Teaching Seminar With Milton H. Erickson

Jeffrey K. Zeig

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781134842179
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Psychotherapy
• Index: Psychology

First Published in 1985. Milton H. Erikson M.D.(1901-1980) was generally acknowledged as the world's foremost authority on hypnotherapy and brief strategic therapy. This volume presents the complete transcript of a five day seminar with Milton Erickson. The reader will experience Erickson talking about his method of therapy, demonstrating his techniques, telling one fascinating anecdote after another- anecdotes which often produce feelings of cognitive dissonance and surprise, but eventually illuminate new ways of seeing patients and thinking about psychotherapy.

The Seminar

MONDAY

The session takes place in Dr. Erickson’s guesthouse, a small three-room house containing a bedroom, waiting room (with an adjoining kitchen) and Dr. Erickson’s office. Sessions are held in the larger waiting room due to the fact that Dr. Erickson’s office is too small to accommodate the groups which sometimes consist of as many as 15 people. There are three bookcases in the room. The waiting room is decorated with diplomas, pictures and memorabilia.

The students sit in a circle on a couch and on cushioned folding chairs. To the left of the spot where Erickson sits in his wheelchair is a green stuffed armchair which often is “the subject’s chair.”

Erickson is wheeled into the waiting room by Mrs. Erickson. Erickson allows a number of students to clip lapel microphones to his jacket. He then holds up a pencil that has an ornamental top. The ornamental top consists of a head with purple fiber hair. The fibers are neatly lined up in a pointed shape on top of the pencil. As he displays the pencil Erickson says to the group, “People come here like this.” Then he twirls the pencil vigorously between his palms, disrupting the fibered hair, and states, “And they leave here like this.”

Erickson then indicates to people that they should fill out some data sheets. He requests that they write the following information on a sheet of bond paper: the present date; their name, address, zip code and telephone number; their marital status and number of children; their education and where their degrees were earned; their age and birthdate; siblings and their sexes and ages; and whether they were brought up in a rural or urban environment.

Erickson waits while people fill out the requested information. Then he carefully reads each sheet, making comments to some of the participants. He corrects some students who did not supply all of the requested information.

We begin the session as Jan, a psychologist from New York, replies to a comment from Dr. Erickson by stating that she had a number of years of experiences being an only child. Erickson then responds to her:

E: Now how much sympathy does a 15-year-old girl have for a seven-year-old brother?

Jan: Things started to turn around after that.

E: Poor brother.

Jan: He survived.

E: You have no siblings? (Dr. Erickson addresses Anna, a social worker from Switzerland.)

Anna: Yes, I do have. I didn’t hear clearly what to fill in. What do you want me to fill in?

E: Siblings, their ages and their sex.

Sande: Hello, Dr. Erickson, I am Sande. (Sande is a therapist from New York who just entered the room.)

E: (Acknowledges Sande with a nod.)

Carol, your degree and the date. (Carol is a doctoral student in clinical psychology from Massachusetts.)

Carol: Date of degree?

E: No, today’s date. Your name, address, telephone number, your zip code, your degree, where you got it, your siblings and their sex and ages, your marital state, children, urban or rural background.

Siegfried: I am Siegfried from Heidelberg, Germany. (Siegfried is a Ph.D. clinical psychologist.)

E: Pleased to meet you.

Siegfried: Is it OK if I put an additional microphone on you?

E: Any number of bugs will be all right.

Siegfried: Thank you.

Sande: Can you tolerate one more?

E: I have a soft voice. I had polio twice, my tongue is dislocated and my lips are partially paralyzed. I have only half a diaphragm and I can’t speak too loudly. Your tape recorders will record what I say all right, but you may have difficulty understanding my speech. If you don’t understand, why not tell me about it. And then another precaution—all of you who are hard of hearing, sit up closer. Usually the people with hearing difficulties sit way back. (Erickson laughs.)

Now, in teaching psychotherapy I emphasize a state of conscious awareness and a state of unconscious awareness. For convenience sake I speak about the conscious mind and the unconscious mind.

Now the conscious mind is your state of immediate awareness. Consciously, you are aware of the wheelchair, the rug on the floor, the other people present, the lights, the bookcases, the night-blooming cacti flowers, the pictures on the wall, Count Dracula on the wall right behind you. (“Count Dracula” is a dried skate that hangs on one wall.) In other words, you are dividing your attention between what I say and everything around you.

