The Blank Screen Or The Hug?
by Garry Cooper, LCSW
Bonnie, if there are any professors of psychology, counseling or social work reading this, they should consider inviting you to give a talk to their class. There are several reasons why they should do this.
First, you bring up some important points that are supported by research into psychotherapy outcomes. Outcomes researchers like Michael Lambert of Brigham Young University have found that one of the most important predictors of successful therapy is when therapists receive ongoing feedback about clients. (See Hawkins, E. J., Lambert, M. J., Vermeersch, D. A., Slade, K., & Tuttle, K. ( 2004). The therapeutic effects of providing client progress information to patients and therapists. Psychotherapy Research, 10, 308-327). That's feedback coming from clients, not from supervisors or consultants. I wrote about Lambert's work in the March/April, 2003 Psychotherapy Networker
John Norcross at the University of Scranton also points out that the most successful therapists have a broader repertoire of styles and should check with the client at the beginning of therapy to see what style their clients would feel most comfortable with. (You can find out more about Norcross's work at his webpage: and in my article in the July/August, 2004 Networker. . And there's also research suggesting that therapists who share parts of themselves, especially when they make appropriate self-disclosures, can improve therapy outcomes.
As you point out, the issue isn't whether one style of therapy works better than another. There are blank screen therapists who do really well with certain clients. And some kinds of clients will feel threatened or discounted by therapists who reveal some part of themselves. Some clients will head for the hills if their therapist shows any reactions, and some will head for the hills if their therapist doesn't. Sometimes one style will work better or worse with a particular client depending upon the stage of therapy. The point is, therapists need to be flexible and thoughtful about how they are at any given moment in therapy. Even knowing when to laugh can be a tricky business, sometimes enhancing the therapy connection, sometimes impeding it, and sometimes blowing it out of the water. Imagine a therapist who laughs at something a client says, when the client didn't actually mean to make a joke. How to manage being spontaneous and genuine, while still being thoughtful and analytic is perhaps one of the most important and ignored parts of training and supervision.
A personal note. Years ago, I was in therapy with a traditional psychodynamic therapist One day, finally, I got her to laugh. It was a great personal triumph and terrific self-validation for me. But I also immediately knew that if I let it lie there, I'd be taking the easy, cheap route--making her like me (and I really, really wanted her to like me--to even, dare I say it, love me) for my sense of humor. So instead of allowing myself to bask in the warmth and glory of her appreciation, I immediately backtracked to the question that had provoked my funny remark and came up with the deeper, more uncomfortable answer that my humor had let me evade. Had she not laughed, I think I would have been so flooded with shame that I wouldn't have backtracked. It's possible that she, being an excellent therapist, would have pointed out that my humor had been a deflection and defense, and we might have still gotten to the deeper truth, but who knows.
Some therapists would say in response to you that it's not such a bad thing if the client becomes uncomfortable and feels shame, and that the important part of therapy is to bring those feelings out and talk about them. I actually have respect for that orientation, but the problem is that if the therapist isn't highly sensitive and skilled, they end up losing the client and then saying that the client was resistant or not ready to change. It's a tricky business.
But there's another important reason why professors should consider clients like you coming in to talk to their students; it would help remind everyone that therapy is a collaborative process, and that wisdom resides in the client as well as in the therapist. One of the occupational hazards of therapy, I'm afraid, is that from time to time even the best and most sincere of us fall into the I'm the only expert in the room trap. Yes, therapists have a lot of training, knowledge and intellectual and emotional insight that they can bring into the therapy. But clients also have a lot of intellectual and emotional insight as well as a different, but no less valuable knowledge. Therapy, like any other important, intimate relationship is a difficult, complex, sometimes frightening and sometimes rewarding journey, and walking the road successfully requires the full presence, awareness, thoughtfulness and heart of both people.
