The New Behavior Online

It’s happening now. More than twenty fascinating thinkers and doers have accepted our invitation to blog here. The group includes many names you know. And with an eye to the future, we have included some gifted new voices whose names you may not know. Not yet, that is. Check back here to see their new articles, front and center!  Read More →

Featured Contributors
 

Insight on Demand

Although I do not consider insight to be the most important component in therapy, it can be very helpful when it occurs. I conduct therapy from a problem-solving perspective, which is based on the assumption that people will live happier more fulfilled lives when they are able to function as capable problem solvers. If you have attended any of my trainings, then you have probably... Read More →

Utilization: Concept #1

During a recent meeting of the Milton H. Erickson Institute of Phoenix, Marilia Baker turned to me and said, “Don’t you think that just as ‘suggestion’ is the golden rule of hypnosis, ‘utilization’ is the golden rule of Ericksonian hypnosis?” She then proposed that in Ericksonian hypnosis these two concepts are conjoined. Indeed, utilization itself is a suggestion that speaks to the individual’s value, to the worthiness of his or her life experiences, personal ideas, and the worthiness of one’s idiosyncratic behavior. Even more remarkably, utilization also... Read More →

The Most Important Skill in Therapy

If there is any single skill that might be used to summarize what the most effective Ericksonian therapists are able to do really well, it would be the general ability to connect with others in deep and compelling ways. Whether you are describing the therapist’s use of effective communication, interpersonal flexibility, skillful observation, or love and compassion, it all comes back to the therapist’s ability to form a meaningful connection with those who are otherwise lost or isolated in some problematic life-circumstance. Like explorers searching for a city of gold, many students of therapy are trying to learn special curative techniques. But the real treasure is found in the state of relationship that is... Read More →

A Conversation with Warren Bennis

BOL: I hope our conversation will focus on the how-to of intervening in order to enhance the performance of organizations. You are a master of that art, but your most important work has focussed elsewhere: on understanding the nature of the organization,... Read More →

A Conversation with Henry Stein

BOL: Alfred Adler’s name is better known to today’s therapists than are his ideas and methods. Your dedication to this body of work must be based on the belief that contemporary practice is diminished because Adler’s contributions are not... Read More →