The unconscious mind is made up of all your learnings over a lifetime, many of which you have completely forgotten, but which serve you in your automatic functioning. Now, a great deal of your behavior is the automatic functioning of these forgotten memories.

For example … I will pick on you. (Erickson smiles and addresses Christine, a physician from California, who has a strong German accent.) Do you know how to walk? How to stand up? Will you please tell me how you stand up?

Christine: By probably shifting my center of gravity and at the same time …

E: Now how did you move your center of gravity?

Christine: Making many unconscious adjustments, I am sure.

E: Well, what are they?

Christine: I don’t think I am aware of it.

E. Do you think you could walk six blocks down a street with no traffic of any kind at a steady pace? And can you walk in a straight line at a steady pace?

Christine: Probably not accurately at a steady pace. And I think the more attention I pay to it the less I would succeed.

E: Now, how would you walk down the street?

Christine: If I made an effort? … Worse than if I didn’t make an effort.

E: What?

Christine: Much worse than if I didn’t make an effort.

E: How would you walk down the street naturally … in a hurry?

Christine: Setting one foot in front of the other and not paying attention to it.

E: And how straight a line would you walk?

Christine: I don’t know. Maybe reasonably straight.

E: And where would you stop and where would you pause?

Christine: Where circumstances make it appropriate.

E: Now that’s what I call an evasive answer. (Erickson laughs.) Where would you pause and where would you stop?

Christine: If there were a red light I would stop.

E: Where?

Christine: At the curb.

E: Not until you got to the curb?

Christine: Maybe just before the curb.

E: How far before the curb?

Christine: A few steps, maybe one step.

E: Well, suppose instead of a stoplight, there is just a stop sign, and suppose there is no sign?

Christine: If there were traffic, I would stop.

E: I said there is no traffic of any kind.

Christine: Then I might continue.

E: Well, say this is the intersection (Erickson gestures) and if there was a stoplight and you walk along here, you look up and then you move your head to see how far it is to the curb. And if there is a stop sign you slow down to read that. And when you got to the curb, what would be the next thing you did?

Christine: After I stopped?

E: After you reach the curb.

Christine: I would stop and look around.

E: Look around where?

Christine: In the directions where I anticipate traffic might be approaching.

E: I said there was no traffic.

Christine: Then I would continue. Then I would look across the street and assess how big a step I have to take down.

E: You have to stop and see how far down you have to step, and you look right and left and up the street automatically. And when you get to the opposite curb, you pause and measure the height of the curb there and you wouldn’t have to look right or left. And what would cause you to slow down?

Christine: Oncoming traffic?

E: Well, if you were hungry, you would slow down passing a restaurant. After looking at your necklace, you would veer towards the jewelry store. (Christine laughs.) And a man who likes hunting and fishing could veer from a straight line toward a sporting goods store window.

And, where would all of you all slow down? At what building? … As if you were walking through an invisible barrier? Didn’t any of you try to walk past a bakery? You always slow down passing a bakery—man, woman or child.

(Addresses Christine.) Now, since you are a doctor, how did you learn to stand up? The same question applies to all of you. You know how you learned to stand up. What was your first bit of learning?

Christine: Making the effort and trying.

E: You didn’t even know what “stand up” meant. How did you learn to stand up?

Christine: Maybe by accident.

E: Not everybody has the same accident. (Laughter.)

Rosa: ’Cause I wanted to reach something. (She is a therapist from Italy.)

E: Well, what was it you reached for?

Rosa: What I was reaching for?

E: Don’t try to answer that question.

Anna: Probably by wanting. By wanting to do the way other people do. As a little baby reaching to the grownups coming up.

E: Yes, but how did you do it?

Anna: Physiologically, pushing my feet down, I imagine … and then helping myself with my hands.

E: (Speaking to the group, but looking at a particular spot on the floor in front of him.) I had to learn to stand up twice—once as an infant and once as an 18-year-old boy. I was totally paralyzed at 17. I had a baby sister. I watched her creeping around and I watched her to see how she stood up. And I learned from my baby sister, 17 years younger than me, how to stand up.

