🎙️ Toward Solutions Podcast | Episode 7: Flexibility, Family Work & Silent Sessions with Ayse Adil

Being client-led doesn't just mean being able to listen. It means you changing your style. Hello and welcome to the Toward Solution podcast where creativity meets practical application. I'm Deon Singh. And I'm Jason Pasco. Together we dive deep into the world of solution focus, exploring its transformative power across a variety of contexts. Come join us each month as we engage in enlightening conversations with experts and practitioners who are applying solution focus in their unique environments. Whether you're looking to enhance your personal life, professional practice or community projects, our discussions will provide you with valuable insights and actionable ideas. Tune in to discover how you can implement solution focused practices in your own context, unlocking new possibilities and creative solutions. Let's embark on this journey of exploration and innovation together. If you like this podcast, leave us a review and subscribe now so you don't miss an episode of Toward's Solutions. Aisha, thanks so much for joining us. Your name came up, we had a conversation a little while ago with Chris Iveson. And we've made a habit of when we're talking to people then asking, who should we talk to next. And so he gave us a few people that we should, he said he must talk to these people and you were you were one of those. So we followed up, we got in touch. I know I've read probably just a really little bit about what you're up to in your work, but it sounds really interesting in your work with families and really came to hear some more about it. So yeah, thanks for joining us. Thank you and it's lovely to be here. We're Dylan and Jason. When I saw their email originally and Chris said, you know, I highly recommend you speaking with these my fellow colleagues and Aisha, a deal was on that list. I thought, what does he want? It's got to be an alternative. There wasn't bless him. He's a lovely guy. There wasn't. It was it was absolutely genuine. So yeah, it's lovely to be here and lovely to be talking about SF. Yeah, fabulous. I noted that your background is in education and obviously there's the child and family component as well. So my background is in education and Deon's background is kind of in that child, child protection area as well as working with Indigenous organisations, things here. So there's kind of that nice combination and we're very, very keen to hear what you're doing, how you're doing it. But to begin, here's our starter question. What is it that you really love about the solution focused approach? If you guys knew anything about me, you would know that 14 years ago when I was introduced to the solution focused approach, I hated it. And I'm very open and honest about it. Could not stand it. Wish you were she. What the crap is this? Would you mean child protection? You can't ask these sort of questions. But what I love about it now is that solution focused to me is a being. It's a process of being. So I always use a brain analogy and I say every person has a library in their brain. And I do this with all my clients. And as long as we can train our brains to be solution focused, everything else will be okay. So it's just being. It doesn't take too much work. It's a mindset of thinking about, right, yes, things are not going great. Reality. Yes, maybe tomorrow things aren't going to be great again, reality, but how am I going to cope with it? So that being that false of being to true to yourself and just thinking, you know what, it's going to happen. This is life. But my library is trained and it knows it knows it's very solution focused. And it's a little bit of narrative therapy kicked in there as well. And this is what we're going to do about it. So that's what I love about it because you can teach anybody the process of being solution focused and they can use it in every aspect of their life, not just for that, for the reason that bought them to us in the first place. Yeah, what that makes me really curious. How did you get from wishy washy to that's why I love it. So I have a particular style of learning, which we all have, right? We all have. And when I was first learning SF because we were, are we delivering a conference, a child-pent abuse conference, and this guy came up to us and have you heard of solution focused therapy? And we were like, no, they said, you should look it up. So we did. We booked on training and I couldn't stand the delivery. So I wasn't actually listening to what the trainer was saying. I was looking for something to captivate me. So I can enjoy it and it wasn't happening. So I was just playing on my phone. I was doodling. I was using some profanity, you know, to my colleague and say, what a waste of money this is. And then he took me to another training and I was like, I'm looking to do it. I'm working pain for this. I is crap. I don't like it. And then another one and then another one. And then we met with Elliot Colley. And I mean, his style is what did it. So then I kind of looked up and I thought, huh. Okay. I still didn't believe in it. But I thought, huh, okay. And then I witnessed my colleague Joe conducting a solution focus session. And I think he kind of said to the final, I'm going to conduct a solution focus session from beginning to end. And you know what, that's not when you're first learning your best types of medical questions. You do the whole Shabang, you know, like a list. And I was in awe because I could see the transformation of this mother and daughter who had walked in ready to kill each other, but walked out holding hands. I was like, oh, okay. So maybe there is something to this. So then I opened up my mind to it. So then now before any families invited into our sessions, we invite the parents to our parent workshops to help them open up their mind before we start the family work. Because I needed that guidance. And I assumed a lot, I assumed a lot of the families parents need it. Because when you're so problem focused, because you have to deal with everyday things, you know, talking about what you want instead might sometimes be a bit of an issue. So we teach them how to use SF before they join the sessions. Awesome. So you were talking about like the, you know, you'd maybe you'd heard it, but you weren't engaged in it. How are you engaging those parents at that point in the in the beginning of their process? So we, we all, like me personally, we will have our own different styles here at family-based solutions, which is great. Yeah, which is absolutely great. I'm more of the do