The Past Tells Stories of Your Strength

Perhaps one of the biggest myths about Solution Focused Brief Therapy is this idea that it’s all about the future, and that’s all we focus on. In fact, I often have people say, “I love Solution Focused Brief Therapy because it’s all about the future and we focus on the future”. But that’s not true. The past is where evidence of your greatness and your strength and your resources are.

I’m here. I’m at Texas Wesleyan University. This is where I graduated from, from college, long time ago, 20 plus years ago. And as I walk around the campus, I’m remembering really positive experiences. Not everything that happened while I was on this campus was positive. Like I didn’t do so well in certain class. Or this girl that I liked broke up with me and dated somebody else.

Like there are lots of things, but there are also some beautiful, wonderful moments. Like I can’t tell you how many times, how many hours I spent in this gym playing basketball with my friends back when I could still run a jump and, and do athletic things in my late teens and early twenties. And I’m walking around the campus now remembering all those things and remembering that version of myself.

And it inspires me and it touches me and it, and it does something to you like it’s good for your mental health to reminisce and to go back in time and like remind yourself that that’s still part of you and who you are. In Solution Focused Brief Therapy, if we just focus on the future, we would lose that. We wouldn’t be able to tap into that.

And focusing on those details is just as important as focusing on the future. So never let anybody tell you that the past doesn’t matter. This is a special place for me. This campus is a very special place for me. This, this court is a very special court to me. It didn’t look like this. They repainted and updated. Look how awesome like the score table is and all that stuff now. When I was here that all that stuff wasn’t there, but it’s still the same building. Like I remember those rafters and I remember the bleachers and my buddies and I would come in here and we’d play basketball for hours, like daily.

And I love thinking about who I was when I, when I was coming up and when I was figuring life out. And again, it wasn’t perfect. But if I were coming to you for therapy, you gotta ask me, “How did you get through those years? What did you tap into? How did you make those friends? How have you held onto the friends?” You gotta ask me about my past. Because it’s rich with experience. It’s rich with evidence of greatness and resource and past success. So never let anybody tell you Solution Focused Brief Therapy is just about the future.