[Elizabeth Wangler]

Initial post

Brain function helps me better understand what’s happening for the client in the stages of Severance, Threshold and Incorporation, and how to feel more comfortable guiding through them. Until this module, I found myself feeling somewhat anxious as I strove to facilitate outcomes. Now, with an understanding of the stages of change, and an awareness of the client’s tendencies toward chaos or rigidity, I feel more comfortable in slowing down, guiding differently, depending on which stage the client is in.

I have felt quite inadequate in working with one of my practice clients because, after three sessions, it seems she is stuck in story and fixed beliefs that prevent her from even clarifying what she wants. Her issue involves being in an unsatisfying relationship, yet she can’t leave for fear of being alone. She wants “clarity” without making any changes. Until this module, I worried that I wasn’t helping her, even though she keeps coming back for more.

As soon as I read Prochaska’s Stages of Change, I felt a huge “aha” that she’s in pre-contemplation. Knowing this, I can relax and understand that it could take quite some time before she is ready for action since she is still resisting change, clinging to the bank of rigidity

Fear based thinking has been evident (“There are no other good men out there. If I leave I’ll be alone forever. I know he’ll leave me eventually for not committing, but I’m better off waiting for that than addressing our differences.) I couldn’t figure out questions that would help her see from a different perspective. Reflections were met with “This is how it is. There’s no way around it.”

Viewing her process using the metaphor of the river that we learned, helps me understand that, for her, clinging to rigidity feels safer than chaos, which I now understand is due to trauma, evidenced by her background. Knowing that chaos and rigidity impair integration and that widening the river of tolerance between the two helps them avoid getting stuck on either bank, allows me to see hope and possibility, even if takes some time for her to test the waters. Before this, I was feeling desperate to help her. Now, I can imagine ways to gently urge her to explore, rather than driving for a solution.

Remembering the acronym FACES (flexible, adaptable, coherent, energized and stable) will help me stay in the proper state with her while maintaining greater awareness of hers. It’s comforting for me to realize that “…complex systems have a natural drive toward integration” and my job is simply “…liberating the natural inclination of each individual to move toward well-being and health—to move toward integration.” (Pocket Guide 16-8) Knowing that integration is not a fixed state, eases my mind. As the author points out, it’s a verb not a noun and can be seen as a journey and not a destination. Until now, I was much too goal oriented with clients, wanting quick results. I see that this client is exactly what I need to test a new way of coaching. With her I’m experiencing that paths toward integration meander with forward and backward steps, especially when trauma is involved.

It’s helpful for me to keep in mind the two ways of processing: left and right brain functions. Also viewed, as Siegel points out, as top down (life filtered through past experiences) and bottom up (experiences perceived in a larger context). He describes that mindfulness practices and living creatively keep the top down function from dominating, yet this can be a life-long challenge for those who tend to feel like victims of outside circumstances. “We have a proclivity to observe and narrate, perhaps to gain a sense of control and certainty, instead of sensing and experiencing with a fresh and open mind. What we need to embrace is uncertainty. Learning to thrive with uncertainty is the root of creativity.”

During my next session with this client I may help her gain clarity using partswork exploration as a mini threshold experience within severance. I see the threshold as one way for clients to experience living creativity and open-mindedly as we guide them to explore without attachment to outcome. Intention opens doors to possibility without rigidity when framed as an “experiment.” Stepping across the threshold with a client can feel like chaos for both of us, but now I hold a deeper understanding of its value as a beneficial creative process. knowing that intention will organize the client’s experience (like Michael’s example of overhearing particular voices in a coffee shop) and, hopefully, provide her relief from the need for control.

Because this client tends toward rigidity and views life through the lens of traumatic memories, I also intend to experiment with mindfulness practices, testing Siegel’s hypothesis that doing so keeps the top down function from dominating. Knowing that Nature (natural process) supports integration and wholeness and even creates the pull toward it, I gain confidence in trusting the process and releasing my own need to be outcome driven while coaching her.

I intend to prescribe “Vitamin G” since we work via Zoom. Nature alone offers a myriad of healing benefits. When combined with mindful awareness (instruction to notice details for example) the positive effects are compounded. To quote Your Brain on Nature “We might consider mindful exercise in greenspace as vitamin G triple strength” (pg. 226)

Since time in Nature shifts our brain through entrainment, triggering an alpha state, this can lead to greater inner awareness, toward harmony and integration, more readily than through coaching without Nature’s participation. I want Nature to become an integral part of all the coaching that I do and this module opened my eyes to even more reasons why.

