I think there is a danger that the notion of relationship is being reified, is being elevated to a ‘thing’, good or bad, that you have or don’t have. In fact it is the product of a verb, to relate, and cannot exist without the verb. As we relate to our clients we have a relationship and when we stop relating we have a memory and possibly an expectation of that way of relating.
My ‘rules’ for relating to clients are:
to take turns so we each have an equality of opportunity to speak and
each turn of mine needs to (in some way, verbal or non-verbal) affirm the client’s previous answer and build on what the client has just said.
When a client says “I don’t know” I assume that to be true at that moment but not necessarily true for all time. I also assume that my question might not have been phrased well, might not be at the right moment or maybe not delivered in a tone acceptable to the client. I am, therefore, extremely grateful that the client is giving me another chance by saying they don’t know and thus indicating (by the turn-taking rule) that it’s now my turn again. This for me is the process of relating where I take in something of the client’s world and the client takes something of mine and together we create a shared experience and shared knowledge. It is in my view, the creative process (co-construction) of any talking therapy and why all therapeutic approaches seem to work more or less as well in terms of outcome.
The ‘Approach’, in my case SFBT, then guides the therapist’s part in the process. The questions we ask are derived from our model. I have only three questions:
What is the client’s hoped-for outcome
How that outcome might look in the client’s day-to-day life
How much of it is already happening or has happened in the past.
I assume that every client has a good reason for talking with me irrespective of the referral method (mandated or otherwise) and that the good reason is connected to the future (often something feared such as losing children). My starting point is to discover that good reason – the future the client is hoping for. I appreciate that this is a radically different (and perhaps more challenging) starting point than earlier versions of the model, described in Clues (de Shazer, 1988) as Complaint – Exceptions – Goals – Task. Not asking about the problem (but listening if the client chooses to describe it) is one big difference and the other is asking about the desired outcome rather than assuming it is the absence of the problem (the difference between a ‘negative’ future based on the absence of “the problems that bring you here”, and a positive future based on the presence of the hoped-for outcome.
It sounds corny but I most often love my clients during our conversations. Because of my interest in the minutiae of a client’s hoped-for future we find ourselves in very intimate ‘moments’: a thoughtful moment when having a cup of tea at the kitchen table, the smile of a child as they wake up, a hug with a partner arriving home from work. I might not know a client’s job, where they live, how old they are or anything about their past, but I experience a closeness with their lives and hopes which I rarely experienced in my earlier therapeutic manifestations. Not that my feelings are important, what is important is that the client hears themselves say something that opens new possibilities so I want to use all the time we have on questions that might lead to such possibilities. The fact that I am warmed by the experience is a bonus for me.
As for the ‘relationship’ I never think about it the same as I never think about body language or breathing – they are things that will inevitably happen because of this type of conversation. And when the conversation is over so is the relationship and when change happens I have had no part in it. As a client once said as she left:
“I know that if we hadn’t met I would now be dead but it is important to me that you know that you have not touched my life at all”
In my idea of Solution Focused Brief Therapy that is what we strive for.
Chris Iveson
London
29th September 2024
