SERIES: SIGNIFICANT CONTRIBUTIONS AND AUTHORS IN RELATIONAL CONSTRUCTIONISM-SOCIAL CONSTRUCTIONISM

Diego Tapia Figueroa, Ph.D. and Maritza Crespo Balderrama, M.A.

“Praxis gives meaning to words.”

(Ludwig Wittgenstein)

Harlene Anderson (I)

(January 8, 2021)

We continue with Harlene Anderson, Ph.D. (Born December 1, 1942, in Houston, Texas, United States).

 •          How can therapists and consultants create the types of relationships and conversations that allow all participants to access their creativity and develop possibilities where they did not seem to exist? The question contains the fundamental elements of this type of work: relationships, conversations, creativity, and the development of possibilities.

•          Home is acceptance.

•          An experience isn’t really meaningful until you find a home in language.

•          These practices are not a technique, but a way of being. It is invited, in each encounter, to adopt a posture, an attitude, and a tone that reflects a way of being in relationships and conversations with people, including a way of thinking, speaking, acting, and responding with them.  This philosophical stance becomes a philosophy of life. A vision of the world that does not separate what´s professional from the personal.

•          The most important aspect of human relationships starts from one’s being… I always wonder what I’m becoming that I haven’t been yet… Being collaborative is a political statement.

•          … Create dialogic conversations and collaborative narrative relationships; a process and relationship characterized by connection, collaboration, and construction.

PHILOSOPHICAL PREMISES	CONTEXTUALIZED REFLECTIONS
Human systems are systems of language and meaning generation.	Human beings develop in systems, within them we occupy a place in relation to others.  This premise implies that what defines the place in which we are located is the language and the senses that each one -concerning others- gives (to oneself, to others, and one’s relationship).
They are forms of social action; independent individual mental processes when constructing reality.	Reality is constructed from the relationship with others, in the social sphere and not so much in an internal, individual process, isolated from the context and relationships.
An individual mind is a social compound and therefore the self itself is a social, relational compound.	Individuals are constituted in relationships, not by spontaneous generation or with limited ties (relationship with the mother for example) but in social spaces that include those initial networks but expand towards the community, at first in the closest spaces (school, neighborhood, church) to then expand by enhancing contact with others and initiating relationships sustained in dialogues that do not end but are recreated.
The reality and meaning that we attribute to ourselves, and attribute to others, and the experiences and events of our life, are interactional phenomena created and experienced by individuals in conversation and action with others and with us.	Reality is perceived through filters, which are constructed from experiences about others and the environment; in that sense, there is no single reality but the one that arises from the relationship and the meaning that the relationship gives to the fact.
Language is a generator, gives order, and meaning to our life and our world, and operates as a form of social participation.	Language, which goes beyond words, is constituted in the energy that gives meaning to the person and his relationships.  How we speak and talk to each other (not only with the voice but also with the gestures, the looks, the silences) will determine who we are and who we are in a relationship.
Knowledge is relational; it is embedded in language and in our daily practices, where it is also generated.	The knowledge that is useful for life is generated in relation to the other; finding in each context in which we develop a meaning that allows us to build ourselves, it becomes a generative, active process that is always present.

• Language is reality… Facts happen, but the meanings we attribute to them are constructed in language.
• Creative action not only means choosing but participating in the creation and expansion of possible choices.
• The facilitating position promotes a process that keeps all voices moving and contributing.

FROM	TOWARDS
A social system defined by a structure of roles.	A system based on the context and product of social communication.
A system composed of an individual, a couple, or a family.	A system composed of interrelated individuals through language.
A hierarchical organization and process led by the therapist.	A therapeutic philosophical stance that invites collaborative relationships and processes.
A dualistic relationship between an expert and a non-expert.	A collective partnership between people with different perspectives and knowledge.
A therapist who knows, and who discovers and collects information and data.	A therapist who is open and curious about the other and who is in the position to be informed.
An expert and satisfied therapist who knows how others should live.	A therapist expert in creating space for dialogue and facilitating the dialogic process.
Therapy focused on the knowledge imparted and on a search for causality.	Therapy focused on generating possibilities and trusting in the contributions and creativity of all participants.
A therapist confident in what he knows (or thinks he knows).	A curious and open therapist for whom knowledge is constantly developing.
A therapist who operates from knowledge, assumptions, and private and privileged thoughts.	A therapist who shares and reflects on their knowledge, assumptions, thoughts, questions, and opinions.
An interventional therapist, with strategic and technical capacity.	A joint search for meaning that depends on the capabilities of all participants.
A therapist who tries to bring about changes in another person or another member of a system.	A change or transformation that is a natural consequence of a generating dialogue and a collaborative relationship.
A therapy with well-defined people, endowed with nuclear self.	A therapy with multifaceted people, endowed with relational self-built-in language.
Therapy as an activity that investigates other subjects.	A therapist and a client who participate as co-investigators to create what they “discover”.

