W
“What does that mean for you?”; “Why?”; Window of Tolerance; Witnessing
“What does that mean for you?”
As described elsewhere (see T for ‘Truth’), there are no journalistic ‘facts’ I am seeking when I work with someone; I want to hear what their experience is. If everybody else involved would agree, or nobody would, is rarely important: what matters is the client’s experience of a situation.
A way in which I sometimes try to access this is with some variant on the question “What does that mean for you?”
Wilson feels hurt when his friend replies to a story about his lover jilting him by saying “I’m sure it’ll work out ok in the end”. From the outside this might sound like a way of being supportive, or perhaps just an empty platitude. But Wilson is raging. I might ask “So when he said that, what did you hear?” And Wilson might reply “It was like he was saying ‘Who cares? Change the subject.” Exploring why he responded that way – perhaps something about his prior relationship with his friend, or his sense of how people support him in difficult moments – will often yield meaningful results.
“Why?”
In training I remember a general view being that to ask a client “Why?” was a pretty bad question. The client doesn’t know, and anyway the more important question is “How?”, which is a question that will get closer to the lived experience than the “why” which goes to the brain. “How” is indeed a better question.
But I think “Why?” is really important. Because I think that people often know. They just haven’t had reason to think about it.
To show interest in why someone reacts a particular way, or why they love or hate someone, or why they get so scared if someone asks them out, feels to me fundamentally important. I never care if they don’t know the answer, but I do want them to know that I am interested and that I think our curiosity might lead us there in the end.
Window of Tolerance
A popular term of art for psychotherapists, the “window of tolerance” – coined by Dan Siegel – refers to the realm in which a client can function (in therapy or in life) without their defences kicking in or their capacity shutting down.
If they rise ‘above’ their window they are hyper-aroused, which might include being flooded with memories, experiencing panic attacks or heart palpitations, or experiencing an overwhelm which brings up a fog of challenge which makes engaging difficult.
If the client goes ‘below’ their window of tolerance they become hypo-aroused, which is when they experience inertia, tiredness, depression or an energy slump which makes functioning impossible from the other direction.
The window of tolerance is what exists between those two dysfunctional responses.
In therapy, the therapist and client will often aim to monitor, together, when the client is rising towards the top of the window (talking faster, perhaps, feeling anxious but still able to respond and connect) or falling to the lower reaches of the window (yawning during powerful exchanges, getting quieter or less articulate), as this can be a crucial means of noting how the discussed material is being received by the person’s body and reactions.
Witnessing
For a therapist a key part of the role is bearing witness. Showing a client that we can hear, see, witness and tolerate their experiences.
For a client, a lot of the value of therapy is in being witnessed: a private challenge being heard, a vulnerability being shared, a trauma being witnessed.
Often therapy isn’t about what the therapist says; it’s about being there. One of the reasons I love being a therapist is that I like being the person who’s there.
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X-Rated Subjects