Experimental Family Therapy Experiential Family

Experimental Family Therapy

EXPERIENTIAL FAMILY THERAPY

INTRODUCTION myriad of experiences contribute to the fabric of a person's life, however only a few of a person's experiences define him/her. In "Profiles in courage: one lost a parent, one lost his health, one lost her way, and the other sought the family he never knew...," Caroline V. Clarke (2004) recounts stories three individuals shared, regarding some of the, most meaningful, albeit in some instances, painful experiences in their lives, and how these experiences ultimately affected them. Clarke stresses: "A single or loss, an event or crisis, even a book or news story can alter your course forever -- or serve to solidify the path you're already on. It is that lasting, life-affirming impact that makes it what we call a 'moment of truth'." This paper, which explores Experiential Family Therapy, asserts that "moments of truth" uncovered and/or discovered for the first time in a person's experience constitutes the heart of this particular therapeutic process.

In the Dialogical Self in Psychotherapy, Hubert J.M. Hermans, Giancarlo Dimaggio, and Brunner-Routledge, (2004) relate core assumptions that underlie Experiential Family Therapy. Hermans, Dimaggio, and Brunner-Routledge cite Angus and Mcleodn (2004) to assert that this therapy model reflects "a sense of therapist's helping clients to access and differentiate emergent emotion schemes while clients shift to reflexive meaning-making processes in therapy sessions" (Angus & Mcleod, p. 80). Experiential Family Therapy is perceived to be co-constructed, as it arises from the client and therapist intentions being interplayed. In experiential therapy, Angus and Mcleod stress, the disclosure of salient personal memories, along with the client's expression of experiences proves foundational to the inception of change experiences (p. 80),

Experiential Family Therapy Considerations

In "Introduction to a mythical family: How to do Experiential Psychotherapy," Alvin R. Mahrer (2007) argues that no such thing as an "experiential family" of psychotherapies exists. He contends a better perception of the practice could be that it consists of therapy which includes multiple kinships and allegiances with both the experiential and various neighboring families. Experiential psychotherapy, nevertheless Mahrer contends, is traditionally accepted as one of the primary families of psychotherapy. Mahrer notes that a number of therapists, in and out of the "experiential family," trace a part of their history to Carl Rogers and his listening for the feeling in what the client says.

According to Robert Elliott and Leslie S. Greenberg (2007) in "The Essence of Process-Experiential/Emotion-Focused Therapy," however, Process-Experiential/Emotion-Focused Therapy does in fact exist, and consists of an empirically-supported, neo-humanistic approach. Experiential Family Therapy assimilates and revises person-centered, Gestalt, and existential therapies. (PE-EFT; Elliott et al., 2004; Greenberg et al., 1993, as cited in Elliott & Greenberg).

Experiential Family Therapy therapists stress the significance of clients' freedom to choose actions during their therapy, as well as, outside the therapy sessions. The therapist's basic stance is to treat clients as experts on themselves. During counseling, "the therapist supports the client's potential and motivation for self-determination, mature interdependence with others, mastery and self-development, including the development of personal power" (Timulak & Elliott, 2003, as cited in Elliott & Greenberg Task Principles section, ¶ 6). The Experiential Family Therapy therapist primarily facilitates the client's growth by tuning into and helping the client explore growth possibilities their experience/s proffer. The therapist may hear, for example, and consequently reflect assertive anger embedded in a client's depressed mood. The client then has to choose how to deal with this anger. The therapist facilitates choice by offering the client "alternatives about therapeutic goals, tasks, and activities. Thus, the therapist might offer a hesitant client the choice not to go into exploration of a painful issue" (Elliott & Greenberg, 2007 Task Principles section, ¶ 6). When clients feel they have the freedom to make choices in and outside of therapy, they more willingly take risks that prove to contribute to their healing in/outside therapy.

At times, as therapists in all counseling methods, experiential therapist will have to deal with impasses resulting from unresolved incidents. Unless resolved, these experiences may block risk taking, and sabotage the family member's creation of new levels of emotional engagement. To effectively deal with impasses, Susan M. Johnson (2004) purports in the Practice of Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy: Creating Connection, "it is helpful for the therapist to be able to step aside from the pressure to "fix" the problem and to recall that the goal of an experiential therapist is to help clients see, at times with excruciating and tangible clarity, the choices they are making and the choices that are open to them" (p. 209).

When a client grasps his/her experience and creates it with more and more awareness and clarity owns the experience an emotional reality, the reality frequently starts to expand, and in time provides answers.

