264 Flexibility

Hello again everybody. Welcome to the therapy show um with myself, Simon Bailey and the wonderful Mr. Bob Cook. >> Thank you for that. >> Um the we're on episode 264 and the title of of the episode is flexibility and creativity are two of the major keys to a to effective psychotherapy. >> Yes, totally agree. And for somebody that goes to Pilates, somebody's at 75, being flexible, you know, having that sense of sort of spontane creativity, uh, is top of my list. And as a therapist, it's top of my list as well. I'm a great believer in creativity, spontaneity, uh I think which really aids effective psychotherapy. >> Well, what do we mean by flexibility? What do we mean by create creativity? We'll put to one side by what do you mean by flexibility? >> Well, you you start off let's start off with the what what what do you see as flexibility? I mean, >> I see it's kind of it's a little bit like the last session we did. It's looking at the person rather than the rather than the technique, >> right? Okay. A little bit more. I agree with you. Well, um it's uh we're dealing with a human, a person coming into the room with a series of issues, a desire to change, a desire to move forward. And if we subject subject them sorry if we impose this is strong language a certain set of techniques on them it might work but I also think they're kind of going to get missed >> as an individual. um for a a a technique like CBT that might be perfect because it's it's a manualized technique and it there's very little room for any flexibility. But in the kind of talking therapies that we do, we have to be I think we have to be able to um adjust, modify um and adapt to the to the client and the client's the client's issues. >> I agree. And I was talking the last podcast about chess and that I play chess and I was saying that in chess there's three stages really. There's the opening session or the opening moves or which leads to the middle game which leads to the end game. And what happens in the opening moves in the first sort of six moves perhaps you have all these you go to chess books all these chess openings from you know queen's gambit to the king's gambit to the Sicilian defense and you learn them chess people in chess learn them >> and they know what the other person's going to move so I if I'm doing this I don't know Sicilian defense that's a certain way and therefore then so What happens is in the opening moves they move very very quickly. So within seconds you've done eight both done eight moves. Yeah. So you know and then it grows to the middle game and then that leads to the end game. The mo the geniuses the international masters though are creative especially in the middle game. The sort of mediocre chess players are the people but just go through the moves and almost like chess by wrote >> and they miss creativity they miss and therefore they'll get so far club standard maybe if they want to go further they need to have I think intuition and creativity >> and if we have if I don't that's very good analogy for what I'm talking about but I think it's the same in therapy is that you can do therapy through techniques you can do therapy through many manual iz books, you can read theory and everything else. But you know what really I think aids effective cure um is to move away from that to allow yourself to to be spontaneous to model spontaneity to your clients to model creativity to think outside the box often because if you just stay with these ways of doing things so with with a parano paranoid client I do this, this, and this. With a schizoid client, I do this, this, and this. Well, it'll work to a certain degree, but I think that if you want real effective psychotherapy, you often need to utilize very different ways of thinking creatively. Certainly be flexible. So that's how I sort of when you talk about flexibility that's what I mean to move away from those ro by rotor sort of which which will end up actually with the client and yourself more nine times out of 10 in a sort of straight jacket >> and I think you answered that very creatively. >> Oh thank you for that >> which we'll come to on to in a minute. >> Yeah. And uh but I I think the issue often is in the training of psychotherapists. Uh they they're taught treatment plans. They're sort they're taught how to work with different types of clients in a sort of manualized way. And if you want to go to the last podcast again, you were talking about beginning therapists often come with a huge fear of doing it right and wrong. And it's that huge fear that keeps them trapped. M >> usually as they start to build up more clinical hours and trust themselves more certainly in relational psychotherapy they might allow themselves to follow their intuition or creativity. It's a bit how I see it. So I think training programs I think the trainers need to bring creativity into the training and also to promote the students to follow their intuition as well as having clinic thinking. >> Did I know you don't train anymore but you did for many years. Were you able to >> I like to think I did >> promote that? How do you know were you conscious of how you did that? >> We had weekends on it to start off with um or creative is how to use intuition and to as a supervisor I would always give permission to therapist to think outside the box. >> Yeah. I that word permission that's one that comes into when I'm using doing supervision >> giving people permission to step outside Oh, that's not exactly how we learned to do it. >> But I also think that you as one who went through the training with you, you modeled it. >> I hope so. >> You know, you seriously you modeled it. You you did therapy in the room in the training. You did therapy. >> And it wasn't roleplaying. It was therapy. And you modeled that flexibility. >> Yeah. Well, I hope to think I did. And you know, I do a lot. I I don't train people so much but I do a lot of psychotherapy intensive still I do a lot of supervision but I do a lot of psychotherapy intensives to trainee students and seasoned therapists and that's a way of modeling it >> but I like to think I'm very creative within the relationship and I'm always saying to myself in as a therapist you know this is a I say it in my head you This is a process, not an event. >> Oh, >> through the process between the two of us. >> I wonder if our listeners have heard that before. [laughter] >> We'll get there. I always say that. And you know, it would be a dull place, wouldn't it? If our therapists, our own therapists, uh, were afraid to follow their intuition or give themselves permission to be creative. Uh, because we're dealing with the unconscious for for God's sake. We're dealing with people's emotional literacy. And we often need to get give people permission to you know be emotional or regulate emotions or whatever it is. And we may need to be very creative in that process. Um people compare different modalities and they say one is better for this and better for that and blah blah blah. And yet underlying that all of them is the therapeutic alliance. the relationship >> the relationship and I think if you're not attending attuning to the other person in the dance then you're missing them. >> Well, I couldn't agree more. I think I quite like what you just talked about there. You use a sort of metaphor, didn't you? >> I'm trying to be creative here. Yeah, >> you're very creative. like therapy in some ways is a dance, isn't it? And I like the way you use that. I mean, could you say a little bit more about, you know, the dance you see between cries and therapy, what that means for you? >> Um, well, as in a as as in a dance, you take one step, I respond. >> Yeah. and and you might go into a waltz >> and and you will then respond to my step and it's >> comes back to that cocreative space. I might be leading it, >> but I remember I remember when I first started um when I was first I I used to be a teacher for a long time. I was I was a teacher and I would never go into a lesson without even if it was just written scribbled on the back of an envelope a a lesson plan. I knew what I was going to do. and stepping away from that into the therapy room and going in and not knowing exactly oh what am I going to do was very very difficult for me >> but it had it kind of it had to be done because I'm not going in to deal with anxiety or depression I'm going to deal with a person whose causes for anxiety I may have never come across before >> so I need that level of flexibility >> reminds me of a story and I think a very true one from a friend of mine who's I I saw as a seen for many years as a mentor for me in the psychotherapy profession and uh he's about 10 years older than me now 75 76 he's about 84 I think and he was over at my institute once and we were chatting and he was talking to me about his early training and he said, "I never got to see Eric Burn." He said, "I missed him." He was American, by the way. I missed him by half an hour. I turned up at this place and he'd gone. But I did meet Fitz Pearls. Oh. I said, "Really?" Yeah. I He said, "Yeah, I did a whole first [snorts] year of training with Fitz Pearls, which I didn't know anyway. He's the originator of Gestalt." >> Yeah. Yeah. >> I said, "Oh, what was that like?" He said, "Well, I'll tell you a story, Bob." I said, "Oh, please do." He said, "When when we I went to the first weekend of training with Fitzp, there was about 20 students and we were all there with our notepads and uh to listen to the great man and um so we were all eager and he walked in the room, this is Fitzp, and said, "Okay, the first thing I would like you all to do is put away all the notepads, all the pads, pencils, they're not going to be used on my training course. And then eventually one of them said, "Oh, you know, oh, why is that then? Or what's the thinking behind that?" Something. And Fit says, "Well, if you do that, you'll move out of contact with me." M >> and uh you know a colleague said that was quite challenging and he just wishes now that he had man managed to make some notes because it'd be worth a fortune those notes with some of