Solutionfocused Therapy

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Solution-focused Therapy

• We must look for the opportunity in every
  difficulty, instead of being paralyzed at the
  thought of the difficulty in every opportunity.
• Walter E. Cole

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Assumption 1

• Resistance is not a useful concept.
• Resistance implies that the client does not want
  to change (De Shazer, 1984).
• Carefully matching what we do therapeutically
  with the unique stage of readiness for change
  that the client is currently in helps to foster a
  cooperative relationship very rapidly (Prochaska,
  1994).
• Our clients want to cooperate with us however,
  we have to be careful not to be resistant
  therapists!

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Resistance is not a useful concept.

• I was returning from high school one day and a
  runaway horse with his bridle on sped past a
  group of us into a farmers yard, looking for a
  drink of water. I hoped on the horses
  back.Since he had a bridle on, I managed to take
  hold of the thick rein and said Giddy
  up!headed for the highway. I knew the horse
  would turn in the right direction.I didnt know
  what the right direction was. And the horse
  trotted and galloped along. Now and then he would
  forget he was on the highway and start into a
  field. So I would pull on him a bit and call his
  attention to the fact the highway was where he
  was supposed to be. And finally, about four miles
  from where I boarded him, he turned into a farm
  yard and the farmer said, So thats how that
  critter came back! Where did you find him? I
  said About four miles from here. How did you
  know you should come here? I said, I didnt
  know, the horse knewall I did was keep his
  attention on the road.
• Erickson (in Gordon Meyers-Anderson, 1981, p.
  166)

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Assumption 2

• Cooperation is inevitable.
• Utilize whatever the client s bring to therapy
• their strengths resources,
• key client words,
• belief system material,
• their theories of change,
• their stages of readiness to change, as well as
• their metaphors and family themes.

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Cooperation is inevitableTools for Fostering
Cooperation

• Positive relabeling (positive reframe)
• Purposive self-disclosure,
• The use of humor,
• Normalization,
• Demonstrating cultural and gender sensitivity,
• Therapeutic compliments.
• What makes change possible is the therapists
  ability to be optimistic and to see what is funny
  or appealing in a grim situation. Madanes, 1984

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Assumption 3

• Change is inevitable
• Change is a continuous process and stability is
  an illusion (Mitchell, 1988),
• The therapists belief in the clients ability to
  change can be a significant determinant of
  treatment outcome (Leake King, 1997),
• There is a direct relationship between therapists
  change talk (when, ill, and would instead
  of if.) and positive treatment outcomes
  (Gingrich, 1998)

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Assumption 4

• Only a small change is necessary.
• Once client are encouraged to value minimal
  changes, they are more likely to expect to make
  further changes.
• Act without doing work without effort. Think of
  the small as large and the few as many. Confront
  the difficult while it is still easy accomplish
  the great task by a series of small acts. Lao-tzu

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Assumption 5

• Clients have the strengths and resources to
  change.
• Perterson, C., Seiligman, M.E.P (2004).
  Character strengths and virtues A hoandbook and
  classification. New York Oxford University Press.

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Assumption 6

• Problems are unsuccessful attempts to resolve
  difficulties.
• Three common ways clients mishandle their
  difficulties (Watzlawick, 1974)
• 1. Action is necessary but not taken,
• 2. Action is taken when it should not be.
• 3. Action is taken at the wrong logical level.

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Assumption 7

• You do not need to know a great deal about the
  problem in order to solve it.
• Investigate in great detail what the client is
  doing differently during the times when the
  problem is NOT happening.
• In order to better assist your therapist with
  knowing what your strengths are, we would like
  you to notice what is happening in your life that
  you would like to continue happening. Please
  write your observations down and bring your list
  to your first appointment (de Shazer, 1985).

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Assumption 8

• Clients define the goals for treatment.
• If you do not know where you are going with your
  clients, you will end up somewhere else (OHanlon
  Weiner-Davis, 1989).

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Clients define the goals for treatment.

• Our job as a therapist is negotiate solvable
  problems and realistic treatment goals.
• Goals are the start of something new, not the end
  of something.
• Elicit a detailed description of how things will
  look when the presenting problem is solved
  (OHanlon Weiner-Davis, 1989). This will
  contain the who, what, when, and how of
  goal attainment.

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Assumption 9

• Reality is observer-defined, and the therapist
  participates in co-creating the therapy systems
  reality.
• The beliefs a person has about what sort of
  world it is , will determine how he sees it and
  acts within it, and his ways of perceiving and
  acting will determine his beliefs about its
  nature (Bateson, 1972.)
• Einstein believed that it is our theories that
  determine what we can observe.
• What you will see is what you will get. Therapist
  cannot have a theory(Anderson Goolishian,
  1991b).

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Assumption 10

• There are many ways to look at a situation, none
  more correct than others.
• For every event that occurs in the world, there
  are at least two or more explanations of that
  event (Bateson, 1980)
• Nothing is more dangerous than an idea when it
  is the only one you have. Emile Chartier
• Therapeutic flexibility is essential with
  difficult cases (Selekman, 2005)