A collaborative therapist keeps the emphasis on knowing“with” another instead of knowing another person, their circumstances, or the preferred outcome better than the person or beforehand. A collaborative therapist is aware of the risk that these knowings can place people in problem categories or identify them as members of a type of person. Such knowing can interfere with the therapist’s ability to be interested in and learn about the uniqueness of that person and the novelty of their life. Knowing “with” is crucial to the dialogical process.
A not-knowing position does not mean the therapist does not know anything or can discard or not use what she or he knows (i.e., theoretical knowledge, clinical experience, life experience). Rather, the emphasis is on the intent, the manner, and timing with which the therapist’s knowing is introduced. The introduction of a therapist’s knowledge is simply a way of participating in the conversation, offering food for thought and dialogue, and offering a way to continue to talk about what is already being addressed. Following the client’s response, including being able to let go if the client is not interested, and refraining from private interpretations regarding the response, is important.
4. Being Public
Therapists also have private thoughts —whether in the form of professionally, personally, theoretically, or experientially informed understandings (i.e., such as diagnoses, judgments, or hypotheses). These thoughts influence how the therapist listens and hears and inform the therapist’s responses. From a collaborative stance, the therapist is open and generous with their invisible thoughts, making them visible or what I call being public. Being public does not refer to what we traditionally think of as self-disclosure. Instead it has to do with the inner conversations that therapists have with themselves about the client and the therapy. Being public is offering food for thought and dialogue, putting forward possibilities of things to talk about or ways to talk about them. It is one way for the therapist to contribute to the conversation. I want to highlight the notion of “participate;” the intent is to take part in an unbiased manner and not to unduly steer the conversation nor tenaciously promote an idea or opinion.
When talking about their experiences of successful and unsuccessful therapy, I have consistently heard clients comment that they always wondered what the therapist really thought of them. They always wondered what was “behind” the therapist’s questions. They felt that there was a private conversation about them that they were not part of.
Elsewhere I have articulated two grounds for making private thoughts public (
One,
Making private thoughts public invites what Bahktin (1981) refers to as responsive understanding. He suggests that, “A passive understanding of linguistic meaning is not understanding at all” (p. 281). Shotter, influenced by Wittgenstein, suggests a relational-responsive kind of understanding. In other words, understanding cannot take place unless both the speaker-listener and the listener-speaker are responsive to each other. An unresponsive inner conversation is in danger of leading to missed-understanding or understanding that does not fit with that of the speaker or their intent (e.g., the client’s).
And two,
Putting private inner talk or thoughts into spoken words produces something other than the thought or understanding itself. The expression of the thought organizes and re-forms it; therefore, it is altered in the process of articulation. The presence of the client and the context along with other things, affects the words chosen and the manner in which they are presented. As well, the client then has the opportunity to respond to the therapist’s inner thought. The response—in the many forms that it may take such as expressing interest, confirming, questioning, or disregarding—will affect it.
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