ABSTRACT
This chapter considers a suggestion from the therapist provided the stimulus for productive introspection on the client's part; it would have been unproductive on the therapist's part to make further suggestions when the client was not in need of them. In order to tackle cognitive block, the therapist can make some suggestions based on the client's case conceptualization or derived from her clinical experience. A way of stimulating a client's introspection when he becomes stymied in pinpointing his situation-specific automatic thoughts is for the therapist to suggest a thought opposite to the client's expected response. For example, the client is uncertain why he feels so anxious about being asked out by a very attractive woman. The therapist can then tease out through Socratic questioning why the client thinks he will disappoint her and whose expectations he will not live up to, his own or what he imagines are her expectations of him.
