Externalizing Therapy

[yenn]

Hi all. Just to let you know that this site gave me the strength to speak to my counsellor about my phobia, realizing there was a name for it and so on really helped. Thankfully he is not into the idea of Exposure therapy (I can't say how relieved I am) and he has a number of suggestions for how we can try to fight this.


First suggestion is to try externalizing therapy. Not entirely sure how it's gonna work, fromwhat I've read it seems to be about dealing with the phobia as separate to me and looking at the effects it has on my life and how I can try to change its effects, rather than it itself. I may well have misunderstood because it was psychological literature that I was reading, But I'll let you all know whow I'm getting on [img]smileys/smilies_01.gif[/img]

[swiftette]

That sounds interesting-please let us know[img]smileys/smilies_01.gif[/img]

[honeybee]

hi,


what is that, i could suggest it to my psycologist if i new what it was?

[sage]

it's a common approach. it helps by sort of "talking to the phobia" about how it's ruined your life, etc. and getting at the underlying emotion that way. It should be helpful. I think it may be related to Geschtalt.


It would be nice to hear how it's going!