•          Social constructionism is a form of social inquiry… I find it useful to recall Gergen’s assertion that any action and its description is subject to infinite revision.

•          Change or transformation is generated in language, is part of the participatory process of understanding, and is full of uncertainty and risk.

•          Knowledge, language, and interpersonal relationships are inseparable areas. Knowledge is relational (it is created and transformed into social exchange) and language is generative (it shapes our lives and relationships).

•          (…) my conceptualization of therapy: a language system and a linguistic event that brings people together in a collaborative relationship and conversation—a joint search for possibilities.

•          Language is the vehicle of our existence and our sharing with others and with ourselves… We act and react by language, we use it to relate, influence, and change.

•          Taken from the thesis of Diego Tapia Figueroa, for the Ph.D. of the VUB and the Taos Institute (2018).

•          These premises imply a movement in the definitions of social system, therapeutic process, and position of the therapist:

Six intertwined features of this postmodern style of psychotherapy:

1) Trust and believe: Consultants want to be trusted and believed. It requires a different attitude and expertise from therapists. Attitudes and skills oriented to the therapy process rather than to the content (diagnosis) or change (treatment) of “pathologies”. Therapists are not driven by the search for truth, but by the need to understand.

2) Ask conversational questions: Consultants say one of the most useful aspects of successful therapeutic experiences is the therapist’s questions. Questions asked from this position help the consultant tell, clarify and simplify a story; open new ways to explore what is known and what is not known; this helps the therapist learn about what is said versus what is not yet said; each question leads to another question, a process of continuous asking that provides the basis for continuing with the dialogic process. They invite the consultant to speak with the therapist; invite the consultant to a shared inquiry. They help to enter into the subjectivity of the consultant (the inner thoughts of the consultant, the unsaid, and what´s not yet been said; what goes through a person’s head is relational).

The question is the tool of this work; the way to be interested, to participate in the life of the consultant. The therapist’s task is to find the question or tool that allows him to learn more about the immediate recount of the consultant’s experience. This means, that if we have just been told something that is the answer for which we must find the following question. The questions result from the immediate dialogical event, and the developing narrative informs the next question, and the narrative is constructed from the questions that are addressed to it.

Rhetorical questions give themselves their answers; pedagogical questions involve the direction of the answer (the two types of questions are used in all modernist psychotherapies and involve one direction. They are the questions that are only interested in the details of the story that the therapist wants to hear and then does not hear the consultant’s story.)

There is no question guide. Each question results from an attempt to understand what has just been said and what has not been said; each is an element of the overall conversational process. The right questions are the ones that arise when one immerses oneself in the world of the consultant. They arise from paying careful attention and being interested in learning more about what worried or made the particular consultant feel bad, rather than pursuing preconceived ideas about “pathologies” and hypotheses. These are questions that make the consultant feel like being invited to a conversation, of belonging.

To begin with, I often ask: What do you think is the most important thing I should know about you, and what do you think people miss out on by not paying enough attention to it?

3) Listen and respond: Consultants say they want to be heard and listened. I define listening as attending to, interacting with, responding to, and trying to learn about the consultant’s history and perceived importance. It involves hearing differently: a process that involves an elaboration of understandings, an interactive effort to reach a shared meaning, which occurs when two people (or more) try to come to a mutual understanding of something. It is an attitude that invites consultants to tell us how things are for them, and what worries them. We are sensitive in a situation, and we do what the situation requires. It is a respectful, humble posture and way of listening, supported by the belief that it is worth hearing what the consultant has to say. It requires us to pay attention, showing that we value the consultant’s knowledge of their pain, misery, or their dilemma.

