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Personal Practice Theory...

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Running head: PERSONAL PRACTICE THEORY Guided Self-Discovery Therapy Kristopher Burnett Mississippi College

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PERSONAL PRACTICE THEORY 2

Table of Contents Abstract 3 Guided Self-Discovery Therapy Underlying Philosophy 4 Reality 6 References 19

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PERSONAL PRACTICE THEORY 3 Abstract Guided Self Discovery Therapy is collaborative form of psychotherapy that attempts to empower clients to achieve self awareness and overcome emotional crises that may arise throughout their lives. This form of psychotherapy is a culmination of many psycho therapies and theories. GSD uses effective therapeutic techniques to promote mental well being and provide clients with a realistic sense of self awareness

Keywords: Rogerian, Self Defeating Language, and Incremental Goals

PERSONAL PRACTICE THEORY 4 Guided Self-Discovery Therapy Guided Self-Discovery Therapy (GSD) is a Rogerian influenced version of Solution-Focused Brief Therapy (SFBT) that incorporates some concepts of Existential Therapy, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), and Gestalt Therapy. Guided Self-Discovery Therapy operates on the premise that people have, within them, innate resources to resolve behavior that is inconsistent with a person’s concept of self. The client is the director of the therapeutic process, the counselor is there to assist the client in identifying maladaptive behavior that is contradictory to the client’s therapy goals. The client/counselor relationship has to be initially, and continuously accepting. With the use of specific and deliberate language, the counselor is able to guide the client to a state of self-awareness to begin to foster a sense of self-acceptance in the client. When a person is aware, he or she is able to identity flawed cognitive processes that produce undesirable behavior, change the flawed processes, therefore modifying behavior that may hinder his or her . ability to achieve a therapeutic goal Underlying Philosophy Guided Self-Discovery Therapy is an existential, person-centered, and methodical form of psychotherapy. It is a non-directive therapy that uses subtle suggestions, in the form of open questions, to promote the client to think analytically and introspectively. GSD therapists must acknowledge that self-awareness is subjective and personal. People are not aware of things that are inconsistent with their sense of reality. This “private world can only be known, in any genuine or complete sense, only by the individual” (Rogers, 1951, p.483). People experience reality differently, a person can only see reality through his or her own perspective despite the perspectives of the rest of the world. The best way to understand a person’s perception of reality is through a phenomenological approach to psychotherapy. Given unconditional positive regard, initially and continuously, people have lowered inhibitions and are willing to be explicit about . their sense of self and reality The counselor/client relationship is paramount to achieve meaningful results using the GSD form of psychotherapy. The counselor must be open-minded, fully accepting, and non-judgmental regardless of what the client discloses. Clients have to know that their therapist wholly accepts and understands the client’s need confide in their counselor. If the counselor is not congruent, the client may notice and begin to not disclose true feelings because of the fear of being judged. GSD therapists are present to only give the client a therapeutic setting and help identify obstacles . that may hinder the client’s self actualization Key Constructs Guided Self-Discovery theorizes that people develop maladaptive schemas throughout their lives. These flawed schemas may be developed through introjection or personal experience. During a person’s personality development, these schemas form the individual’s sense of reality. If the individual’s sense of reality is not accurate, or not in consensus with his or her sense of . self, his or her behavior will reveal those inconsistencies between cognition and behavior I believe that behavior follows some form of cognition, whether it is conscious or unconscious. If this is the case, behavior is not reflexive. Behavior comes directly from our thoughts whether they are consistent with the rest of society’s thoughts, or maladaptive and deviant. The goal of GSD Therapy is to assist the client to achieve self awareness by identifying maladaptive thought processes, behaviors, and schemas. Once the client has achieved self awareness, they are able to identify toxic thought processes and behaviors without the help of a therapist. Therefore . empowering the client to engage in a therapeutic process within him or herself GSD Therapy is a process that should progress rather quickly. It utilizes a three step process that