the stories of Fritz pearls but I I I that made me think because it was the same with me I did a four years training five years training transactional artistis and then I went into another whole training um and uh uh what was it? Object relations. And I um I thought, well, I'll practice not writing anything. It was challenging for me, but it was really challenging for the trainer. And the trainer said, "Why aren't you writing anything down, Bob?" You know, uh I thought that was interesting. So, I really resonate with what you said. >> Okay. Okay. >> Yeah. And I learned a lot from that. So and I think for many many people including me uh I had to take all these notes and everything else bit like a crutch but the more I allow myself to follow my own spontaneity rather than thinking what I should or shouldn't be doing um things turned out a lot better for me and certainly as a therapist >> um it's experience isn't So we've used examples. So moving from flexibility to creativity >> in the same ballpark. Yeah. >> But we've already used some. >> So we've used metaphor. >> Story. >> Storytelling. >> Yeah, we've definitely I I've always thought of myself as a narrative therapist. >> Okay. That's creative visualizations. I love visualizations. I mean, I've started working clinically now, but I you use visualizations a lot. >> And what do you mean by visualization? >> Oh, you take the client on a journey. >> Okay. >> So, for example, say someone with a shame based system. One experiment might be you'd have to know the client well of course you know this on the first session but you might say do you want to let go some of the shame you say just close your eyes a moment just imagine you're on a hill the sun is coming down I'm not going to do it Simon but you take them through a story where they visualize the story and you in this case you might take them to a forest. And in the forest is a very wise man. And the wise man says, "You can say anything you want to me." And the client says, "I'd like to get rid of my shame." He says, "Look over there. You see a really big red well. And if you take every bit of shame off you, imagine that they're goblets." and you put the shade in this well will go down and down and down to the tree of life and get washed away forever. So you tell them a story to empower them in the visualization. >> Mhm. >> That's what I mean by visualization. >> Yeah, I know. And I I do I use it. Yes. >> Yeah. I particularly use it to kind of create a safe space for people. Oh, >> so this is, you know, >> if you're anxious, this is the place you will go to in your and we refer that refer back to that. >> So they're very creative techniques and I remember I think I I loved it. I loved it partly because with my daughter when she's 27 now, but when she was younger, I every night told her a story, but not from a book. I mean, I did sometimes, but mainly what she liked most is when I made up my own story and I told her the story about whatever it was like. We created an ending together. And I think that experience um just talking to you reminds me of this why I like visualization so much because it comes from that creative expression I had with my daughter. I think I never thought about that before. >> Okay. >> I use them a lot. >> Yeah, I I do. I don't do visualization so much, but I certainly bring stories in. >> Stories from my life, places I've been to. Stories I've I've nicked from >> from you. >> Yeah. >> From other trainers I've had. I will adapt them. Oh. Uh yeah. when this happened to me and it's a direct copy of a story I heard from you. Um, >> uh, yeah. >> In the service of the client. >> In the service of the client and the understanding what's going on. >> Yeah. I mean, I I forever used creative techniques. I did a course on art therapy. So I I did a lot of work with people uh writing or drawing or whatever we want from their less dominant hand for example. Um I did a I also did a bit of training in drama therapy. I often did enacted out dramas in the therapy room, sculpturing also many ways of expression through creativity to get to the inner child really because they're all in a child techniques [clears throat] >> and I suppose I'm well known for that work in terms of how to access the inner child and [snorts] and the best way to I've in my professional opinion one of the best ways to uh help the client access their inner child or their vulnerable child is through creative expression. >> Okay. >> So without that I think working with the inner child becomes much more challenging. And how do you do that? Do you get So I've had clients draw pictures and representations. How do you do that? Well, I've just done what you've done it. Yeah. But I Well, you know, I might say, "Okay, there you I don't know." They draw a picture of whatever it is. And I say, "Okay, so talk me through the picture and every symbol that you have drawn and talk as if you're that representation." >> Uh, and then there's dreams for example. >> Okay. >> Work with dreams. That's very creative, isn't it? >> It is. two or three ways