[Elizabeth Wangler]

Initial post

Brain function helps me better understand what’s happening for the client in the stages of Severance, Threshold and Incorporation, and how to feel more comfortable guiding through them. Until this module, I found myself feeling somewhat anxious as I strove to facilitate outcomes. Now, with an understanding of the stages of change, and an awareness of the client’s tendencies toward chaos or rigidity, I feel more comfortable in slowing down, guiding differently, depending on which stage the client is in.

I have felt quite inadequate in working with one of my practice clients because, after three sessions, it seems she is stuck in story and fixed beliefs that prevent her from even clarifying what she wants. Her issue involves being in an unsatisfying relationship, yet she can’t leave for fear of being alone. She wants “clarity” without making any changes. Until this module, I worried that I wasn’t helping her, even though she keeps coming back for more.

As soon as I read Prochaska’s Stages of Change, I felt a huge “aha” that she’s in pre-contemplation. Knowing this, I can relax and understand that it could take quite some time before she is ready for action since she is still resisting change, clinging to the bank of rigidity

Fear based thinking has been evident (“There are no other good men out there. If I leave I’ll be alone forever. I know he’ll leave me eventually for not committing, but I’m better off waiting for that than addressing our differences.) I couldn’t figure out questions that would help her see from a different perspective. Reflections were met with “This is how it is. There’s no way around it.”

Viewing her process using the metaphor of the river that we learned, helps me understand that, for her, clinging to rigidity feels safer than chaos, which I now understand is due to trauma, evidenced by her background. Knowing that chaos and rigidity impair integration and that the river of harmony between the two helps them avoid getting stuck on either bank, allows me to see hope and possibility, even if takes some time for her to test the waters. Before this, I was feeling desperate to help her. Now, I can imagine ways to gently urge her to explore, rather than driving for a solution.

Remembering the acronym FACES (flexible, adaptable, coherent, energized and stable) will help me stay in the proper state with her while maintaining greater awareness of hers. It’s comforting for me to realize that “…complex systems have a natural drive toward integration” and my job is simply “…liberating the natural inclination of each individual to move toward well-being and health—to move toward integration.” (Pocket Guide 16-8) Knowing that integration is not a fixed state, eases my mind. As the author points out, it’s a verb not a noun and can be seen as a journey and not a destination. Until now, I was much too goal oriented with clients, wanting quick results. I see that this client is exactly what I need to test a new way of coaching. With her I’m experiencing that paths toward integration meander with forward and backward steps, especially when trauma is involved.

It’s helpful for me to keep in mind the two ways of processing: left and right brain functions. Also viewed, as Siegel points out, as top down (life filtered through past experiences) and bottom up (experiences perceived in a larger context). He describes that mindfulness practices and living creatively keep the top down function from dominating, yet this can be a life-long challenge for those who tend to feel like victims of outside circumstances. “We have a proclivity to observe and narrate, perhaps to gain a sense of control and certainty, instead of sensing and experiencing with a fresh and open mind. What we need to embrace is uncertainty. Learning to thrive with uncertainty is the root of creativity.”

During my next session with this client I may help her gain clarity using partswork exploration as a mini threshold experience within severance. I see the threshold as one way for clients to experience living creativity and open-mindedly as we guide them to explore without attachment to outcome. Intention opens doors to possibility without rigidity when framed as an “experiment.” Stepping across the threshold with a client can feel like chaos for both of us, but now I hold a deeper understanding of its value as a beneficial creative process. knowing that intention will organize the client’s experience (like Michael’s example of overhearing particular voices in a coffee shop) and, hopefully, provide her relief from the need for control.

Because this client tends toward rigidity and views life through the lens of traumatic memories, I also intend to experiment with mindfulness practices, testing Siegel’s hypothesis that doing so keeps the top down function from dominating. Knowing that Nature (natural process) supports integration and wholeness and even creates the pull toward it, I gain confidence in trusting the process and releasing my own need to be outcome driven while coaching her.