The therapist may ask, “What you say is that…? Do you mean that…? A while ago you said… Is that what you meant?” A sensitive-active listening-hearing does not mean simply shutting up and doing nothing. It doesn’t mean the therapist can’t say anything, offer an idea, or express an opinion. Nor does it mean that it is simply a technique. It is a way of being, a genuine attitude that communicates and demonstrates sincere interest, respect, and curiosity. It is listening with a face to reflect on everything that the consultant says. When a therapist doesn’t actively listen and respond to what they hear, they risk rushing too much to ask questions, offer feedback, hypothesize, and give suggestions, all of which can make the consultant/client feel unheard, frustrated, and criticized. They are actions that block dialogue and inhibit mutuality.

4) Maintain consistency: Consultants say they want the opportunity to tell their stories. To this end, the therapist must create and safeguard the space of a first-person narrative of the consultant. For this it is critical that the therapist authentically commits to opening up to the story of the other person, to be curious about what the other person wants to tell. This involves working with the consultant’s reality: their language, vocabulary, and metaphors. When the consultant is not included in the conversational arena, they can speak or act in ways that we sometimes feel and label as resistant denial or even paranoid non-cooperatives. Therapy from social constructionism is an intersubjective process, a dialogue where all participants can make room for creativity and awareness of others. Thus arises the novelty, co-created in a dialogue between therapist and consultant, instead of being developed, introduced, or offered by the therapist. The production of a new meaning rests on the novelty (the non-knowing) of what the therapist is about to hear, and on his ability to simultaneously attend to the inner and outer conversations of each member of the system. Maintaining consistency is part of an intentional conversation that carries the purpose of re-establishing dialogue. Difference: The content question looks for data and information. A process question facilitates a different dialogue.

5) Maintain synchrony: Consultants say therapists often seem to lose patience. Sometimes we make the mistake of moving forward in our footsteps and ignoring those of the consultant. It is better to go like the turtle: you reach the destination faster by going slower. I arrive as a therapist faster walking next to the consultant than pushing him from behind or pulling from the front.

6) Honor the consultant’s story: Consultants say they want to be taken seriously and be validated and legitimized. It is important that people can give voice to their own “position” towards those around them, and be taken seriously with an active response. It is to offer a space of trust; a place to begin a sincere dialogue. The possibility of not hiding anything and the sense of working towards the transformation of relationships. A therapeutic process and relationship characterized by connecting, collaborating, and building.

•          There are two postmodern trails… one leads to the landscape of the “already said” … The other leads to the “not yet said” – the novelty that occurs in dialogue.

•          What is necessary or critical for the practice is to always keep in mind the importance of respect for the other person; be open to their differences, be aware of their local knowledge, and also invite and use it.

•          Questions are a way to invite other voices and other sources of experience, to continue to set a tone for collaboration, and to start creating intersecting dialogues.

•          Asking, on the therapist´s side, and asking the consultant himself, again and again about a fact, about a relationship, allows him to deconstruct the text of his story, as he has told it so far, validating what he considers important, “inviting to put thoughts into words”.

•          True “listening” can only occur when we are open to the difference and uniqueness of the other without judging, blaming, or criticizing. By being so and doing so, we are listening ethically.

•          The premise that dialogue is generative (that transformation occurs in and through dialogue) is the foundation of my thoughts and actions in collaborative learning communities (…) I want each person to generate their seeds of novelty, and to cultivate them in their personal and professional lives beyond the organized context of learning (…) I want to make sure every participant has a voice, contributes, questions explores, feels insecure, and experiments.

•          The responsibility lies in the forms of relationships that arise in processes and expand them. This position is best described as a philosophical stance -a way of meeting, reflecting together, of talking to the people a therapist works with- it is a posture characterized by an authentic, spontaneous, and natural way of acting. Through this attitude, tone, and position, we are telling the other, “I respect you,” “You have something valuable to say to me,” and “I would like to hear it.”