First you reach up and pull yourself up. Then accidentally, sooner or later (you all make the same accident), you discover that you put some weight on your foot. And then you discover that your knee bends and you sit down. (Erickson laughs.) Then you haul yourself up and you try the other foot and the knee bends again. It takes a long time to learn to put your weight on your feet and to keep your knees straight. You have to learn to keep your feet far apart and never get them crossed, because if you get your feet crossed you can’t stand up. You have to learn to keep your feet as far apart as you can. Then you keep your knees straight and then your body betrays you again—you bend at the hips.

After awhile, after many efforts, you manage to keep your knees straight, your feet far apart, your hips straight and you hang on the side of the playpen. You have four bases—two of your feet and two of your hands.

And then what happens when you lift this arm? (Erickson lifts his left hand.) You sit down. It is quite a job to learn to lift this hand and a bigger job to put your hand out because your body goes over that way. (Erickson gestures to the right and to the left.) And then it goes that way, and that way. And you have to learn to keep your balance no matter how you move this hand. And then you have to learn how to move the other hand. And then you have to learn to coordinate it with the movement of your head, your shoulders and your body. And finally you can stand up with both hands free.

Now, how do you shift from two feet to one foot? It is an awfully big job because the first time you try to do it, you forget to hold your knees straight and your hips straight, and you sit down. After awhile you learn to put all your weight on one foot and then you move one foot forward and that alters your center of gravity, so you fall down. It takes a long time to learn how to put one foot forward. So, you finally take your first step and it seems to be pretty good. Then you take the second one with the same foot and that doesn’t seem so good. You take a third one and sit down. It takes a long time to go right, left, right, left, right, left.

You all can walk, yet you really don’t know the movements or the processes.

(Erickson addresses Christine) Now, you speak German, do you not?

Christine: Yes.

E: How much more easily did you learn English than German?

Christine: Not any more easily. It was more difficult to learn English.

E: Why?

Christine: German was natural and came effortless because I heard it being spoken. English I learned …

E: You had to learn an entirely new set of vocal movements. You had to coordinate those with your ears. Can you say “The bird flies high?”

Christine: The bird flies high.

E: Now say it in German.

Christine: Der Vogel fliegt hoch.

E: Can you say it in Plattdeutsch?

Christine: No.

E: Why not?

Christine: I never learned it. I don’t think I could even understand it. It’s quite different.

E: Do you know this: “It’s nice to be Preiss (pronounced ‘price’), but higher to be Bayer (pronounced ‘buyer’)?”

Christine: I don’t think I quite understood.

E: It’s nice to be Preiss, but higher to be Bayer.

Christine: I’ve never heard that.

E: I can’t speak German. My accent may be wrong. It’s good to be Prussian, but it’s better to be Bavarian. (Laughter)

Siegfried: Would you please speak louder.

E: Now, I want to make the accusation of all of you that you talk too softly. I think the truth is, I can’t hear so well. (Erickson laughs.)

(Erickson speaks while looking down.) All right. In psychotherapy you teach a patient to use a great many of the things that they learned, and learned a long time ago, and don’t remember learning.

The next thing I want to say is that we all have billions of brain cells. Billions and billions of brain cells. And brain cells are highly specialized. You learn German with one set of brain cells, and you use another set of brain cells to learn English and another set of brain cells to learn Spanish.

The illustration I can give you of that is this: I had two patients on a ward that I used to illustrate things for one of my medical students. Both patients had a minor hemorrhage of the brain—a very minor hemorrhage. One patient could name anything. But if you asked him what you do with these things, he didn’t know. He could name a key, and the door, the doorknob, the keyhole. He could name anything, but he didn’t know any verbs.

The other patient didn’t know the names of things, but he could illustrate their use. He couldn’t name a key; he couldn’t point out a keyhole or a doorknob or a door. And if you handed him a key and told him “Unlock the door,” he didn’t know what you were talking about. But if you indicated to put it in the keyhole, he’d unlock the door. If you told him “Turn the doorknob,” he didn’t kn...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Halftitle
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Foreword by Richard Van Dyck, M.D.
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• About Milton H. Erickson, M.D.
• Introduction
• Erickson’s Use of Anecdotes
• The Seminar
• Appendix: Commentary on the Inductions with Sally and Rosa