I intend to prescribe “Vitamin G” since we work via Zoom. Nature alone offers a myriad of healing benefits. When combined with mindful awareness (instruction to notice details for example) the positive effects are compounded. To quote Your Brain on Nature “We might consider mindful exercise in greenspace as vitamin G triple strength” (pg. 226)

Since time in Nature shifts our brain through entrainment, triggering an alpha state, this can lead to greater inner awareness, toward harmony and integration, more readily than through coaching without Nature’s participation. I want Nature to become an integral part of all the coaching that I do and this module opened my eyes to even more reasons why.

[Elizabeth Wangler]

Hi Anna. Not sure if you are still in this discussion since you GRADUATED (CONGRATS!!!) but thank you for posting this. It’s helpful for a practice client I’m working with. We can’t seem to get out of pre- or early contemplation because her thinking is so rigid that I can’t figure out how to ask the right questions. I’ve tried the body awareness and when I ask “What do you feel?” she jumps right into a logical explanation or changes the subject. You’ve highlighted the importance of continuing to get her out of the left brain for more balance. As I’m writing this, it’s occurring to me that, in this case, trauma my be an underlying culprit. She has had some major losses in her life that shifted her life course dramatically and her issue involves fear of being alone. Hmmmm. Your post is helping me connect dots. Mindsight is sitting on my table but I haven’t started it yet. I’ll move it to the top of my reading list. Thanks so much!

[Elizabeth Wangler]

Initial Post

I found it much easier to apply the Gestalt principles in the F2F than I have with practice clients so far. I’ve guided two different clients since then and I felt during each one that much of what I’d learned went out the window. Of course this isn’t completely true because afterward I was able to see what I could have said and done differently, based on what we learned.

Neither of my strangely similar practice clients knew what they wanted to work on. Both had strong desires to tell stories and talk about the past. Interestingly, they both have very similar situations and, in the end, the same wants. The whole time I kept trying to get them to stay “in” their experiences instead of telling stories “about” them. I wasn’t very effective. Though both said afterword that they appreciated being heard without judgment so maybe that’s what needed to happen. Both sessions ended with a place to start next time.

My awareness has risen tremendously from exposure to Gestalt. Prior to this I found 360 degree listening a challenge. Now it’s much easier to notice not only what is happening with the client but also in Nature. Plus, I’m becoming more aware of body language, the subtleties of facial expressions and changes in tones of voice.

I’ve also become more tuned into my own energy, noticing where I get pulled in, distracted and, especially, when I start to feel responsible for an outcome. This is a constant challenge. I find myself relying on the structure of the ceremony and wanting the session to fit cleanly within it, even though I know that it’s fine for a client to stay in severance for the entire session as these did. “Here and now” is my goal, with acceptance and non-judgment about whatever is up in the moment.

Learning about Contact Boundary Disturbances was comforting because I recognized deflection occurring throughout the sessions. My attempts to deal with it were not effective. In reviewing my F2F notes afterward I see that Derek told us deflection is caused by an Interject and that it’s often more effective to address that. I’m not sure how I would have done that. (Open to ideas).

I realize that I needed to keep bringing the clients back to the “now” in order to interrupt the Cycle of Experience they were both stuck in. I tried, by using questions such as “What are you aware of as you say that?” or “I noticed that as you say that your voice changed/your energy shifted, etc.” I tried sacred questions as well. With both clients, these attempts were met with a deflection into a different story. Both were fast talkers which I found challenging.

After reading about the four characteristics of dialogue in Gestalt, I realize that I’m probably a bit too stiff and formal. Speaking up about what’s true for me, without judgment, is better than trying to come up with the right question. In hindsight, I could have said something like…”I need to pause for a moment here. I’m feeling a bit disoriented and I’d like to check in. Would you be willing to back up to the point where I noticed your energy shift? I think we might discover something there.”

I found myself letting them ramble as I wondered about the line between coaching and therapy. How deep should I attempt to take them when they don’t seem to want to? Will they derive benefit if I don’t? Clearly, I was not completely engaged when these thoughts arose. If I had been, perhaps I could have interrupted the ramble by asking them something like:. “I’m torn about what to do here because I want to make sure you derive benefit from this session. With the time we have left, what would be a good outcome for you?”

I believe that awareness and staying in the “here and now” is the key. I believe that practice will help, along with trusting myself to share in the client’s experience without manipulating. Even though these sessions did not end up as I anticipated, I felt that the clients gained awareness about what they want and I wondered what would transpire for them between sessions.

