WORKSHOPS >>
 
THERAPEUTIC MOMENTS THAT COUNT:
BRINGING MORE HUMOR, DRAMA, 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 couples and family therapy, and sponsor lively personal interactions that spark moments of real change? How do we successfully repair ruptures in our therapeutic alliances with family members who may have felt slighted or misunderstood by us in the therapeutic process?

In this upbeat, practice-oriented workshop, we’ll focus on the creative use of self in couples and family therapy as a catalyst for therapeutic change and demonstrate practical guidelines for bringing more humor, absurdity, drama, art, storytelling, creative writing projects, and in-session imaginative experiments into the clinical encounter. Trouble-shooting guidelines for getting unstuck with difficult couples and families will be presented. You’ll leave the workshop feeling more inspired, liberated, daring, and inventive in your clinical practice.

The workshop format will combine information-rich didactic presentation, extensive use of videotape examples, and playful, out-of-the-box skill-building exercises that tap participants’ inventiveness.

The workshop will cover:

• Therapeutic alliance-building strategies and techniques with couples and families to co-create a climate ripe for change
• A systemic use of self framework guidelines to determine therapeutic moves in specific clinical situations
• Tapping family members’ and your inventiveness to co-construct solutions
• Taking positive risks and being more transparent outside the comfort zone in couples and family therapy sessions
• Using storytelling, creative writing projects, time-traveling, drama, art, and playful and imaginative therapeutic experiments and rituals with couples and families
• Effective therapeutic strategies for constructively managing unexpected ruptures in alliances with couple partners and family members
• Trouble-shooting guidelines for getting unstuck with difficult couples and families

About the Speaker:

Matthew D. Selekman, MSW is a highly seasoned couple and family therapist in private practice and the co-director of Partners for Collaborative Solutions, an international family therapy training and consulting firm in Evanston, IL. He is both a Clinical Member and an Approved Supervisor with AAMFT. Matthew received the Walter S. Rosenberry Award in 2006, 2000, and 1999 from the The Children’s Hospital in Denver, Colorado for having made significant contributions to the fields of psychiatry and the behavioral sciences. Matthew is the author of four professional books: Working with Self-Harming Adolescents: A Collaborative Strengths-Based Therapy Approach; Pathways to Change: Brief Therapy with Difficult Adolescents (Second Edition); Solution-Focused Therapy with Children: Harnessing Family Strengths for Systemic Change; and Family Therapy Approaches with Adolescent Substance Abusers. He has presented workshops on his collaborative strengths-based family therapy approach with challenging couples and families throughout the United States, Canada, Mexico, South America, Europe, and Australia.