SoFAP key concepts

BASIC AXIOMS of Solution Focused Applied Psychology (SoFAP)

Abstract

From a theoretical viewpoint, these axioms enrich our way of looking at how we, together with our clients, co-create an alternative reality. From a practical viewpoint, the axioms offer us elements that we can fall back on when in doubt about the way to proceed.

These basic axioms support the way of thinking behind the solution-focused approach. They form the foundations on which we base our interventions.

The basic axioms we are dealing with are: (1) resource orientation; (2) resilience; (3) the science of well-being; (4) working in a client-oriented way; (5) systemic approach and practice; (6) the four-leaf clover: cognition-emotion-behavior-interaction.

When we intervene with our clients, the basic axioms help us see beyond mere solution- focused techniques. They help us create a rich world of ideas from which to draw incisive interventions.

Basic axioms

Solution-focused therapy originally does not result from big theories but from daily practice. de Shazer and his team strived to make the clients suffer less by eliminating all unnecessary detours like delving in the past, searching for root causes, or applying the diagnosis-treatment chain. Bypassing these classical routes and going straight for the solution-focused approach that you will encounter in this book saves time and energy. Even if it is not the goal but a welcome side-effect, the solution-focused approach works faster and produces more robust outcomes. That’s where the original name comes from: Brief Family Therapy.

But SoFAP is not based on mere personal views and opinions. SoFAP is based on views from related scientific fields that we transform into axioms: unproven statements that are accepted as foundations.

These basic axioms support the way of thinking behind the solution-focused approach. They form the foundations on which we base our ways of thinking and are also an addition to, as well as a deepening of, the traditional solution-focused model.

From a theoretical viewpoint, these axioms enrich our way of looking at how we, together with our clients, co-create an alternative reality. From a practical viewpoint, the axioms offer us elements that we can fall back on when in doubt about the way to proceed.

1. The axiom of resource orientation

A resource is a source that provides the strength a client can use to achieve his goal. A goal is not only the solution for a problem the client is struggling with. It can also be something the client strives for, what he wants to accomplish. It can be a concrete goal: I want to pass the next exam. It can also be something more diffuse like: I want to grow as a person, I want to find meaning in my life, I want to enhance my well-being.

A resource can literally come from anything: intelligence, family, friends, professional relations, world view and convictions, past crises. But resources can also come from difficult life events like loss of work, bereavement, a difficult financial situation. The crux is obviously what the client does to transform these events and emotions into a resource.

2. The axiom of resilience

Resilience is the ability to go through inevitable disrupting life experiences, to endure them and to recover from them, so that you learn from it and develop a pro-active response mechanism that will enable you to handle a next disrupting life experience somewhat better. This ability is forged by and not despite setbacks. As Albert Camus said: “In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer.”

In our everyday lives, we all come across “disrupting life events”. We were all born and we all die. Those are two inevitable life events that are quite disrupting. But life has more in store: loss, infatuation, illness, decline, adolescence, heartbreak, the joy at the birth of a child, layoffs, divorce, a young love, and so on.

3. The axiom of well-being

SoFAP no longer refers to “the science of happiness”, but to “the science of growth, well-being, and satisfaction”. We all want to grow as human beings and find meaning in each phase of our life cycle. We define “well-being” as: everything that makes life worth living, including accepting the fact that being unhappy is an inevitable part of it. Satisfaction stands for being content with what you have. A more common phrase is: count your blessings.

4. The axiom of client-orientation

“Therapy is not about techniques. Therapy is done in the language and experience of the client.” This is reflected in the basic mindset of the solution-focused professional and constitutes a breach with the traditional therapy models. Within the solution-focused model, it is the client who is central not the therapist or his therapeutic theory.

The more client-oriented we are, the better we can understand the client’s perspective. Also, the better we understand his language, the better we can connect with him. That way, the client becomes the central actor in his own healing process. It is the client who is the hero of the process, not the therapist. Therapists are facilitators, who create a context in which the client is helped to help himself. Any psychotherapy is in fact nothing more (but also nothing less) than “assisted” self-therapy.

5. The axiom of systemic thinking

The image of mankind on which solution-focused applied psychology is based states that every person is a unique individual who functions in a relational network. This implies that we are interested in the person, in the context in which the person lives and how he functions in this context. It’s clearly “and-and-and” and most certainly not “or-or-or”. In other words, we are interested in the intra-psychic structure of the person we are working with, as well as in his environment and how he deals with his environment. Consequently, when trying to help our clients, we can intervene in any of these three fields.

6. The four-leaf clover: cognition, emotion, behavior, and interaction

Based on recent scientific discoveries in the field of neurology, neuronal networks, and swarm intelligence, you could think of a human being as a neuronal network computer, wrapped in a biomechanical shell that functions in a network of social relationships with the characteristics of a self-learning and self-organized swarm (Cauffman, L. & Kennedy, J.

2007 Keynote SOL Conference) his highly scientific definition can lead us astray from what’s most important in everyday therapy: every human has thoughts and feelings and behaves in a certain way in the contact with other human beings and the environment. This four-leaf clover makes us human. Thoughts are constantly going through our heads; at the same time, we experience emotions, and we do something – even if that something is doing nothing. Moreover, we don’t live in a vacuum, but are constantly interacting with others.

Conclusion

These basic axioms are no Nobel Prize winning truths. They are assumptions and working hypotheses that form the basis of our solution-focused interventions. Becoming aware of these basic axioms helps to connect the solution-focused practice to the complexity of life. When we intervene with our clients, the basic axioms help us see beyond mere solution-focused techniques. They help us create a rich world of ideas from which to draw incisive interventions.