Fran Harris

During therapy, Fran Harris recounted that one experience that occurred when she was 16 years old. At the age of 38, rippling effects from that experience still affected her (Clarke, 2004). Harris remembers:

had gotten into a student exchange program where you went to live with a family in Mexico for a month," Harris recalls. "My mother was so excited about it. From the beginning, she kept saying. 'You have to go. Don't worry about me. Just go.' I can so clearly remember her dropping me at the airport and saying goodbye." Harris boarded the plane from Dallas to Mexico City. Her mother went home, had a heart attack, and died. (Harris, as cited in Clarke, 2004, Her Mother's Daughter section, 2004, ¶ 3).

During a year of therapy, Harris experienced a number of "moments of truth" that helped her overcome the anger and confusion she experienced, following her mother's death. Therapy helped Harris unload feelings inside her. "It relieved her loneliness and sense of utter isolation and validated what she was going through" (Clarke, 2004, Her Mother's Daughter section, 2004, ¶ 18).

Through therapy, Harris learned a number of things clients in experiential therapy routinely learn:

Feelings are perfectly normal, given a person's experience/s;

Strategies are available to cope with feelings; and Benefits, evolve from the deep necessity, of sharing feelings (Ibid.).

Sharing feelings related to personal experiences, something Harris's family, as a number of families, failed to do, depicts a vital component of Experiential Family Therapy.

Emphatic Understanding

According to Kathryn a. Moon (2007) in "A Client-Centered Review of Rogers with Gloria," emphatic understanding, also a vital component of Experiential Family Therapy, does not automatically occur. It does, albeit, denote the therapist's devotion to "following and grasping the client's communications, intentions, and meanings. 'Thus it means to sense the hurt or the pleasure of another as he senses it, and to perceive the causes thereof as he perceives them' (Rogers, 1959, p. 210, as cited in an Attitudinal Approach section, ¶7). In regard to emphatic understanding, Rogers later noted this to include meaning that the therapist, during a designated time, is lays his/her personal values aside to be able to enter another person's world without prejudice. Sometimes, empathy may arise from interaction with the client, as he/she reveals experiences, and, as required to follow and understand the revelation from the client, the, counsellor/therapist sensitively checks his/her understanding of the client's experience with the client (Brodley, 1998; Raskin, 2005, pp. 330-331; Rogers, 1951, p. 29, as cited in an Attitudinal Approach section, ¶7). Rogers (1980) recounted his growth-model theory of therapy late in his life with the following:

Individuals have within themselves vast resources for self-understanding and for altering their self-concepts, basic attitudes, and self-directed behavior; these resources can be tapped if a definable climate of facilitative psychological attitudes can be provided" (p. 115). The facilitative attitudinal conditions to which he referred are congruence, empathic understanding, and unconditional positive regard. Congruence is the integrated internal state of the counselor, the counselor's readiness for setting aside concerns and personal preoccupations and for being available and open in relationship with the client. Rogers at varying times referred to this condition as genuineness, openness, authenticity, or transparency. These synonyms can be misleading unless understood as complementary to the therapeutic intention to be present and empathically receptive of the client's communications and experience. Shlien (2003) described congruence as "the ability to listen... without being impeded by the reverberations in oneself" (p. 15). The other two facilitative conditions depend on the counselor's congruence, the counselor's ability to attend to the client. (Moon, 2007, an Attitudinal Approach section, ¶ 6)

The Experiencing Scale

Katje Wagner (2006) explores "Focusing" as a psychotherapeutic modality in "Inside out: Focusing as a therapeutic modality." Wagner concludes that "Focusing bridges the subjectivity of experiential psychotherapeutic traditions with the objectivity of scientific realms" Wagner, Conclusion section, ¶ 1). As the method tests cognitive perceptions with inwardly felt phenomena, Wagner explains, it simultaneously engages a number of aspects of one's perceptual capacities. Focusing helps one develop and enhance his/her feeling and thinking abilities. A person's inner experience, according to Focusing, serves as a primary indicator of change, "a phenomenon that applies across therapeutic orientations" (Wagner, Conclusion section, ¶ 2).

As Focusing proffers a way to facilitate somatic shifts, along with outer directions they imply, the method validates the mind/body connection. Focusing-oriented experiential therapy, historically grounded in humanistic and experiential psychology traditions, were cultivated from E. Gendlin's collaboration with Carl Rogers, the founder of client-centered psychotherapy (Bohart, 2003; Rogers, 1957, 1961, as cited in Wagner, 2006). During the 1950s, Rogers presented the concept of "unconditional positive regard, empathy, and congruence as therapeutic attitudes central to the process of change" (Wagner, 2006, Background and Development section, ¶ 1). Gendlin expanded the Rogerian approach of person-centered therapy by further exploring and analyzing client involvement qualities, which indicative movement and change evolving from therapy. (Wagner) the following Experiencing Scale depicts a number of states, Wagner notes, in Focusing that positively contribute to counseling and holistic health.

