ABSTRACT
Often, parents, adolescents, and children will complain of the interaction that “happens ev eryday.” They find themselves in an unsatisfying pattern but feel helpless to break out of it. Fre quently, if you suggest a change, they will explain that they have already tried that or they know that it won’t work. The purpose of this exercise is to join with the client in their problem pattern and at the same time make it difficult for the pattern to continue. Rather than trying to convince them to solve the problem your way, you might explain that since the solution hasn’t presented itself yet, it might be helpful to study the interaction in more detail by purposefully repeating it. This suggests that they replace something that feels automatic with purposeful and deliberate action. Clients will likely have difficulty carrying out this exercise, but if that is the case, they will have broken the pattern. If they are able to successfully repeat the pattern, you can talk about that experience. Focusing on the difficulties they had reproducing the pattern implies that it takes effort to preserve the status quo. As a result, they may be able to identify parts of the in teraction where they do, in fact, have control.