PERSONAL PRACTICE THEORY 5 helps clients identify their goals, the actions needed to accomplish those goals, and behavior or thoughts that may impede the accomplishment of those goals. Once clients are aware of the thought patterns and behaviors that either promote or stagnate the accomplishment of their goals, they are better able to adapt to sudden emotional events that will occur or have already occurred. GSD Therapy attempts to the client’s thought patterns and behaviors as tools to be used manage . stressors that they encounter Reality People’s sense of reality is solely based on their perception. To get an understanding of the client’s perspective, therapists must use a phenomenological approach. The client can only express his or her perception of reality through the use of language. The use of language can be a limiting factor for the client to explicitly define his or her sense of self and reality. Empathic listening is crucial to fully conceptualize the client’s relationship with reality and the external world. According to Diamond (2010), how we perceive, understand, experience, interpret and respond to reality has concrete and practical repercussions in both our intrapersonal and interpersonal relationships. GSD Therapy has the capacity to align a client’s distorted sense of . reality with the reality of the external world Existential Philosophy I firmly believe that a person has the power in them to do or be whatever they desire to be. After I had a traumatic car accident, I became a recluse. I played a massively multiplayer online computer game for social interactions. I only left my house to attend doctor’s appointments. I learned my father had a terminal illness in 2006. I watched him live life to the fullest extent until the day he died. Looking at him on his death bed made me realize that I better start living the life that I wanted to live before I died. I accepted who I was and the condition I was in at the time. I . then started setting incremental goals to self-actualization Language There is no way to define, communicate, or understand anything without the establishment of language. It is difficult to recognize cognition and language as separate entities. Scientists have long debated the relationship between cognition and language (Harris, 2006). I believe that language and cognition have a unique relationship because they are able to produce or elicit each other. GSD Therapy assumes that the careful use of specific and deliberate language can elicit and influence the meaningful thought that is necessary to alter a client’s perception. Language also influences a person’s behavior by describing negative or maladaptive thoughts. Neurolinguistics is the study of the neural mechanisms in the human brain that control the comprehension, production, and acquisition of language. Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP) is a set of language and sensory-based interventions and behavior-modification techniques designed to help improve the client’s self-awareness, confidence, communication skills, and social actions. GSD Therapy utilizes NLP language patterns to empower the client to gain a . positive outlook on life The Unconscious I believe that unconscious thoughts have the tendency to influence conscious behavior. Unconscious thoughts cannot occur naturally according to Christof Koch (2008). They are the result of either introjection or personal experience. An example of this phenomenon would be similar to the classic television scene that depicts a woman, while on an elevator, clinching her purse tightly as a younger male of a minority race enters the elevator. I believe those types of unconscious thoughts are the results of societal conditioning. As a person gains self awareness, he or she is able to recognize that situations similar to the elevator example may cause

