Ericksonian Methods

The Essence Of The Story

Jeffrey K. Zeig, Jeffrey K. Zeig

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781134859818
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Psychotherapy
• Index: Psychology

First published in 1994. Ericksonian Methods: The Essence of the Story contains the proceedings of the Fifth International Congress on Erickson Approaches to Hypnosis and Psychotherapy. It consists of the keynote speeches and invited addresses from the Congress.

PART VI

Therapy Techniques

CHAPTER 20

Advanced Techniques of
Utilization: An Intervention
Metamodel and the Use of
Sequences, Symptom Words,
and Figures of Speech

Jeffrey K. Zeig

INDUCTIONS*

It’s a pleasure to proceed from this platform, can’t it be now? And, proceeding to personally discover some of the mysteries of hypnosis can be a departure from your present track. And tracking the process.… down… inside… you can experience many things with minimal effort now. For example, you may effortlessly… straighten out your head… so you’re … looking forward… too… learning more. And, your eyes can be opened and you can be still here….

Because today is Wednesday. And how do you conceive “Wednesday”? Can it be an assemblage of separate letters in your mind’s eye? Can you envision those letters vividly? Can there now seem to be a comfortable process of coming together… of the letters? Can you simultaneously notice your posture? Are you sitting with open arms? And deeper still, can you modify the letters easily? Can you make them colorful? For example, letters can seem red… and then you knotw the kind of day it is. Fascinating.

And as I have been talking with you, certain changes occur:

Your breathing rate slows down;

The pulse of your experience is different;

You’re not swallowing things wholly as you were before;

You may notice that your head seems farther away from your feet (which means that your feet are nowhere near your mouth);

You may notice that your right shoulder seems farther away from the left shoulder;

You may notice that your head seems larger… not too large.

And these experiences can be a platform from which it is a pleasure to proceed, can they not?

Obviously, the preceding passage is an induction of hypnosis. The components that make it an induction could be described. For purposes of this chapter, however, I would like to suggest that the reader consider a particular aspect of the induction: What was one of its primary linguistic vehicles?

Before answering that question, I will offer two more inductions of hypnosis using different linguistic vehicles. (The following section is a description and further transcript of the actual presentation.)

One: Zeig asks an audience member to describe a current symptom.

Two: Zeig asks a second audience member to describe the process of walking into the lecture hall. The ensuing dialogues follow:

One

Susie: I have a headache.

Zeig: This headache that you have, where do you experience it?

Susie: Behind the eyes.

Zeig: Behind the eyes.

You can close your eyes for a minute, get in touch with that headache that you have behind your eyes, and then describe it to me in a different way. What’s that headache like?

Susie: Like a cloud.

Zeig: Like a cloud. How is it like a cloud?

Susie: It is pressing down and covering.

Zeig: Pressing down and covering. And is there a color to that cloud pressing down and covering?

Susie:Gray and red.

Zeig: Okay. Thanks.

Two

Zeig: Now I need someone else who can describe to me what was it like to come into this room? I need a linearly organized person.

Evie: I was upstairs. I sat down with a gentleman. I asked if I was in the right place. He said, “No.” I found a helper and then I learned where to come to.

Zeig: Now I would like to personalize brief inductions for Susie and Evie. I will start with Evie.

Evie, I would like you to just put things aside and then to just sit comfortably with your feet on the floor and your hands on your lap so that your thumbs are not touching in any way. And realize, Evie, that as you do those things, there is a certain order that you can follow. An order that can become yours, your order in developing this state of trance … in developing this state of comfort.

And I’d like you to understand that as you go inside, there also can be an order. Perhaps you can start out upstairs somewhere in your head, and the reality can be upstairs … in your head. But you can realize that you’re sitting down and that I can be a gentle man in guiding you to go inside and discover other realities. And you can be wondering upstairs if you are in the right place. And you can think now, “It’s nice to just take that easy breath and go down inside.” And it’s as if you can find upstairs in the back of your mind, your unconscious mind, which may serve you as a helper. And your unconscious mind may say, “No, not right to stay upstairs. Much better to go down inside.”

And then Susie, you can orient yourself similarly, in your way … comfortably. And recognize that some part of you can hold back. And Susie, realize that some part of you can refuse to go too deeply into the experience. Some part of you can be in reserve, so that you notice that this trance doesn’t have to be black or white. It doesn’t have to be completely in or completely out. Rather there can be some gray areas of going inside. And you can realize that part of you, perhaps your inner mind, is pressing to go down deeper into trance. But the experience can be cloudy in some way. And all along, behind your eyes, there can be images developing, interesting, following images. So that you can notice the way in which those images may be covering and recovering from some of the blackness, new colors, new shapes, like the kaleidoscope of images that you can notice before your eyes.

All along staying a bit reserved, a bit resistant, holding back so that trance can be more, neither black nor white, but just interesting and comfortable, watching those colorful changes behind your eyes.

And then now, each of you, perhaps recovering something interesting from the experience, can be here, here now fully, take one or two or three easy breaths, and then Susie and Evie, stretch, reorient yourself, completely rested and refreshed, wide awake. Thank you.

Let’s consider these three different inductions. There is something about those offerings that makes them hypnosis. Yet, each one of the inductions emphasizes a different linguistic vehicle. What are the linguistic vehicles used for the first induction? For the induction with Evie? Susie? How do those linguistic vehicles differ? And moreover, what therapeutic principle is used to generate those linguistic vehicles? This chapter will address these issues.

INTRODUCTION

The three inductions presented above are extensions of the principle of utilization, championed by Milton H. Erickson, M.D. They represent three special techniques of utilization; namely, the use of figures of speech, such as idioms and proverbs, the use of sequences, and the use of symptom words.