Stage 1: The content is not about the speaker. The speaker tells a story, describes other people or events in which he or she is not involved or presents a generalized or detached account of ideas.

Stage 2: Either the speaker is the central character in the narrative or his or her interest is clear. Comments and reactions serve to get the story across but do not refer to the speaker's feelings.

Stage 3: The content is a narrative about the speaker in external or behavioral terms with added comments on feelings or private experiences. These remarks are limited to the situations described, giving the narrative a personal touch without describing the speaker more generally.

Stage 4: Feelings or the experience of events, rather than the events themselves, are the subject of the discourse. The client tries to attend to and hold onto the direct inner reference of experiencing and make it the basic datum of communications.

Stage 5: The content is a purposeful exploration of the speaker's feelings and experiencing. The speaker must pose or define a problem or proposition about self explicitly in terms of feelings. And must explore or work with the problem in a personal way. The client now can focus on the vague, implicitly meaningful aspects of experiencing and struggle to elaborate it.

Stage 6: The subject matter concerns the speaker's present, emergent experience. A sense of active, immediate involvement in an experientially anchored issue is conveyed with evidence of its resolution or acceptance. The feelings themselves change or shift.

Stage 7: Experiencing at Stage 7 is expansive, unfolding. The speaker readily uses a fresh way of knowing the self to expand experiencing further. The experiential perspective is now a trusted and reliable source of self-awareness and is steadily carried forward and employed as the primary referent for thought and action.

Layers

In "The Multi-level Approach: A Road Map for Couples Therapy," Michele Scheinkman (2008) identifies a number of levels that an experiential family therapist may use to promote needed familial changes. The process utilizes a layer by layer uncovering approach to encourage healing in a family. In experiential therapy, experiences are uncovered layer by layer.

Experiential Therapies Prove Challenging to Operationalize

Tammy J. Mitten, and Gary M. Connell (2004), associates of the Department of Professional Studies, Edinboro University of Pennsylvania, assert that experiential therapies prove challenging to operationalize. Compared to behavioral therapies, Mitten, and Connell contend, less research exists to support the effectiveness of experiential methods. Basically, excluding work of Greenberg and Johnson, proponents of emotionally focused therapy (EFT) who utilized specific problems and client populations to empirically validate their methods' effectiveness, " there have not been many outcome and/or process research studies conducted on the experiential approach" (Gurman, Kniskern, & Pinsof, 1986; Sprenkle, 2002, as cited in Mitten & Connell, ¶ 3). Regarding the state of the field in 2002, Sprenkle purported evidence across family therapy models as uneven, and concluded that particular approaches remained empirically underdeveloped. During 2004, Mitten and Connell reported that at that time no empirical research conducted on symbolic-experiential therapy, the focus for their study.

Symbolic-experiential therapy Mitten, and Connell (2004) examine Symbolic-experiential therapy, which evolved from the clinical work and writings of Carl Whitaker. based on a phenomenological existential conception of human development, Symbolic-experiential therapy stresses one may learn most effectively through his/her experience. One primary tenet that underlies this particular model contends that:."..Families cannot change their process of living by being taught. Symbolic-experiential therapy is a growth-oriented psychotherapy approach that is "not based on intellectual understanding" (Keith, as cited in Mitten & Connell, Primary Goal of Symbolic-Experiential Therapy section, ¶ 1). Instead, the foundation for Symbolic-experiential therapy includes an interactive process, which utilizes metaphorical language, and personal interaction of family members. Whitaker stressed the value of the therapist-client relationship, noting that within the therapist-client relationship, this relationship serves as a potent unconscious-to-unconscious personal contact (Whitaker, 1952, as cited in Mitten & Connell, 2004). Although Whitaker utilized a number of psychoanalytic concepts into his practice, he held that the personhood of the therapist, instead of transference, worked as the primary curative ingredient of therapy (Neill & Kniskern, 1982; Whitaker, 1944, 1946, as cited in Mitten & Connell). In symbolic-experiential therapy, Mitten and Connell (2004) explain, the therapist seeks to help the family transform the its symbolic world. Humans, according to Mitten and Connell (2004) "create symbols to represent each other, objects, ideas, and experiences" (Primary Goal of Symbolic-Experiential Therapy section, ¶ 3). Symbols evolve as a result of family members' experiences. Symbolic-experiential therapy seeks to "enrich, expand, and, at times, alter the family's symbolic world (Connell, Mitten, & Whitaker, 1993, as cited in Primary Goal of Symbolic-Experiential Therapy section, ¶ 3). Anything a person experiences may become a symbol.

