SFBT isn’t about Solving, it’s About Inspiring

So I just got done teaching a live Masterclass and something came out of it that I thought was really important that I wanted to share with you, and that is like the name, Solution Focused Brief Therapy is misleading because we’re actually not looking to solve anything. And I actually think that that’s true, not just for Solution Focused professionals, but Psychotherapists at all. What we’re actually looking to do in a session is to inspire a person, because once a person is inspired, then they’re capable of achieving their wildest dreams. An inspired person is literally unstoppable.

But here’s the thing about problems. Oftentimes a lot of us have had difficult things happen. We’ve had trauma in our lives, we’ve had pain, we’ve had suffering, we’ve had injury, we’ve had grief, and there’s really no way to solve those things. We have to learn how to carry on with those things as a part of our story. So once you inspire someone, then that’s exactly what happens. They carry on in spite of a difficulty or in spite of a challenge going on around them.

But somehow in our graduate studies, and somehow, somewhere along the way, we started thinking it was our job to solve client problems. And that’s not true. The only thing that happens if you try to solve somebody else’s problem is you get frustrated, you get burnt out. You yourself will begin to suffer. So we have to understand, we have to truly accept. We have to believe that this really isn’t about solving things.

It’s about inspiring people. And once you understand that, that’s your role, then this work becomes significantly more simplified, significantly more straightforward, and then you’re really able to make a difference in lives. Not just your client’s life, but your life too.