PERSONAL PRACTICE THEORY 6 unnecessary anxiety which can potentially transform into a phobia or a social anxiety disorder. GSD Therapy could be an effective therapy for someone experiencing anxiety or cognitive dissonance stemming from unconscious thoughts that produce behaviors that are not congruent .with his or her sense of self Goals of Therapy The main goal of GSD Therapy is to empower clients by fostering a therapeutic environment conducive for introspection and positive change. I believe that if a client is given a positive and nurturing environment, he or she will conform to the environmental and begin to initiate positive change themselves. According to Carl Rogers (1980) as persons are accepted and prized, they tend to develop a more caring attitude toward themselves. As persons are empathetically heard, it becomes possible for them to listen more accurately to the flow of inner experiencing. As a person begins to value himself or herself, they become more genuine and a growth-enhancer for themselves. The tendency of the client to initiate change on their own is directly reflective of the therapist’s attitude and therapeutic environment. Along with a positive therapeutic environment, therapists assist the client in recognizing behaviors and thoughts that could foster or limit self actualization. Simply stated, the final goal of GSD Therapy is to equip . clients with practical skills to overcome emotional crises without the assistance of a counselor Therapeutic Relationship The therapeutic relationship is the most vital component of GSD Therapy. It is the essential foundation that be in place before any form of meaningful therapy can occur. According to Rogers (1957), in order for constructive personality change to occur, it is necessary and : sufficient that the following conditions exist and continue over a period of time (1) Two persons are in psychological contact. The first, whom we shall term the client, is in a state of incongruence, being vulnerable (.2) .or anxious The second person, whom we shall term the therapist, is congruent or integrated in the (.3) .relationship . The therapist experiences unconditional positive regard for the client (.4) The therapist experiences an empathic understanding of the client’s internal frame of (.5) . reference and endeavors to communicate this experience to the client . The communication to the client is empathic (.6) . If any of these conditions are not met, psychological change for the better cannot occur The counselor and client work collaboratively to accomplish the therapeutic goals of the client. The therapeutic goals are of the client’s own thinking, the counselor does not set goals for the client. The client is seen as the “captain of the ship,” while the counselor can be viewed as being the “navigator“ of the journey to accomplish the client’s therapy goals. The client must always be the expert of their own lives, the counselor takes on the role of being a student of the client’s ordeal. The counselor accomplishes this by the subtle use of deliberate language in the form of Socratic questioning. The client must fully trust that the counselor is congruent before the counselor can trust that the client is being open and honest while responding to questions. There is no greater catalyst for therapy than the empathic counselor/client relationship that . provides the client with unconditional positive regard Selected Techniques The techniques utilized by GSD therapists are integrated from a number of earlier theories of psychotherapy. I believe that GSD therapists should be competent in a large array of counseling techniques to be able to assist the client with adequately exposing maladaptive

PERSONAL PRACTICE THEORY 7 behaviors and thoughts and identifying healthy behaviors and thought patterns that promote self awareness and mental wellbeing. Although no technique is as essential as the therapeutic counselor/client relationship, they are vital to the therapeutic process. Counseling techniques are analogous to the tools of any profession. The tools of a trade are useless without the knowledge . to properly use the tools

Assessment I believe all therapeutic relationships should begin with some form of assessment. The assessment process informs the therapist of the client’s problems, strengths, resources, and expectations. The counselor can begin to choose the techniques most suitable to empower that particular client and help him or her achieve wellness. GSD Therapy does not use assessments in the traditional sense. Assessments are only used to give the client the opportunity to state his or her therapy goals and how he or she wants to accomplish them. Assessments are not used for diagnostic purposes because that would imply that the client is not the expert of his or her own ”. life. “What matters is not how the counselor assesses the client but the client’s self-assessment (Corrie, 2013, p.177 ) Involving the client in a collaborative therapeutic relationship also involves working collaboratively with the client while performing assessments. Assessments don’t have to be the traditional questionnaires or inkblot tests to determine what the client is experiencing. A simple conversation, in which the client leads, may disclose all the information needed to proceed with meaningful therapy. I believe some forms of assessments can be prejudicial to some clients because they do not adequately represent the client’s perception. There can be a stigma associated with some psychological assessments and furthermore, a large number of psychological assessments have been found to be invalid based on empirical evidence (Norcross, (Garofalo, and Koocher, 2006 Phenomenological Inquiry It is important that the client view the client’s problems and goals from the client’s perspective. Open questions are used to get the client to engage in deep thought about what he or she is currently feeling as he or she discusses an issue that causes him or her anxiety. Clients are encouraged to stay with the aversive feeling so the counselor can assist them with identifying effective coping behaviors to progress through a crisis. Once the client is aware of the thought processes that was used to overcome his or her emotional ordeal, the counselor asks the client to give that thought pattern a name. It is my belief, that being able to identify the thought pattern by a name, the client is able to recall that thought pattern and use it as a skill to overcome other .similar crises Correcting Self Defeating Language A person’s language has the ability to set parameters on his or her life. Self defeating language is toxic to a person with goals. I believe that a person should speak language that positively affirms their sense of self. Self defeating language unconsciously limits a person’s ability to envision progressing beyond a perceived barrier. GSD therapists can use words that speak directly to the subconscious mind to empower clients by altering their speech patterns. According to Milton Erickson (1981), change will lead to insight more often than insight will lead to change. Erickson was one of the pioneers of hypnotherapy. After reading a number of articles and books he authored, I now have a better understanding of how language can alter a person’s perception, . therefore altering their behavior