you want change? I will always ask the clients, do you want change? Are you ready to make change? Because if you're not, get out. And as soon as I say get out, they're like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, because I don't have that time anymore to, okay, you know, give it six weeks. I might, especially when they've had like therapy for such a long time, and they almost have memorized the type of questions that they may have been asked. And then he comes to solution-focused therapies asking the opposite style of questions, and it froze them. But I think for me, it's very important to put to help everybody be in the mindset before any therapeutic work starts. So I will teach them how the brain works. I will tell them about their librarian. If they have ADHD, autism, whatever, might be trauma because they're referred to domestic abuse, I will teach them what happened to the brain. What's happening to their brain? So I'm opening up their mind, and then I'm asking them to, to be trained in SF principles, assumptions, and then the family work starts. And then I will ask the question, are you ready for change? Would you like to make some change? Because you're all part of the family. Every single one of you is a puzzle piece. And then I'll go to my next question. What do you want to know about me then? If you're ready for change, what do you want to know about me? So I don't actually ask the best hopes question, not until the very end of the first session. What do you want to know about me? And then what do you want me to know about you? So I have the problem free conversations. Then I then ask the best hopes question, and then I end the session. I don't ask follow-ups. Just so they can leave with that thought. But that, my style in engaging them is I'm very much upfront. Right, we don't have time to waste. You've been through domestic abuse. You've been going through this for 12 years. How much more energy do you want to put into it? If you want me to talk to you like a victim and keep you in a victim state, you're in the wrong, you're in the wrong organisation. But if you want to come out of it, you're in the right place. So that's my style. If they need more of a TLC, all of that, they don't come to me. They will go to someone else. I love that. I love the idea of, sorry, - I hope you're answering your question. (laughs) - No, well, it's prompted a whole bunch more because I had a conversation today with a national organization here. And it was touched on something that you just said. The importance of saying, what do you want to know about me? Because we can walk into situations and people have read professional bios or someone gets, we were talking in the context of delivering professional learning. Someone will read out your LinkedIn bio as they introduce you or something like that. But it's what matters to the other person. - Exactly. - Yeah. - That sets the tone. And then I love the fact that you say, now what do you want me to know about you? - I think starting with the best host question will suit some clients, but not all clients, especially when you're librarian in the brain is so busy juggling all these filing cabinets because it can't, finding folders because it's struggling to follow them away. And there's so much trauma going on for them. And they're like, what are your best types? Well, to not fill this way. Ah, but when you have the problem free conversations, I'm actually, it's therapy for themselves. So like we were at the Copenhagen SFBT conference and I showed a video of one of my clients a male victim of domestic abuse. And when I asked him what would you like to know about me, he said, you know, have you worked with male victims before? Yes, I have. And I just keep the answers very short. Yes, I have. Have you done this put? Yes, I have. So it's very deliberate because if I then start giving him examples, then it becomes about me and it's not about me. If he wants to ask me a follow-up question, he can. But then when I asked him what would you like me to know about you, despite him at the very beginning saying, oh, I've got to tell my story again, haven't I? Well, no, absolutely not. But then what would you like me to know about you? Well, I got married and did it and then the whole thing came out. I was like, I didn't even ask you. But it is really interesting because within that, you pick out so many nuggets of, yes, I'm going to throw that back in your face. Yes, I'm going to use it there. Yes, I'm going to use that there. then you're going with the best type and I think that's more respectful for me. Let's think of a contract at Tours the End once you get to know me a little bit rather than write, what your best times we're going to work towards there? What are wearing the scale? Is it not as easy as that because we're human beings? It's a really interesting, it's kind of just the beginning of the therapeutic relationship isn't it because it's how you start out that and then genuinely getting to know each other and so I think it's really valuable and then what I love about solution focus is how it kind of compounds that. So once you start to get to know each other, it tends to create a really healthy professional relationship because it leaves people feeling good, feeling hopeful, like you believe in them, although sorts of things as well. So really cool. Can you tell us? So you kind of talked a bit about the fact you're using it with families but for anyone who didn't know any kind of context, how are you applying solution focus practices in your context? So the charity was set up to work with families experiencing child to parent abuse. So children that were abusing parents from the age of 16 to 21. Then quite quickly, as we can all imagine, we worked out that, hold on a minute, a lot of these kids have experienced domestic abuse, intimate partner violence. So then it's hard on a minute. Now we have the parent that they're living with who has mental health issues, depression, anxiety, mostly contributed from their experiences of IPV and they're kind of absent from their children. And then hold on a minute, now we've got issues with the perpetrators who are also victims in their own right, most of them right, because people aren't born to become perpetrators. And they're still having an influence on that kid. So why are we working with child's parent abuse? Well, actually, A is not the child's fault, never is. And B, they still all these outside influences. The safe people are the outside influences and that also can include education. So then we started working with families recovering from domestic