WORKSHOPS >>
 
THERAPEUTIC MOMENTS THAT COUNT:
BRINGING HUMOR AND ADVENTURE TO COUPLES AND FAMILY THERAPY

No matter how precisely we follow a treatment protocol, in the end, it’s our unrehearsed capacity to inspire spontaneous moments of humor, surprise, revelation, and emotional connection that transforms therapy from a clinical procedure to a healing art. How can we draw on our authenticity and natural inspiration to engage reluctant clients, inspire a sense of adventure in therapy, and sponsor lively personal interactions that spark moments of real change? In this workshop, we’ll focus on the creative use of self in therapy as a catalyst for therapeutic change, and demonstrate practical guidelines for bringing humor, absurdity, storytelling, drama, art, and in-session imaginative experiments into the clinical encounter. You’ll leave the workshop feeling more inspired, liberated, daring, and inventive in your clinical practice.

Workshop Objectives  

1. Use therapeutic alliance-building strategies and techniques with couples and families
2. Use systemic use of self framework guidelines to determine therapeutic moves in specific clinical situations
3. Tap family members’ and your inventiveness to co-construct solutions
4. Increase therapeutic comfort level with being more transparent and taking more positive risks in couples and family therapy sessions

 Workshop Presenters:

Matthew Selekman, MSW, is in private practice and co-director of Partners for Collaborative Solutions in Evanston, IL and is the author of Pathways to Change: Brief Therapy with Difficult Adolescents (Second Edition).

Jim Wilson, CQSW, co-director of Partners for Collaborative Solutions in Gwent, Wales, United Kingdom, Consulting Systemic Psychotherapist Gwent Health Care Trust and Foster Care Associates, and author of Child-Focused Practice: A Collaborative Systemic Approach.

Mark Beyebach, Ph. D., Research Consultant for Partners for Collaborative Solutions in Salamanca, Spain, Director of the Master’s Degree Program in Systemic Therapy, Department of Psychology, Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca, and author of Twenty-Four Ideas for Brief Therapy.