(…) my change in thinking and talking about the philosophical position: for years I said it’s a way of being. Now I realize that it is not that, they are ways of being and of becoming. This seemingly subtle grammatical shift draws attention to the notion of being static versus a fluid one. There is never only one way to be, exist, and respond to each other. Our being is influenced by so many things and is unique to every encounter. The being must be plural. I also added becoming to further signify the dynamic nature of being. We are always on the path of becoming with the other and with ourselves… a special way to be present, tuned, and receptive…

Harlene Anderson (II)

(January 22, 2021)

•          Collaborative therapy does not have some specific techniques or certain steps to follow. It is rather a philosophy or position regarding people, the people who consult us, and how we relate to them. This philosophical stance manifests itself in an attitude that communicates to the other that it is worth listening to what he has to say, that we see him as a unique human being and do not categorize him as a member of a certain group or type of people. If a therapist believes this, he will connect authentically with the other and be able to collaborate and build with him in a participatory, collaborative, and non-hierarchical therapeutic process. Another important aspect of this approach is that it assumes that most people value and want to have successful relationships and good quality of life.

•          Explicitly, the professional adapts his answers to the uniqueness of each consultant and the members of his system, talking to them about what is important to them with the intention that the meeting will generate potential transformations.

•          The consultant is the expert in what he says regarding the content: he is the one who knows about his life experiences and the reasons that bring him to therapy. The therapist, with all this, is the specialist in the process: his expertise consists of creating a dialogical context, and engaging with the consultant in a first-person conversation… A therapist becomes a resource for a way of being.

•          A process of forming, saying, and expanding what is not said and what needs to be said  -unfolding through dialogue, new meanings, themes, narratives, and stories- through which new self-descriptions can emerge.

•          The goal, according to Gergen and McNamee, of an exploration of relational responsibility is not to change one or another flawed person or resolve a conflict. Rather, it is about broadening the spectrum of voices -“relational realities”- that are accepted into the conversation. Become more responsible, and give more account of yourself (…).

•          Coherence between the way of being personally and professionally. When a professional is “doing” his job, he is also present as a person (…) Beyond the fact that it is possible to separate the “personal” from the “professional”, we can ask ourselves what we would lose in trying to create this separation. Personal and professional connections can expand and improve all aspects of our lives. One reason for this is that our consultants and students also do not leave their personal nature “out” when we meet with them. We all yearn for human connection and what we are as people is what we have to offer to the other (…) Distinguishing “the person of the professional” adds dimension and depth to the relationship, in addition to promoting a favorable atmosphere for the formation of a collaborative community.

•          The way we begin to receive and get to know people creates the kind of conversations and relationships we can have with them.

•          Take responsibility for inviting collaborative relationships (context) and dialogic conversations (process).

•          The therapist/facilitator offers questions, opinions, perceptions, and suggestions as a way to engage in the conversation.

•          The new perspective suggests a collaboration between therapist and consultant that tends to be less hierarchical, authoritarian, and dualistic, and more horizontal, democratic, and egalitarian… it’s a conversation between colleagues…

•          We live, organize and give meaning to our lives through socially constructed narratives.  Our stories are not formed in isolation but are relational.  The meanings and interpretations we ascribe to the events and experiences of our lives -including our identity- created, experienced, and shared by individuals who are in relationship and dialogue with each other.

•          On the other hand, if the therapist is responsive to the consultant, then he can offer suggestions, as long as he stays in a “not knowing” stance in terms of believing his suggestions are the right thing to do. The point is not to assume as therapists that we “know nothing,” but to assume that “we know differently.”

•          Conversation -in therapy, in teaching, in a business consultation- seeks to help people have the courage and ability to “move between things and events in the world”, to “have a clear perspective”, to produce.  This is allowed by a special type of conversation -dialogue- and the therapist’s ability to create a dialogic space.  And therapy is a language system and a linguistic event that brings people together in a collaborative relationship and conversation– a joint search for possibilities; it is about facilitating a dialogical process – a philosophical stance.

•          Through conversation we form and reform our life experiences; we create and recreate our way of making sense and understanding; we build and reconstruct our realities and ourselves. Some conversations increase the chances; others decrease them.  When possibilities increase, we have a sense of creative action, a sense that we can face what worries or disturbs us -our dilemmas, problems, pains, and frustrations- and achieve what we want: our ambitions, hopes, intentions, and actions.