Symbols in dysfunctional families routinely become rigid and fixed; which consequently inhibits healthy growth. In symbolic-experiential therapy, the therapist provides experiences for the family to experience that will in turn, help reshape dysfunctional family symbols. During the course of the therapy, the symbolic-experiential therapist:

explores the family's infrastructure, encourages primary process relating, and crafts corrective emotional experiences (Mitten & Connell, 2004, Primary Goal of Symbolic-Experiential Therapy section, ¶ 3).

The symbolic-experiential therapist relies on him/her self as a catalyst for the therapeutic change process. As the family participates and becomes involved in the treatment process, new information may be generated. When this new information is fed back to the family's unconscious, nonrational processes, "dysfunctional symbols are altered and new ones created" (Mitten & Connell, 2004, Primary Goal of Symbolic-Experiential Therapy section, ¶ 3). In time, the process empowers families to reorganize themselves around new positive, productive, profitable symbols.

Challenges in Experiential Therapy in "Obstacles in Therapy: Redefining the Therapeutic Role," Howard Denofsky (2006) relates 22 difficult challenging clinical situations that may constitute challenges in experiential therapy. Denofsky also relates potential, positive therapeutic responses a therapist may utilize to move freely more freely in and out of the client system (Denofsky, Summary section, ¶ 3). Samplings from the 22 scenarios Denofsky notes, include:

Obstacle 1: The Therapist Jumps into the Client's Real World Process Not Progress

Obstacle 2: The Therapist Gets Captured by the Rule System of the Client and Avoids Taboo Subject Matter

Obstacle 3: The Therapist Takes on the Content of the Discussion and Ignores the Lack of Affect

Obstacle 4: The Therapist Abandons His or Her Own Beliefs in an Effort to Help

Obstacle 5: The Therapist Is Uneasy About Offering Individual Therapy While Other Family Members Are in the Room

Obstacle 6: The Customer Is Always Right?

Obstacle 7: The Therapist Abandons the Therapy and Acts Like an Agent of an External Agency

Obstacle 8: There's Something You (the Therapist) Should Know

Obstacle 9: The Story Is Not the Problem

Obstacle 10: Second-guessing the Family's Tolerance for Feelings or Subject Matter

Obstacle 11: The Client Views a Therapy Session Like a Visit to the Family Doctor

Obstacle 12: The Therapist as the Expert on Good Living

When a client views his/her therapist as the expert on good living, he/she may experience problems taking control of his/her life. To counter this scenario, the therapist may take on a one-down position, and/or proffer anecdotes to dispel the client's contention that the therapist is above the human dilemma.

Obstacle 13: The Client Expects the Therapist to Start Conversation

When this scenario, the client contends that the therapist can know what he/she should discuss.

The responsibility for talking about his/her pain, life experiences, and family living albeit, belongs to the client. The therapist's job does not include forcing client-hood onto his/her client. In this type scenario, the therapeutic value of silence cannot be underestimated. Using silence may not only encourage the client to talk, it also emphasizes that the struggle rests with the client; that it is not "the therapist's job to ease or remove the struggle" (Denofsky, 2006, Summary section, ¶ 3). The therapist is to be available for the client amidst his/her struggling experiences.

Obstacle 14: Why Don't You Act Like My Last Therapist?

Obstacle 15: When the Client Becomes Involved in Several Treatment Modalities at the Same Time

Obstacle 16: The Client Wants What the Therapist Does Not Offer

Obstacle 17: The Client Asks Absurd Questions

Obstacle 18: Couples Take Positions of Blame and Then Want the Therapist to Take a Side

Obstacle 19: The Client Tries to Corner the Therapist by Implying Expertise

Obstacle 20: Can You Just Prompt Me?

Obstacle 21: The Client Reports Getting Something Out of the Therapy, but the Therapist Doesn't

Obstacle 22: It Hurts Too Much, so I'm Just Going to Hint at the Problem (Denofsky, 2006, Summary section).

CONCLUSION

In Experiential Family Therapy, despite the fact that the client may sometimes feel the process "hurts too much," and although at times the therapist and client may reach an impasse between themselves, the therapist must be true to the call of his/her counseling, to help hurting people begin to heal through their experiences. The message Fritz Perls, developer of Gestalt Therapy, relates in the following Gestalt Prayer, could encourage Experiential Family therapists during challenging their own, as well as their clients', experiences.