not have so much power over us, as they do not define us.”
• “Further, just like taking apart the building blocks, we can practice letting go of these events. Even if the memories revisit us, we can recognize that they are memories that do not define us. We can let them go again and be ready to welcome new possibilities in the next new moment and see what new stories will be told by the building blocks.”

Debriefing Theme #4: Being constricted by our own self-stories

• “Rigid identification with ideas about ourselves can constrict our actions and true potential. If you say to yourself ‘I’m shy’ or ‘I can never sing or dance’ or ‘I can never make a social change’, you may be closing yourself off from many potential opportunities, choices, or experiences in your life and limit your capacity to grow or your capacity to help or relate to others.”

Debriefing Theme # 5: Self as Observer

• “In doing this exercise, some of you might have noticed that you have changed a lot over the years – your body, your styles of fashion, your friends, your social networks, your roles, your perspectives, etc. What got you really excited as a child, like getting a candy or an ice-cream cone, may not get your excited now. However, there is something that has not changed, and that is – you as the observer of your lived experience. Notice that when you were recalling an event in the past, your recollection was your current interpretation of the observations or perspectives that you had in the past – as a child, as a teenager or who you were last year. While everything in life changes, your existence as the observer of your lived experience remains. Your observer self, or self-as-context, will always be there as you go through life.”

Key Summary Points

• When we recall different events from our past they may take on new meaning and we may gain deeper insight about these experiences, but the key learning we want to highlight from the exercise is that throughout all these changes, there is a sense of self, i.e., an observer self, that provides a sense of continuity across time and events. This is the self-as- context in ACT, distinguishing it from “the self” as often defined by concepts and stories.
• While we may focus on various pieces of building blocks as symbolic representations of ourselves, another perspective is to locate the self as the paper plate with our names on them. The plate is actually the holder that contains all the various pieces of building blocks, which change and vary over time in configuration.
• The creating and taking apart of the building blocks promote the “letting go of” and the “defusion from” the stories that we hold on to about ourselves, whether they are good or bad, joyful or traumatic, heroic or tragic.

Source:

Fung, K. P., & Wong, J. P. (2014). ACT Training Manual. Toronto, ON: Strength In Unity Project .