•          The new perspective suggests a collaboration between therapist and consultant that tends to be less hierarchical, authoritarian, and dualistic, and more horizontal, democratic, and egalitarian… it’s a conversation between peers.

•          The purpose of therapy is to help people tell their narratives in first person so that they can transform their identities into others that allow them to understand their life and their events, that open up many possible ways of being and acting in the world at any time and in any circumstance, and that help them achieve and express or execute their creativity or their sense of autonomy.

•          Relationship and conversation go hand in hand. The types of relationships we engage in, influence the quality of conversations we can have with each other, and vice versa, sometimes they don´t.

•          For me, listening is never an independent activity. It is interconnected with speaking, responding, and hearing, all of which are essential in any genuine effort to accept and understand the other. It is a process of being and committing to the other as a unique human being. John Shotter refers to this type of listening as sensitive listening: always ready to respond with curiosity and as an invitation to share more.

•          I speak to invite the other to speak so that I can listen. I listen to respond. Responding is a human and moral responsibility, and the way I respond is decisive. What appears to be or is “unanswered” is a response that the speaker can interpret in different ways. The way we respond points to the importance -or non-importance- of the other person and what they said. I want to respond to acknowledge that the other has spoken and to show consistency with what was said or what I think was said. I want to respond in a way that helps me clarify whether I have really heard what the other wanted me to hear, and to do so in a way, tone, and attitude of respect and curiosity. Respect and curiosity show appreciation and recognition of the “humanity” of the other.

•          Authenticity is important. We must show sincere and genuine interest and be present in and with the relationship. But no matter how we strive to be genuine, we must also recognize that we cannot be blind to our values, beliefs, and prejudices. Our ears, eyes, and body -our lenses and our senses- are full of cultural and historical influences that can easily lead us to assume, judge, blame, or categorize the other. We tend to make sense of the other, their narrative, and our experience of them through our pre-understandings and perceptions: what we do from our maps that make sense.

•          We cannot transcend our realities gratuitously or pretend that our subjectivities do not exist. We can, however, be an interested and curious listener and speaker who is trying to learn from the other, and learn from his map-of-meaning, not ours. I find that when I’m involved in this kind of learning, my responses to what I think I hear and understand are more consistent with what the other wants or longs for. This does not suggest that the intent of my response is always to support, validate, or condemn what was said. I just want to make sure I understand the best I can. Therefore, understanding is active and not passive, just as it is mutual and not singular.

•          “True” listening can occur only when we are open to the difference and uniqueness of the other without judging, blaming, or criticizing. By being and doing so, we are listening ethically.

•          By listening ethically, we do not strive to change the other, but allow ourselves to be influenced by them.

•          Contribute to creating a community in action, which connects in meaningful ways, with creativity and imagination, in dialogues and joint actions, committed to transformations that generate common well-being.

•          … it has to do with the way you reflect on this: How do you think about the people you work with? How do you think about yourself? How do you think about what you are doing together in that therapeutic dialogue, in that encounter? What do they do and is it generated differently and how do they do it? What is the goal of being together?

•          As a therapist: speak little, listen a lot (listen deeply, to the other; listen with the whole body), and keep the goal in mind. We are with people: listening, talking, and responding in a more active, meaningful way. We invite the silent voices of the consultants (their internal dialogues) to express themselves, giving them meaning.

•          Stop playing a role -the role of therapist- and choose to be a person among and with other people. Learn a way of being with people; to dialogue with people. How to have a relationship with the consultants that are generative and from where responsibilities will emerge from the transformative dialogue? Understanding is a dialogical process that happens between people, it is not a thing that happens, it is a built-in dialogue with the other.

•          Each person brings their clouds in the sky for therapeutic conversation. Like a child looking at the sky and seeing in the cloud something of his own: an elephant, a whale, a horse. When those clouds collide in the sky, something new is created. It’s an example of how we influence each other.

