DAY ONE
What do we mean by resistance and stuckness?
- Depression, shame, self-loathing
- Chronic suicidality or self-destructive behavior
- Belief that nothing will work
- Difficulty coming to or being present in therapy
- Struggles for control of the process
- Phobias of vulnerability
- Phobias of closeness or being visible
- Phobias of abandonment and distance
- Trauma-related fear and mistrust
- Survival responses and strategies
- Introduction to the Structural Dissociation Model
- Understanding resistance and stuckness as defensive, not offensive
- Triggering aspects of psychotherapy
- Decreasing the ‘threat’
- Positively re-framing stuckness and resistance as adaptive
- Acknowledging and sharing the dilemma: the client wants help but not at the cost of vulnerability
- Navigating the threat of closeness and the threat of distance
- Making use of the “social engagement system”
- Therapeutic benefits of laughter and playfulness
DAY TWO
Helping clients deconstruct inner conflicts and struggles
- Making use of the Structural Dissociation Model in therapy
- Helping clients understand internal conflicts as struggles between parts
- Using the language of parts to articulate and highlight contradictory behavior
- Honoring the parts who defend by resisting
- Introducing mindfulness as a therapeutic tool
- Increasing curiosity and interest
- Using psychoeducation to challenge existing beliefs and patterns
- Letting go of our need for the client to change or engage
- Facilitating empathy for parts who defend and parts that feel injured
- Re-framing resistance and stuckness as “the parts,” not the whole of the client
- Cultivating compassionate internal relationships
- ”Negotiated settlements” with defender parts
- Internal soothing and comfort for hurt and fearful parts
- Therapeutic support for resistance and acceptance of stuckness
- Creating a sense of “we” that includes the parts who collaborate and the parts who resist as well as the therapist
- Providing ‘missing experiences’ of healthy attachment
- Therapy as a play space: balancing permissiveness and structure
- ”Being” the therapeutic relationship instead of talking about it
- Enjoying the struggles rather than resisting them

