Using crisis as a compass

My client wants to work on their past trauma, but we keep getting sidelined by upsetting situations each week and this takes up the whole hour. How do I redirect them to working on our EMDR targets?

Francine Shapiro said “The past is the present.” We are rarely working on only the past, the present or the future. The gift of using EMDR is that EMDR isn’t just about using bilateral stimulation (whether eye movements or audio/tactile BLS); EMDR is about using the Adaptive Information Processing model as the lens to view our client’s distress–any distress. When a client comes to session upset about, it’s helpful to use what they’re bringing to session to guide the client to identify:

• What is the negative belief that is increasing their distress?

• How does this emotion, body sensation or belief relate to past experiences? Is this a pattern that they’ve noticed throughout their life?

• How would they want to respond differently, if they were connected with their most authentic, adult self?

• Can they name a time they handled a similar situation well? What was the outcome? How did that feel?

• What resource might they need to respond in a more mindful, wise-minded way in the future?

This information becomes gold nuggets for both your work together and for the client to feel a better sense of control and understanding why some situations seem to bring such an emotional charge. This guides your resourcing more specifically during Phase 2 and leads to powerful options as you set up Future Templates.