you can work with well I can think of many ways you work with dreams from analysis of dreams where you might say to the person okay so tell me a little about your dream they tell you and then you say okay well go on three more sections of the dream that you didn't allow yourself to finish that's one way of looking analyzing you can look at the kto way of analyzing dreams where they express and play out every part of the dream as if it was themselves because the theory is that every part everything they dream is part of themselves. That's another way to life. Very creative ways, aren't they? >> Very creative experiments. >> I love it. I was one of my clients today was talking about his dream and [gasps] [sighs] filling the car up for his mom and his auntie >> and pouring the the petrol into the tank and being overcome by the fumes. >> And we spent we spent Yeah. a fair a bit of time talking about what was going on there. >> He had the insight. He knew. >> Yeah. And the great way to get to the inner child. All these creative methods I always utilize to get to the inner child. >> I was well known for that and I spent a lot some people would call that regressive therapy. >> Okay? >> But if you're going to go to the inner child by definition you're doing aggressive therapy and I think the use of I'm not talking about cognition. I'm talking about the use of creativity expression is the best way into the inner child without a doubt. not cognition. >> Okay, >> you need to move away from cognition. >> Okay, I'll use metaphor, >> but I don't necessarily explain it. I'll leave it to to them to interpret that. >> Yeah. Yeah. That's another way into the in I think they're all giving permission for the person to be creative, >> have freedom of expression is a wonderful way to get in charge. And also nearly majority of clients I saw a lot of them especially more disturbed ones have had a history of being defined by another. So if you can get to a place where you can give them permission to express their inner soul and create spirit >> that's powerful >> only be effective. Yeah. [clears throat] >> What about humor? >> Oh, well, that's in the ballpark again of creativity and metaphors and all things we're talking about. Wouldn't therapy be dull if you had a therapist who never use humor? Oh my god, I can't think of anything worse. I mean, I by definition naturally have a large sense of humor. So I'm talking about using human service of the client. But wouldn't it be dull? Honestly, from that point of view, I think expression modeling human and everything else. But I also think about it in terms of the intensity of therapy is often so dark. You need some lightness. >> You need to come out of the bloody toilet and come out to lightness. And humor is a wonderful bridge for that. >> Okay. I never wanted a therapist that couldn't use their humor. >> Okay. Okay. I remember when I first started, I would not I would smile and and be funny and well, you know, with the client, but I wouldn't use humor. I would because I felt every time I' I I'd introduce something funny, I lost the connection. >> You lost the connection because it wasn't spontaneous. >> That's okay. I think you've led that. Thank you, Simon. When I'm talking this way, I mean I don't mean thinking, well, I'm going to tell a joke or I'm going to be funny or I don't mean that. I mean things like spontaneous humor. Not that I think I'm going to be funny or I think I'm going to say that or I think I'm going to do that. That that's a sort of like just just the position. >> It's opposite. It's ironically opposite of what I'm talking about. >> I mean to allow and to model sp the level of spontaneity with humorous effect. That's what I'm talking about. >> Which I I have allowed myself to do more and more in my career more and more in my career. So >> that's all in the ballpark, isn't it? creativity, flexibility, modeling, permission giving, creativeness, experiments with the inner child, drama, all these wonderful, wonderful ways of helping the person get to their vulnerable uh self. You'll never get there by cognition. >> Yeah. >> No, I really believe that. >> Yeah. Because I tell you what will happen if you do your the person will go in transactionality terms will go into their adult they go into their older self as sense of self and you'll miss the child altogether. >> That's right. >> I always lower my voice when I want to get to the child ego state. I higher it louder if I'm taking on the parent. But if I want to go to the child, I'll go lower. Now, I know this is not a podcast on how to work with the inner child. I don't know if we've done one. We must have done one because it's one of my favorites. >> I'm sure you have. Maybe we'll revisit it at some point. >> Yeah. But it's interesting. And the more therapy I did for myself, I I allowed myself to I had to had to work hard therapeutically in my own therapy to give my permission to be creative, to follow my intuition, all that sort of stuff. It didn't come naturally. M and again giving yourself permission, giving supervises