•          Create and facilitate an environment and a learning process where participants can develop their skills and abilities so that: “each person generates their seeds of novelty and cultivates them in their personal and professional life, outside the organized context of learning … invite each participant to take responsibility for being the architect of their learning… that each participant has a voice, criteria, relational intelligence, contributes, asks, explores, has uncertainty and experiences.

•          Shared consultation: invite the other to share, research, and be hospitable. The way we welcome sets the tone for a generative relationship and conversation. I want to be a welcoming host and a welcomed guest, as both relationships are critical to fostering generative conversations. This requires an ability to be spontaneous and flexible in engaging with others. It also means avoiding prescribed behaviors and expectations.

•          The consultant brings a precious gift: the stories of his life. I want to accept the gift, but I don’t want to take it away. I want to look at it and start asking questions about it. I think of the gift as a ball of stories composed of narrative fragments of his life story.

•          This approach contrasts with the idea that the therapist can predetermine what information is critical and pre-structure questions to collect it. My questions, comments, and body movements are informed by the conversation and my way of participating in the narration. My intention is always to be in a process of learning and understanding what the consultant wants me to know better. I remain attentive and eager to learn what the consultant thinks is important for me to know and understand. I am aware that I can never learn and understand everything, and that what I learn and understand is my interpretation of the consultant’s story and my experience with them.

•          My questions are not asked for answers, rather, they are invitations for the other to speak… Listening is part of hearing, speaking, and the response process, a type of rhizomatic process that is dynamic and multidirectional.

•          The conversation begins as a one-way activity in which the therapist is a curious student and the consultant is a teacher. This process naturally changes to mutual learning back and forth, in a joint inquiry in which the consultant is infected by the curiosity of the therapist. While the consultant listens and responds to the therapist’s curiosity, they become interested in the topic of conversation in new ways, as they have not done before. This cultivates a generative process of the consultant wondering, questioning, and considering his story from a different perspective. It is in the dynamic, an interactional process of trying to understand from the perspective of the consultant what was clarified, and a new meaning is developed for both: the consultant and the therapist. As John Shotter suggests, “Our words do not make sense in themselves, nor is it about them occurring in a context, nor about the intentions of the speaker. Meaning is created by, with, and for people in collaborative meetings with each other.”

•          Relational experience: the relational experience coincides with the premise that the knowledge and specific meaning of the consultant and his situation are created through the process of narration -that is- in the dialogic interactions between the therapist and consultant. The consultant brings valuable resources to the meeting: their experiences, beliefs, and knowledge. Therapists bring their unique experience to invite the speaker to dialogue and maintain a collaborative relationship, and generative conversation. Each experience is different and equally important; the therapist is an expert in processes and the consultant is the expert in the content. For a collaborative therapist, the experience is in how to invite and interact with others in a generative conversational process and how to invite and use the consultant’s experience. Importantly, it is not about the therapist having experience in solutions or interpretations for others.

•          Conversational societies: The collaborative therapist and his/her consultants become “partners” or conversational partners by establishing collaborative relationships and engaging in dialogic conversations. To achieve this, it is necessary that the focus of attention is what the consultant has to say and that the therapist constantly listens, learns, and tries to understand the consultant from the perspective and language of the consultant.

•          Transformation is inherent in the dynamics of dialogue. Dialogue requires the therapist to be open and accept otherness, the distinctive uniqueness of the other person, that is open to the difference and brings it to the relationship and conversation.

•          This allows the therapist to suspend judgments, prejudices, and opinions and try to understand the other from their perspective. It also requires the therapist to be fully present, interested and engaged as a human being. If the therapist acts as if they are performing a role, they will not be able to listen to the consultant and respond in a manner consistent with the otherness of the consultant.

•          The therapist should be equally aware of the consultant’s influence on him/her, as he or she is usually concerned about his or her influence on the consultant… Change can happen over time, sometimes long after the moments of your therapeutic beginning.

•          Therapy as research: There is an interest in “local knowledge”, which refers to what the consultant knows about his experience and his situation, rather than in a general theory that explains it. Together, the therapist and the consultant generate knowledge through shared research in which they explore the familiar together and co-create the novel. A very important part of this process is that the consultant tells his story and by doing so in this context of co-research, clarifies, expands, and transforms it.

