I’m finally reading the latest book he wrote with Yvonne Dolan, Insoo Kim Berg, Harry Korman, Terry Trepper and Eric McCollum: “More than miracles: The State of the Art of Solution-Focused Brief Therapy”. (You will notice that it inspired the title of the .)
There, to his already famous three principles (“If it’s not broken, don’t fix it”; “If something works, do it more”; “If something doesn’t work, do something different”), Shazer adds another 5:
The therapy was conceived by Steve as a minimalist approach. Building solutions is a process that is typically accompanied by a series of small, manageable steps to achieve change; changes that expand and gradually produce systemic changes. Helping people get to the solution through small steps gets people to start doing things gradually.
2. The solution is not necessarily or directly related to the problem
As Shazer himself pointed out: “The solution, many times, comes before the problem”. Unlike other approaches that recognize change as a result of first knowing the problem and then finding a solution that relates to it, Brief Solution Focused Therapy (TBBS) develops the conversation trying to first know what the person wants. be different in your life when the problem is resolved. Therapist and client work to achieve a common goal, which is important to the client. They then identify experiences in the person’s life that indicate, even if minimally, that what they want happened at some other time, indicating that the person knows and knows how to solve this problem. TBCS is not concerned with analyzing dysfunctional interaction patterns or the origins of the client’s problem or “pathology.” Although some of these factors may be interesting and even have some influence on the client, TBCS focuses almost exclusively on the present and future.
3. The language we need to develop a solution is different from the language we need to describe a problem.
The language of problems tends to be very different from the language of solutions. Following Wittgenstein – one of Steve’s greatest influences – “The world of happiness is very different from the world of unhappiness”. As usual, talking about problems is negative and describing the origins of the problem often contributes to the permanence of the problem.
The language of solutions, on the other hand, is usually more positive, hopeful – as some students of the online course pointed out when they developed an exercise with the miracle question: it generates a feeling of tranquility and security that generates real and feasible possibilities and solutions. : rigidity becomes flexible and doors open; Good spirits and the search for small, easy changes, in turn generate, like a snowball effect, larger changes, up to the subsequent construction of a new reality – which point out the transience of the problem.
4. Problems do not occur all the time: there are always exceptions that can be used very well
This principle, following the idea of the transience of the problem, reflects one of the most commonly used approaches: questions to find exceptions, since there is always an exception to the problem, no matter how small or insignificant it may seem. These exceptions can be used to build useful small changes.
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5. The future is co-created and negotiated
This principle offers, for Steve, “a solid foundation for practice. People are not seen as locked into a set of behaviors based on a history, a social stratum or a psychological diagnosis. With strong support in social constructionism, this principle suggests that the future is a hopeful place, where people are the architects of their destiny.”.
Here, finally, Steve mentions 3 reasons why TBCS can also be considered a systemic therapy:
1. Generally, therapists are involved in working with couples, families, and even individuals, who can – from the systemic metaphor – be considered as systems, and therapists often make a decision about who can also participate, in addition to the person who comes to consultation.
- It is systemic because the solutions are explored in interaction, that is, the problems that people bring, exceptions and change, also involve other people, usually family members, work colleagues, or friends.
3. It is systemic because a small change that begins to occur generates other changes that are generally larger and usually interactional and systemic.
You can buy the book through , in its physical version or through the Kindle