7.2.1.
Outline: Empathy Tracks and Typical
Therapist Response
|
Client Experiential Track |
Target (What the therapist is listening for) |
Corresponding Therapist Responses |
Examples |
|
Central content/ task |
The gist or main point; also what the client is trying
accomplish at this point in the session |
Empathic Understanding |
OK, so I guess you’re saying that your main feeling is
disappointment with no one taking you seriously. |
|
Emotion |
Poignant, touching emotionally alive experiencing (or the
absence of emotion) |
Evocative reflection |
•The hurt, it just cuts so deep. •Just sort of a dull, numb feeling. |
|
Edge |
Important, emerging, unclear experiencing |
•Empathic exploration •Empathic repetition |
•You’re not quite sure how to put in into words but it’s sort of
almost ‘bittersweet’…? •”Too sensitive...” |
|
Person |
What it’s like to be the client; mode of existence; “contact
boundary” between self and world |
Empathic formulation |
Oh! So no wonder
you this has gotten to you; it’s the thing you’ve always been afraid would
happen someday. |
|
Process |
Immediate experience, task, action, manner |
Process reflection |
And now as you sit here with me, I guess you’re wondering if I’m
going to answer any of your questions. |
|
Implicit |
Unspoken but probably present experiencing |
Empathic conjecture |
Is there also a feeling that if you let me get close, I’ll turn
against you as well? |
|
Avoided |
Avoided, minimized, ignored, side-tracked experiencing; also
unreflective, critical of self or others |
Empathic refocusing |
But as much as you’d like to done with resenting your mom, I
guess the feelings are still there. |
Materials designed to
accompany the book Learning Emotion-Focused Therapy: The
Process-Experiential Approach to Change from APA Books.
©2003 Robert Elliott, Jeanne Watson, Rhonda Goldman, and Leslie Greenberg
http://www.process-experiential.org/learning