•          The consultant is the expert: The collaborative therapist considers the consultant to be the expert in his own life. The consultant is the therapist’s teacher. The therapist respects the consultant’s story and takes seriously what the consultant has to say and how he wants to express it.

•          The “not knowing” position: Not knowing suggests thinking about knowledge and its use from this conceptual framework. By taking a position of not knowing, each consultant and their life circumstances are new to the therapist. This means that meeting each consultant is like meeting a foreigner who teaches you their language, customs, and rituals. In other words, the therapist is careful not to impose, believing himself an expert in the lives of others, a theoretical map in which the stories told by the consultant are placed and classified.

•          As Harry Goolishian and I said, “The therapist is always prejudiced by his experiences, but he must listen [and respond] in such a way that his previous experience does not completely close him to the meaning of the description of the consultant’s experience.” Importantly, when offering knowledge (e.g., comments, suggestions, questions) the therapist considers the intention, attitude, tone, and timing of what they choose to share. The therapist also pays special attention to how the consultant responds and maintains consistency with the consultant’s response, without judging whether or not it is appropriate.

•          I want to try to remain curious and able to understand the map of the other, understanding that their map is logical from their perspective or truth. I find that, if I can remain curious, what at first may even seem like nonsense to me makes sense from their perspective… I want to be respectful. Continuous curiosity and the attempt to understand are part of the interconnected process of speaking, listening, hearing, and responding.

•          Uncertainty: Uncertainty – ambiguity, confusion, unknowns – fill collaborative-dialogic practice. As a connected practice, dialogic collaboration is an approach that involves the consultant and the therapist mutually determining the destination and the path to achieving it… Therapy may be a process of giving birth to something totally unexpected, or it may uncover something subtle and nuanced, but you’re not trying to discover or validate something pre-existing that we “know” is there.

•          This requires being able to live and trust in uncertainty, thus, embracing vagueness, ambiguity, the unknown, and unpredictability. Uncertainty is part of life and all creativity in processes. Certainty has the potential to make us overly confident in our experience and inhibit our spontaneity, risk-taking, and openness to challenges and changes.

•          Part of not knowing has to do with uncertainty. From a collaborative perspective, we can never know a priori where a conversation is going to take us, or where a session will end. This is because language is generative. As the consultant and therapist talk together, ideas emerge that probably neither of you had before your conversation. In light of the postmodern view on language, we cannot think of causality in human interactions. We cannot predict that if the therapist says or does something specific, the consultant will say or do that. An implication of this is that the therapist approaches each consultation as a unique situation, this includes what the consultant presents and the possible outcome of the therapy.

•          From this position, the therapist does not cause a change in the consultant, but both are transformed through their interaction. I prefer the term “transformation” to “change” because “change” in psychotherapeutic culture often has a connotation of causality: one person changes another or someone passes from one state to another. “Transformation” refers to the fluid and continuous movement in our lives, while retaining at the same time a sense of continuity.

•          Being “public” as a therapist: Being public refers to the belief that the therapist needs to share their inner thoughts. Consultants want to know what their therapist is thinking, writing in their notes, etc. In my research on consultants’ experiences of useful and useless therapies, consultants often commented that they wanted to know what was behind the therapist’s questions and comments.

•          The therapist’s openness also has to do with the idea of being “public.” We all constantly have external (with other people) and internal (with ourselves) conversations. Being “public” as a therapist means being willing to share the inner conversation rather than keeping it hidden or veiled. The therapist shares his or her ideas for participating in the conversation, not guiding or directing it. Putting these ideas on the table can also prevent them from skewing the conversation, as what isn’t said can influence how the therapist asks questions or contributes to the conversation.

•          Therapy as everyday life: Most people everywhere want similar things. Although expressed differently, with various meanings and varying degrees, people want to live a fulfilling life, have good interrelationships, and secure livelihood. Most people I know seem to be coping as best they can when we consider today’s global challenges. Every person, regardless of their background, life history, or current situation, has unique and sometimes invisible strengths and resources. Each person wants to be able to decide on the choices that impact their lives. In general, human beings want to experience a sense of belonging, to feel appreciated and respected.