permission to be to be natural, to be to to not be hidebound by the rules of whatever modality they're using. >> Yeah. Code number 672 on the ethics code. Yeah. Or whatever it is. >> That's right. whatever policemen they've got in their heads >> about what's you know is right in the world of psychotherapy or wrong. And of course the truth is nearly all our clients have had a history of that being defined. >> Following rules. >> Yeah. for me kind >> I'm just thinking about that word congruent and how important it is to be to be there with the client >> but to be yourself >> you have clinical thinking and also to be yourself >> and I think the more experienced but you know what I think you for me my own therapy was the was the key to opening up my ability to do what I'm talking about now. >> Okay? >> Because I was born in a world of rules and regulations. >> So it was my own years and years and years of therapy that allowed me to uh find my own inner child to be able to model that to other people. >> Okay. >> And I think supervision is also you mentioned that it's very important. I would want a supervisor that was creative for God's sake. I'd want a supervisor that was be able to have a sense of humor. I'd want a supervisor that could think outside the box. I would >> I I'm I agree. I was doing trying to encou I was encouraging one of my supervises to do a role play with me a couple of weeks ago and they were really uncomfortable. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Role play is another creative aspect, isn't it? We talk. >> Yes. >> Yes. in supervision and is in and in and in the world of therapy >> and and also you know what are we doing in the room? We're listening to stories. >> It's a it's that exchange of of of experience of story of stories. >> Yeah. Eric Eric Burn is the originator of transactional analysis. There's a quote but I don't know where he said it. It always gets quoted to me in folklore. I've looked for it, but I'm sure it's true. Anyway, apparently he used to say to his trainee, "Think Martian." >> Mhm. >> Yeah. And um what he's really saying is allow yourself to be creative and not bound by cognition, not bound by the whole aspect of logical processes. Um uh and if you're going to get to the inner child, you need to go to your you need to utilize your own younger self. >> There's a creatively. >> Yeah. There's a story I tell that um I heard Richard Erskin tell. >> Yeah. >> And he I don't know how true it is, but that's not important. He talks about, you know, at the end of the Second World War and the the the troops from America would was were were sent home, some of them went by plane and some of them had to take the long six week ship journey. >> Yeah. >> You know this story? >> No, I don't know this story, but it's true. >> Okay. And when they got back, there was the kind of those who had come back quickly and those who had come back slowly. And some of them integrated into into society, 1940s American society, better than the others. Who do you think it was? And my clients will say, "Oo, people on the plane. Oh, people on the ship. Why?" Well, it was the people on the ship because they had six weeks of sitting telling stories to each other about their experiences in the war. Oh, I didn't know this story, but I can see the powerfulness of this. >> Absolutely. Absolutely. And that I think that is everybody has a story to tell and everybody wants to tell the story. Um, and I will use that storytelling in as you do and you the joy you've that you've talked about telling your stories to your daughter and my guess is that she's taken that on and carries that around with her and tells stories to >> Yeah. She thinks in stories. >> She does. Yeah. >> Absolutely. Yeah. >> So, they're all the same bridge and and creativity, intuition, permission is all we're talking about. And they're the bridge to the inner child. >> Indeed. Yeah. And on that note, I think we're going to finish there. Sir, >> please do. And I'm going to look back at how many podcasts I've done on uh working with the inner child. Maybe we can revisit it sometime because it's one of my favorite topics. >> That would be I Yeah, I'd like to do that. Yes. >> However, what are we talking about next week? >> Next week we're talking about I don't know, Bob. What have we got? >> I don't know. But I tell you what, I'm glad you've done that, especially on this podcast terms of creativity and spontaneity and flexibility. Let's live in the world of anticipation. So the people [laughter] obviously we'll pick from the list but I mean I just think of the listeners the excitement the spontaneity of just tuning in in the you know what I think is of in therapists often explore holding the unknown. >> So I'm looking forward to whatever we discuss. >> Good. Well, thank you very much and um thank you everybody to listening or watching as the case may be >> and we'll be back with you in a week's time >> with >> whatever might happen. >> Yeah. Bye-bye. >> Okay. Thanks. Bye-bye. 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