In this chapter, the concept of utilization will be defined and presented within the context of a metamodel of psychotherapy. The three special techniques of utilization will be described and developed. Although the text of the chapter primarily concerns the use of utilization techniques in hypnotic induction, indications will be presented for their use in nonhypnotic psychotherapy, including family therapy.

UTILIZATION

Utilization has been defined as the “readiness of the therapist to respond strategically to any and all aspects of the patient or the environment” (Zeig, 1992, p. 256). Any aspect of the psychotherapy experience can be utilized, including the patient’s style, dress, mannerisms, history, and family. The therapist also can utilize the symptom, the symptom pattern, and the resistances. Moreover, the clinician can use the patient’s social system and environment (Zeig, 1992).

The literature on Ericksonian therapy is replete with examples of utilization. It is not hyperbole to state that utilization was a central facet of all of Erickson’s interventions.

Here are two simple illustrations:

Case Example One

A female patient consulted Erickson due to moderate to severe alcoholism. Her pattern of imbibing was rebellious and covert. When her husband came home from the office, she was already drunk, and that led to many battles. All weekend long she pursued her “little hobby” of gardening, during which time she took sips from a hidden bottle of whiskey.

Her husband also had a “little hobby.” All weekend long he sat in his living room chair reading “dusty old books, dusty old newspapers, and dusty old magazines” from cover to cover. The wife confronted the husband about his withdrawal but her efforts were to no avail.

Erickson discovered two additional pieces of information about the couple: Both of them hated fishing. Also, they enjoyed camping, but didn’t do it often.

Erickson met jointly with the couple and gave the following instructions: The wife was to hide a bottle of whiskey in the house. When the husband came home, he had a specified amount of time to discover where she had hidden the bottle. If he didn’t find it, she could drink with impunity.

For a few days, the wife took decided glee in finding hiding places that no man could easily discover. After a while, however, the task lost some of its pleasure.

When the couple returned for the next session, Erickson insisted that they go fishing. Nothing else would do, only fishing. Why? Well, if they were on a small boat in the middle of the lake, the wife couldn’t possibly hide a bottle of whiskey; the husband couldn’t possibly bring dusty old books, dusty old newspapers. Therefore, fishing was the only task that was satisfactory.

The couple rebelled against Erickson’s prohibition and went camping. Subsequently, they continued to go camping and voluntarily gave up their symptomatic patterns (Haley, 1985).

In this case, Erickson utilized an aspect of the symptom, the patient’s sneaky behavior; he turned it into a game, thereby changing the emotional valence of the behavior from negative to positive. Erickson also used the stubbornness of each member of the couple. They could rebel against his task of fishing by choosing their own activity. In the process, they could modify their symptomatic behavior, and they could do so to their own credit.

Case Example Two

I met Erickson for the first time in December 1973. A transcript of our initial three-day visit appears in Experiencing Erickson (Zeig, 1985). At the time, my financial resources were limited; I had just completed my master’s degree, and I was working at my first professional job as a therapist for acute psychiatric patients in a residential treatment center.

Erickson and I did not have a clear financial arrangement about my visit. However, during the course of our sessions, it became clear that he was not going to charge me for his time.

I asked his daughter, Roxanna, to take me shopping for a thank-you gift. Because Erickson treasured woodcarvings, I bought him a carving of a duck. The base was unfinished driftwood that abstractly looked like a duck’s body. The head and neck were shaped and stained to look more realistically like a duck.

I gave Erickson the gift just prior to departing Phoenix, not knowing whether or not I would ever see him again. Erickson received the carving graciously. He held it and eyed it pregnantly: He looked at me; he looked at the duck. He looked at me; he looked at the duck. He looked at me; he looked at the duck. Then he pointedly said, “Emerging” (Zeig, 1985, p. 54).

At the time, I was emerging both as a therapist and as a person. Erickson’s style of thanking me for the gift included a splendid example of multilevel utilization.*

So wedded was Erickson to the idea of utilization that it was an integral part of his persona. Utilization was a life-style, not merely a technique.

In summary, utilization is a “state” that the therapist enters in order to provide effective treatment. Utilization can be considered an aspect of the therapist’s “trance”: The therapist enters a state of response readiness and thereby becomes a model for the patient to access a similar state. The patient is encouraged to enter into a state of constructively responding, culling kernels of wheat from his life situation, rather than focusing on the chaff. Problems represent a “state” of insufficiency in which patients believe they do not have resources to cope or change; utilization models sufficiency back to the patient.

Although utilization as a technique is used to some extent in other methods of therapy, it is central in the Ericksonian approach. In fact, it can be said that utilization is to Ericksonian therapy as interpretation is to psychodynamic therapy; as desensitization is to behavior therapy. (For more information on utilization, see Zeig, 1992.)

The value of utilization per se can be readily understood; however, one cannot merely effect utilization without considering two questions: 1) Utilization to what end? and 2) What might the clinician select to utilize?

Utilization to What End: A Metamodel of Psychotherapy

Utilization is a goal-directed philosophy of the therapist. As the therapist assumes the posture of utilization, she must think ahead toward actualizing a specific target. There are numerous targets that a therapist can have in mind. To better understand targets and the place of utilization in therapy, I will offer a metamodel of psychotherapeutic interve...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Full Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Introduction
• Acknowledgments
• Contributors
• Convocation
• I. Keynote Addresses
• II. Reflections: The Ericksonian Approach
• III. Overviews
• IV. Conceptual Issues
• V. About Milton Erickson
• VI. Therapy Techniques
• VII. Specific Populations
• VIII. Special Issues
• About The Milton H. Erickson Foundation, Inc.
• Faculty of the 1992 International Congress on Ericksonian Approaches to Hypnosis and Psychotherapy