•          We are all part of many conversational systems and therapy is just one of them. What happens in therapy is very similar to what happens in our daily lives, in the sense that colloquial, not “professional” or technical language is used. We use “conversational questions”; they are questions very similar to those that occur in other everyday conversations, whose answers will require new questions and that invite us to talk about the familiar or the known in different ways and that can open up possibilities. The important thing is the process of dialogue and how through it, ideas are clarified, considering alternatives and creating different meanings for all the people involved in the conversation. Conversations with our consultants also mobilize and transform us as therapists.

•          The multiplicity of perspectives: an important idea in postmodern therapies is that there are many perspectives and different possible meanings for any life event. In this type of therapy, plurality and complexity are valued and ways are often sought to include different ideas or voices in the sessions. Collaborative therapists often work with a “Team as Yes.” The members of this type of team listen to the session “as if” they were different people involved in the situation described by the consultants. At the end of the interview, team members share their reactions, speaking “as if” they were those people.

•          I remember a quote from John Shotter, which includes his perspective to emphasize the importance of the professional’s humanity in how we relate to our consultant to enhance that consultant’s chances of becoming the person, the “who,” they want to be: “I will consider that the basic practical moral problem in life is not what to do but what [who] to be.” When I pause reflectively, this thought accompanies me consistently.

SUGGESTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Anderson, H. y Goolishan, H. (1996).  The expert is the client: ignorance as a therapeutic approach. In Mc Namee. S & Gergen K.  Therapy as a social construction. (pp. 45-59) Barcelona, Spain, Editorial Paidós.

Anderson, H. (1999). Conversation, language and possibilities.  A postmodern approach to therapy. Buenos Aires, Argentina Editorial Amorrortu.

Anderson, H. (2012).  Collaborative relationships and dialogic conversations: ideas for relational-sensitive practice. Family Process, Vol. 51 (No. 1), 1-20. Retrieved from:

https://es.scribd.com/document/125580289/Relaciones-de-Colaboracion-y-Conversaciones-Dialogicas-Ideas-Para-Una-Practica-Sensible-a-Lo-Relacional.

Anderson, H. (2013).  Collaborative Language Systems and Collaborative Relationships: A Postmodern Approach to Therapy and Consultation.  In Deissler, K. & McNamee, S.  (Ed) Filo and Sofía in dialogue: the social poetry of therapeutic conversation.  (pp. 58-67) Ohio, USA: Ed. A Taos Institute Publication.

ISI Notes: International Summer Institute (Mexico: 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017). Organized by Sylvia London, Harlene Anderson and Irma “Ñeca” Rodríguez.

Crespo, M. (2020). The culture of peace in dialogue with diversity. Digital magazine Centro Cultural Benjamín Carrión. Quito, Ecuador.

Brief Thoughts on Listening.  Taos Institute Ideas, News and Resources – February 2020.  RELATIONAL AND SOCIOCONSTRUCTIONIST CONSORTIUM OF ECUADOR (IRYSE). Brief Thoughts On Listening.

https://iryse.org/2020/02/

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Tapia Figueroa, Diego, Thesis (2018) for the Ph.D. with the Free University of Brussels (VUB) and the TAOS INSTITUTE.

Harlene, Conversations Interrupted. (2019) Editors: Rocío Chaveste Gutiérrez and ML Papusa Molina. Ohio, USA: Ed. Taos Institute Publication.

Tapia, D. (2020). Transformative social dialogues. Digital magazine Centro Cultural Benjamín Carrión. Quito, Ecuador.

The Sage Handbook of Social Constructionist Practice. Edited by: Sheila McNamee – Mary M. Gergen – Celiane Camargo-Borges – Emerson F. Rasera, – October 2020 | 696 pages | SAGE Publications Ltd.

https://uk.sagepub.com/en-gb/eur/the-sage-handbook-of-social-constructionist-practice/book266523#description

http://harleneanderson.com/

Taos Institute page containing books and publications by Harlene Anderson:

https://www.taosinstitute.net/?s=harlene+anderson

Speaking, listening, responding, listening and understanding: An Orientation to the Intra-actions of Dialogue*. International Summer Institute, June 21, 2020.

Harlene Anderson Ecuador TAG project 2019

English translation of Bruno Tapia Naranjo.