I discovered this in the reading and it provided some comfort: “The general approach of Gestalt therapy is to facilitate exploring in ways that maximize what continues to develop after the session and without the therapist. The patient is often left unfinished but thoughtful or ‘opened up’ or with an assignment. This is like a roast that continues to cook after being removed from the oven.”

I wish I’d thought to invite the clients to give themselves an assignment. Obviously, I need a lot more time in the oven!

[Elizabeth Wangler]

I love your idea of “What are you sensing on your skin?” as a way to bring her to the here and now. I can imagine my client’s response if I asked her that. “What? What do you mean on my skin?!” That’s a fantastic way to break homeostasis and to gently guide her into heightened awareness.

I appreciate your insight that clients sometimes can’t immediately connect to what’s going on inside of them and that they may need to connect to the external first. I think you’re right that getting to the here and now can take time and patience.

Thanks for your kind words and encouragement. It’s nice to have this support from you.

[Elizabeth Wangler]

Megan, I love your questions of “when was a time you knew what you wanted? what was that like? do you know anyone who knows what they want? what are some of the qualities they have?” Perhaps if I’d employed these with my client at the outset, it would have helped her. I have experienced quite few clients who are not sure what they want to work on in a session. I’m wondering how to frame up a coaching session with an intro that might give my clients a bit more space to ponder it before I dive right in and ask them what they want. Sometimes I’ll ask “What inspired you to want to be coached?” Which seems a bit softer and expansive than “What would you like to work on today?” which I also sometimes ask. I’m wondering how others of you begin your sessions and how you handle it if clients don’t know. Also wondering if there would be a benefit to giving them some prep questions before a session. Has anyone tried that?

[Elizabeth Wangler]

Yes, Anna, reconnecting will be great! Perhaps soon after the first of the year? I’ve started Mindsight and will be meeting with that practice client again soon. Or, I’d be open to more partswork too. So happy we’ll be staying in touch!

[Elizabeth Wangler]

Hi Hannah! It’s wonderful to come home to your thoughtful reply and question. I realize that a big part of feeling more connected to my client’s experience without getting lost in the process is to become unattached to the outcome. I’m often so concerned about delivering value and accomplishing something that I worry about getting them through the process or to a breakthrough. I find it more challenging to work with clients who are very different from me. It will be interesting to see how the sessions I have this afternoon go! Thanks for providing food for thought before I engage with them today.

[Elizabeth Wangler]

Thanks, Carrie! Today is my first day home in weeks and I have two practice clients this afternoon. It’s wonderful to have your encouragement and the reminder to ground and connect to my soul before I start. One of these two clients always wants to dive right in so remembering this will definitely help. I intend to slow her down a bit as well. Thanks so much!

[Elizabeth Wangler]

Thanks, Michelle! I have two practice clients today and will definitely try this. I feel a bit rusty after being gone, but also eager to discover what has shifted in me and how that will impact my coaching. I appreciate your thoughtful response and your encouragement.

[Elizabeth Wangler]

Brad,

Thanks for your encouragement! I’ve been away traveling and it’s nice to come back and find your supportive message since I have two practice clients today. I hope all is going well for your in your work!

[Elizabeth Wangler]

Hello Kairon. I appreciate that you highlighted the concept of “Dialogue is Lived” and I’m curious how you did that with your client. You mention that she embodied her issue and that this allows her to go beyond solving the issue into healing and returning to wholeness. Would you be willing to share how you guided her into embodying it and to elaborate on the transformation that exceeded solving her issue? I recall Derek talking about the importance of accepting the issue before change can occur and you seem to be aware of an even deeper level of change.

[Elizabeth Wangler]

Hi Brad. I find your thorough (and very eloquent) review of Gestalt helpful. I really appreciate your way of establishing trust and rapport by asking the client to share what brings him to this place in his life, long and short term goals and a typical day. I asked my clients how they were feeling and if they needed to take a moment before we started. They didn’t and jumped right in. Setting the foundation the way you do may have allowed a much quicker path to getting to their wants. Your vision of a session feels natural and well-paced. It reminds me to slow down and not be so concerned with fast track to outcome as I have a tendency to do. Thanks for this!