PERSONAL PRACTICE THEORY 8 Corrie (2013) lists several language patterns that people use that can limit their confidence and subsequently limit their tendency to attempt self actualization. People use self defeating language to depersonalize, generalize, and hide from accountability. GSD therapists should use an intervention and confront the client about his or her usage of language that limits his or her therapy goals. The confrontation should not be aggressive. It should be in the form of a question similar to this example, “Would your statement have a different meaning if you replaced the word “it” with “I?” Wording a confrontation similarly reduces the chance that the client will . resist the notion of his or her language pattern sets limits on his or her behavior Dream Works Unconscious thoughts often manifest themselves in the form of a dream. According to Fritz Perls, the dream is the most spontaneous expression of the existence of the human being (Corrie, 2013). Perls theorized that every object in a person’s dream is a direct projection of that person. Having clients act out their dreams and create a dialogue with every object in that dream forces the client to think critically about what he or she is projecting. This exercise brings self . awareness to clients through an unconventional technique Confrontation Guided Self-Discovery Therapy uses subtle confrontations. All confrontations are interrogatory. Open questions provoke the type of thought that is needed to foster meaningful behavioral change. The confrontation is display a different approach to a particular emotional event. The confrontation is not used to show the client that his or her thinking was flawed, it simply offers the client an alternate logic. Some confrontations may be viewed as judgmental, GSD Therapy attempts to remove any sort of condemnation from the therapeutic process while still holding the . client accountable for his or her own behaviors Socratic Questioning Socratic questioning is defined as disciplined questioning that can be used to pursue thought in many directions and for many purposes, including: to explore complex ideas, to get to the truth of things, to open up issues and problems, to uncover assumptions, to analyze concepts, to distinguish what we know from what we don't know, to follow out logical implications of thought or to control the discussion (Fishbein, Ajzen, 2005). Socratic questioning invites the client to explore his or her own reasoning and perspectives. The counselor is there to challenge the client’s reasoning if it is not conducive to progressing toward the desired outcome of the client’s therapy. I believe clients will accept an alternate rationale, coming from a counselor that has established an adequate amount of rapport. I also believe that a positive therapeutic environment will allow the client to be open to change his or her thought patterns. The client voluntarily sought therapy, so I believe that he or she may already be looking for an alternate .perspective Reframing the Narrative . Reframing a client’s story is similar to refraining from engaging in self defeating language One of my strongest beliefs is that, if you do not like the life you’re living, change it. Having personally gone through a life altering trauma, and being in a place where I could not tolerate the stagnation of my life, I made the decision to change it. I changed the story of my life, then I set incremental goals to align my life with the story that was written. I used this technique long before I learned anything about Narrative Therapy, so I know that this technique can be an . effective tool to initiate change in a client’s life Incremental Goals Clients express their desired outcome of therapy to their counselor. The counselor and client then

PERSONAL PRACTICE THEORY 9 work collaboratively to develop objectives that will serve as stepping stones to guide the client to his or her desired outcome. If the client has goals that are not attainable, the counselor has the responsibility to inform the client that his or her goals are not realistic. The logic of incremental goals is that repeated and continuous progression can move a person a long way, both figuratively and literally. Clients should be taught that they can accomplish eno...