The power of metaphor and story is that they can bring new functions to bear on a situation in a rapid manner, without an excess of description. Referring back to familiar metaphors can catalyze defu- sion. Compare these two sentences: “Hold that thought lightly, as you might hold a butterfly that has just landed on your finger” versus “You should respond to your thinking in a defused way—with detachment and acceptance; and willingly, with openness, fascination, and curiosity; and not with violence, struggle, battle, possession, being right about it, argument, or trying to figure out if it is true and criticizing it if it isn’t.” Notice how the brief analogy can get across many of the qualities of defusion, without the need for an exact description.
Once a defusion exercise has been conducted or a metaphor related, a therapist can rapidly bring defusion into the room by referring back to earlier defusion exercises or metaphors. Take, for example, the following transcript, in which the concept of “buying a thought” versus “having a thought” had been introduced in an earlier session. The goal of this distinction is to help clients respond to their thoughts based on the functional utility of those thoughts, rather than on their literal truth.
Client: I just don’t know what to do. I just can’t connect with people. I get in social situations and I just can’t do it. I just have nothing to say.
Therapist: Let’s take a look at this. You’ve just shaken this person’s hand, and your salesman mind shows
up and sells you the thought, “I can’t connect with people.” It looks as if you’ve been buying that so far. Maybe the important question here for us is whether that’s a thought you want to continue to buy. Let me ask it this way: when you follow that thought, where does it lead you in terms of your values in this area?
Client: I just stay at home. Or when I’m at a party, I don’t talk much to people.
Therapist: And I’m guessing there’s a story connected to the idea that you can’t connect with people? Client: Yeah, it’s true, I don’t connect with people.
Therapist: So then your mind sells you “It’s true.” When you buy that, where does it lead you? Client: Again, not toward where I want to go.
Therapist: So, we’ve talked before about how you have a value that you want to connect with people.
Right?
Client: Yeah.
Therapist: And now your mind is selling you the thought that you can’t do it. And it can even marshal
evidence. Now, let me ask you another question. Suppose you were to go out tomorrow and actually be able to connect with people; suppose there were people out there who really could “get” you, and you were able to just really get with them, really open up to them, and let them know you. Let’s say you did that tomorrow. Who would be made wrong by that?
Client: Huh? I’m not sure … [ten-second pause] I guess I would.
Therapist: Yeah, you’d have to give up this story that you can’t connect with people. You’d be wrong
about that story. Your choice here seems to be either to defend your story or get your life back. What do you think would come up for you that would be painful if you were to do this?
Client: It would mean I could have done it all along …
Therapist: Yeah, let’s stay with that. When you say that, I notice some sadness coming up. Can we make
room for you to have that right now?
Client: [quietly] Okay.
Therapist: If having this sadness, this sense of loss, could make it possible for you to really connect with
people, to be able to really be there for your sister in a way you’ve never been able to before, would it be worth it? [At that point, the therapist can guide the client into an exercise in which he would be present with his sadness and could practice willingly holding it.]
Asking clients, “Who would be made wrong by that?” if carefully timed, can be a powerful interven- tion to help clients whose story about who they are, or how their life works, is in conflict with a valued direction they wish to take. Asking this question often results in a pause before clients respond, and sometimes their reaction is confused because the question seems to have come out of nowhere. It also has the potential to sound accusatory if poorly timed, or if the client and therapist have not already created a compassionate, accepting relationship, built around agreement about the client’s values. This statement is not meant to blame the client for his or her difficulties, but rather to help the client see how being correct, logical, or coherent (being right) can actually stand in the way of living a vital life. Done skillfully, the confrontation is between the client’s mind and the client’s experience or values, not between the client and the therapist.