Connecting
with Stories of Change
by
George
W. Burns, Lic. Clin. Psych. Subiaco, Western Australia
(from the Milton Erickson Foundation Newsletter)
"I am fascinated by the
power of stories to connect with people who may have chosen not
to connect in other ways, to alter experiences that have
otherwise remained unaltered, and to change patterns of behavior
that experts in behavioral change have found unchangeable.
Jessica provided me with one such example. Although she was just
six years old when her mother brought her to see me, she was to
teach me something about the power of metaphors.
"Jessica had been labeled
from the outset. An elective mute was the diagnosis. She was a
child who chose to speak only to whom she wished, and that meant
no one outside of her immediate family. She was a child who was
a problem to adults, especially her teachers. Their system
demanded measurement and accountability. Jessica was not playing
by the rules. She could not be assessed on verbal-based
measures.
"At home Jessica spoke
freely. Her parents considered her vocabulary, sentence
structure and fluency of speech to be comparable to her peers.
"She had visited a school
psychologist and a private clinical psychologist and out-smarted
them both. They tried to coax and cajole. They asked her to talk
through puppets and they set up a behavioral schedule for her
classroom, but Jessica remained an elective mute. I wasn't sure
I had any additional weapons in my arsenal.
"While speaking with her
mother, Jessica sat on the floor drawing, thus giving me the
opportunity to address her indirectly while apparently
conversing with her mother. My initial therapeutic intent was to
normalize selectivity of speech and then to set an expectations
of change. I did not anticipate what would happen in the next
few moments.
"I spoke with Jessica's
mother about how we all choose with whom we want to speak and
with whom we do not. We communicate openly with people we like,
while we may not want to talk to others at all. My aim was to
confirm Jessica's power to be selective, and reassure her about
the normality of her choices.
"To set an expectancy of
change, I told her mother a true story about a childhood
classmate of mine, Billy. Nobody at school had ever heard him
speak, but there was a rumor he spoke at home. Billy was teased
by the other kids, who poked fun at his silence. But nothing
changed –
until one day.
"At this point of the story
Jessica stopped her drawing and looked up at me. I continued to
keep her mother's gaze and proceeded with the tale.
"That day the door of
the cupboard at the back of the classroom was ajar and a
feather duster protruded through the gap. As we filed into
class, Billy's eye fell on the protruding feathers and,
without thinking, he exclaimed, 'Sir, there's a hen in the
cupboard!' Everyone laughed, and after that Billy spoke.
"Jessica, who had stopped
drawing to listen to the story, picked up a fresh sheet of
paper. In a few moments she passed me a drawing of a bird.
'What's this?' I ventured to ask. 'Tweetie' came the reply.
'Who's Tweetie?' I pressed gently. 'My canary,' she answered.
"Her mother looked as
incredulous as I did. I was the first adult Jessica had spoken
to outside of the family in her whole six years. As Jessica
taught me, metaphors can hold a unique ability to facilitate
connections, whereas other language forms may not. The
empowerment for her to change an established pattern of behavior
had come not just through a story, but through one told so
indirectly that it was apparently being communicated to someone
else."
(A more detailed account of
this case, other examples of change through metaphor, and
step-by-step guides for using therapeutic stories are provided
in George Burns'
101 Healing Stories: Using Metaphors in Therapy.)
