ABSTRACT

This chapter discusses advanced empathy skills that allow to focus on deeper levels of the client's experience—his feelings and meanings. Part of acknowledging people's emotional state is to accurately understand at what level of intensity they are experiencing that feeling. There are two types of reflections of feelings: straightforward and combination (combo). Straightforward reflections provide the feeling without relating that feeling to the situation it is contextualized in. Combination reflections connect the client's feeling with the content that led to the feeling. The chapter explores the first two levels of a client's story: the content and the feeling. Metaphors can function as either paraphrases or reflections of feelings. There are two types of metaphors: those generated by the client and those generated by the therapist. Client-generated metaphors are metaphors the client created and brought into the conversation. Therapist-generated metaphors are metaphors the therapist created and brought into the conversation.