Brief therapy, sometimes also known as strategic therapy, is an umbrella term for a type of approach to psychotherapy. It differs from other schools of therapy in that it emphasises direct and strategic intervention, whereby the therapist takes responsibility for working more pro-actively with the client, in order to treat clinical and subjective conditions faster under some circumstance. It also emphasises precision observation, utilization, and temporary suspension of disbelief to consider new perspectives and multiple viewpoints. Psychotherapy is a set of techniques intended to improve mental health, emotional or behavioral issues in individuals, who are often called clients. These issues often make it hard for people to manage their lives and achieve their goals. ...

A primary approach of brief therapy is to open up the present to admit a wider context and more appropriate understandings (not necessarily at a conscious level), rather than formal analysis of historical causes. Becoming aware of these new understandings, it asserts that usually clients will de facto undergo spontaneous and generative change. Consciousness is a quality of the mind generally regarded to comprise qualities such as subjectivity, self-awareness, sentience, sapience, and the ability to perceive the relationship between oneself and ones environment. ...

Brief therapy is highly strategic, exploratory, and solution based rather than problem oriented. It comprises many approaches of which the therapists role is to choose moment to moment the most promising avenue next. It is less concerned with how a problem arose than with the current factors sustaining it and preventing change. It does not have one "correct" approach, rather it sees there being many paths any of which may or may not in combination turn out to be ultimately beneficial.

Founding proponents of brief therapy

Milton Erickson was a master of brief therapy, using clinical hypnosis as his primary tool. To a great extent he developed this himself. His approach was popularized by Jay Haley, in the book "Uncommon therapy: The psychiatric techniques of Milton Erickson M.D." Milton Hyland Erickson, MD (1901 - 1980) was a psychiatrist specializing in medical hypnosis. ... Hypnosis has been practiced for thousands of years and continues to be controversial. ...

"The analogy Erickson uses is that of a person who wants to change the course of a river. if he opposes the river by trying to block it, the river will merely go over and around him. But if he accepts the force of the river and diverts it in a new direction, the force of the river will cut a new channel." (Haley, "Uncommon therapy", p.24, emphasis in original)

Richard Bandler, the co-founder of neuro-linguistic programming, is another firm proponent of brief therapy. After many years of studying Erickson's therapeutic work, he wrote: Richard Bandler (full-name: Richard Wayne Bandler) (born February 24, 1950) is the co-inventor (with John Grinder) of Neuro-linguistic programming (NLP). ... Neuro-Linguistic Programming is the name of a set of techniques originally proposed by Richard Bandler and John Grinder to describe the relationship between mind (neuro) and language (linguistic, both verbal and non-verbal) and they propose how their interaction can be calibrated to affect an individuals mind, body...

"It's easier to cure a phobia in ten minutes than in five years... I didn't realize that the speed with which you do things makes them last... I taught people the phobia cure. They'd do part of it one week, part of it the next, and part of it the week after. Then they'd come to me and say "It doesn't work!" If, however, you do it in five minutes, and repeat it till it happens very fast, the brain understands. That's part of how the brain learns... I discovered that the human mind does not learn slowly. It learns quickly. I didn't know that." (Time for a change, 1993, p.20)

See also

• Psychotherapy
• Cognitive therapy
• Therapeutic metaphor
• Hypnotherapy
• Neuro-linguistic programming
• Fritz Perls

Psychotherapy is a set of techniques intended to improve mental health, emotional or behavioral issues in individuals, who are often called clients. These issues often make it hard for people to manage their lives and achieve their goals. ... Cognitive therapy or cognitive behavior therapy is a kind of psychotherapy used to treat depression, anxiety disorders, phobias, and other forms of mental disorder. ... Therapeutic metaphor is a specialized use of metaphor. ... Hypnotherapy is the application of hypnosis as a form of treatment, usually for relieving pain or conditions related to ones state of mind. ... Neuro-Linguistic Programming is the name of a set of techniques originally proposed by Richard Bandler and John Grinder to describe the relationship between mind (neuro) and language (linguistic, both verbal and non-verbal) and they propose how their interaction can be calibrated to affect an individuals mind, body... Frederick S. (Fritz) Perls (1893 - 1970) was a noted German-born psychologist and psychotherapist. ...

External Links

• Information on NLP A form of Brief Therapy