Joining: From the Perspective of the Use of Self

JOINING: From the Perspective of the Use of Self Purpose: To gain the trust and partnership of the client Harry J. Aponte Introduction The first task of therapy is to gain the trust and partnership of the client, the foundation of the therapeutic relationship. The work of therapy requires the active, two-way engagement of therapist and client. The therapeutic relationship does not just imply the client opening up to allow the therapist into his/her/their personal life struggles. It also involves the client actively engaging with the therapist to understand and solve the client’s “problem.” Something is broken, painful, and deeply personal, something the client could not achieve a solution to alone. It will take the efforts of both the clients and the therapist to solve the issue. Neither one can do it on their own. These two strangers, client and therapist, thus face the challenge to join hands to meet this formidable challenge together, the therapeutic alliance. The Purpose of the Technique of Joining The technique to accomplish this goal of the therapeutic alliance is commonly referred to as joining. There are many approaches to this technique depending on the school of therapy. However, here I will treat on what therapists need to bring of their personal selves to successfully carry out this technique regardless of therapeutic orientation. If we accept that the essential goal of joining is to gain a level of trust with the client that draws the client into partnering with the therapist, then joining implies a type of intimate personal connection between therapist and client within the boundaries of the therapeutic process. To win the confidence of clients, therapists need to demonstrate competence. However, to gain a trust that allows clients to disclose their pain and failures, and to consent also to actively engage with the therapists in changing their lives – something very personally profound needs to happen between therapist and client. At its core, that connection is a human connection, which means that on the part of the therapist there must be a depth of understanding and caring that says that the therapist is all in. Then clients can risk sharing their vulnerabilities and risk joining the therapist in the effort to change. Description and Implementation of Technique For therapists to be able to communicate their personal presence effectively in the relational process, the endeavor begins somewhere inside of themselves. First of all, they must want to make that connection, whether it comes with little or great effort with a client because of who the client is and/or what the client’s issue is. They must care, which means opening themselves in mind and emotion to the person/s who is the client. This calls for finding something in themselves that can identify personally with the client to the point of empathy, even as they remain well grounded in the differentiated self. No matter how different the clients are from them, therapists must be able to resonate with some aspect of their common humanity, enough to feel with and care about the clients’ struggles. However, the deeper that emotional connection, the more vital is the need for therapists to be grounded in their own sense of self. This grounding is best achieved by therapists for their purposes as healers by connecting to their own personal struggles and vulnerabilities, and just as important, to be committed to and engaged in their own personal journey of healing and changing. This personal work will enable them to differentiate their experiences from those of their clients in the intimate engagement of therapy – all so necessary to be able to see their clients with some objective clarity and allow for the clients’ responsibility and ability to contribute to their own efforts to change. Therapists look to join their clients in their journey – bearing with them their pain through empathy, and sharing with them their battle to overcome through their engaged presence and energy. That connection, called joining, evolves not only through the commonality of the human experience, but also through the attributes that shape and define us – our gender, culture, race, social location, life experiences, and spirituality. These distinctive elements of our lives can serve as commonalities that help therapists connect with clients in their world-views, personal sentiments, and resonating experiences. However, these distinctive characteristics can also present significant obstacles to communication and mutual understanding. From the perspective of the use of self, however, they can also serve as opportunities and challenges for therapists to stretch themselves beyond their comfort zones, and risk extending themselves to enter viewpoints and personal experiences that may not only be alien to them, but even disagreeable and distasteful. To join in these circumstances, therapists need not and likely should not try to force themselves to agree with or like what is presented to them, but they must open themselves to hear, see and feel that other person’s distinctiveness. Clients must feel safe to join the relationship from their side. They need to believe that their therapists can and will enter the swirling rapids with them, which means that therapists, when engaging with their clients, need to be aware of themselves, connected to what is going on in themselves, and have developed a degree of personal self-mastery within their professional roles to inspire confidence in clients. Joining is a deeply personal experience within a well-directed professional process. Contraindications There are no contraindications when therapists are able to put themselves consciously and purposefully into the therapeutic process. There are serious contraindications when they attempt to put their personal selves into the process without a self-awareness and self-discipline trained to work integrally with their professional training. The therapy’s relationship must be personally intimate while professionally appropriate and therapeutically calibrated. The clinical assessment must be personally intuitive and professionally methodical. Therapeutic interventions must be personally meaningful and impactful while technically strategically fitting. A Case Example The therapist was a Latino, married with children, from a relatively disadvantaged background. The client family was an upper middle-class Anglo-Saxon couple with three children. The family came complaining about their rebellious adolescent middle-son, but with a strained marriage that clearly impaired their parenting. The therapist had to connect across an ethnic divide, although as a long-time professional he was now comfortable at this point in his career with this ethnic and socioeconomic segment of the population. However, he did not resonate easily with the emotionally inhibited, apologetic manner of the man, and the woman presented a controlled demeanor that initially distanced him. Their children, from pre-teen to college-age were kids enough like his own that he had little trouble relating to them. The wife had shut down to her husband whom she felt abandoned her when it came to disciplining the children. The husband recognized he avoided confronting conflict in his family interactions. The therapist could see that in spite of their marital tension, this couple shared caring and commitment, which allowed the therapist to enter their relationship through his feelings about his own marriage. The therapist was reluctant to connect with his own failings as a husband, but knew that would be necessary if he were to identify with this man’s pain in the relationship and the wife’s frustrations with her husband. Reaching within himself, he drew from his own experience to speak to the husband in a way that touched the man about how difficult it was to want to do a better job relating to his wife. Connecting within himself to his own wife’s frustrations with him, the therapist spoke with understanding to the wife about her frustrations with her husband. They each knew they were heard. The therapist could now reach to get them in touch with the affection they shared allowing them to soften what was alienating each in the relationship. They could love even as they irritated and frustrated one another. They were ready to talk and work together. The therapist had been there and experienced these feelings himself, which he used to help him walk the journey with them. Aponte, H. J. 1988). Love, the spiritual wellspring of forgiveness: An example of spirituality in our therapy. Journal of Family Therapy (U. K.). 20(1), 37-58. Aponte, H. J. & Kissil, K. (2014). “If I can Grapple with this I can truly be of use in the therapy room”: Using the therapist’s Own Emotional Struggles to Facilitate Effective Therapy. Journal of Marital & Family Therapy. 40(2), 152-164. 1