abuse, with survivors of domestic abuse, victims of domestic abuse, perpetrators of domestic abuse, any gender. Which didn't go down well at the beginning. What do you mean you work with male victims of domestic abuse? Yes, there is such a thing, it's called a human problem. So that kind of didn't go down well at first, but again, those of you who know me just don't get the flood. So we started using it in all these areas, but what's bringing about SFS? It's like, it's like you can mold it to each person. It's not, if you're using it as a box standard, what are your best hopes and little to do? Okay, it might work, but you can mold it, you can do visualisation, you can do silent sessions, you can be created with art, there's so much you can do, so then your client's centred. Right? Because if we keep asking the same questions over and over and over again, it becomes about us. I'm comfortable with these questions, I know how to ask these questions, therefore I'm going to ask these questions. Where is it not about that? So when I'm working with a, especially in male victim of domestic abuse, they know what I'll be telling me about their experiences as a victim, especially when they're six foot seven, quite big, in construction, and then there's me. Right? Because their anxiety levels are pretty heightened at the even sheer thought having to talk to me about their experiences. So then don't ask them. I don't get them to just do a silent session. Imagine everything was working better for you, what would be different? I want you to visualise that you're liberating your brain feeling much better about themselves. What would you be, what are you seeing? Trying to describe it to me, but without using your words. Which finding cabinets would you like around your library instead of what you have at the moment? I don't know what they're going to replace it with. Where would you like to put the one you don't want? On a scale of one to ten, where would you say you are right now? Where would you have scaled yourself last year? What did you do from between last year to now to get yourself to that point? You're, but I never know the answers. So then you're giving them permission to be open and honest with themselves because it doesn't matter about what I know. Especially when you're working with perpetrators or with children, and then they're going to give you bull. You know they're going to give you bull. Yeah, because they're not going to out with this like your beat my mom or I do this. But they can be honest with themselves. If there's anyone they're going to be honest with themselves, right? So we just give them that platform. And that's what's brilliant about SF. It doesn't matter what type of client, where they're from, what their experiences are. You can mold it. If you're clever enough, you can mold it and bring out the honesty in that person to the forefront so they even they can feel better about themselves in an instant. I'm really interested here in Australia. There's a, well, in my opinion, a huge gap in, you know, programs for people or programs that actually engage people who are using violence. Can you tell us a bit about your experiences of using solution focus in that context with people who are, you know, using violence? It's actually not that different to when you're using it in any other context. It's finding a motivation to change and it's not usually the person that they were using violence on is usually their children or their own parents or somebody. What will they like to see happening for you? It's not that different. I think the biggest difference is they expect you to be judgmental. So it's just about not being judgmental. So when they see me and I've got a perpetrator in front of me, they're like, oh, gosh, she's going to judge. No, I'm sure there's a really good reason behind all of this. We're just going to work it out together and then we're going to move forward. That's all we're going to do. I don't need to know exactly what you did. I don't need to know any of that, but no one is born to abuse. Right? And then they kind of just go, yeah, okay. So we don't need to tell me your life story, but do you know, can you recall what might have been the triggers? Then you start with your whole SS stuff. You know, your, your, your classics of in six weeks time, what changes would you like to see that you've made? And what does that look like? You might even do a silent session with them. You might visualize them in a heated argument with their partner or with their child, but what are you going to do different? Now let's visualize it. It's the same person, the same environment. So it's a miracle day, right? But we're doing a visualization. Yeah. Yeah. Closureize, sit back, let's talk about this, but I don't want to know the answers. So the process is exactly the same. I think it doesn't matter where you use it, you know, it's about making it client-centered to that. person. It's a lot harder working with female perpetrators, much more difficult, because society accepts that. Right? Because if you were to see a man on the street slapping his wife, hitting his wife or his partner, we would all intervene. But if a woman was to hit a man, most of us would think, "Oh, I wonder we're wounded." Right? So because society tells us it's okay, working with a film, there is no solution focus after session two with a female. It's you are perpetrator, you need to stop it, you can see it a bit removed, because they they they know shame because there doesn't have to be because society allows me to. Yeah, so that's a whole that's a whole new ballgame. But with men who use harmful behaviors, it is finding their motivation to change. When you were eight years old, were your best hopes to grow up and hit your partner in front of your children? Because if it was great, amazing, you know, you've achieved it. No, no, of course it was, well, what was it then? And then they'll tell me, "Right, great, now we're working towards that." So it's not about holding them accountable, at all, I don't need them to confess to what they've done, but I need them to understand that you won't be born to do this. You can drop the mask. We need to work this out. I'm interested in, I guess the shifting gears, when you see the moving in and out of solution focus, or using solution focus. It's something that's intrigued me. My experience here has also been working within child protection. So it's something that I've kind of thought, you know, where, how do we shift gears within that context? Do you have any particular thoughts around that? I mean, I shift gears all the time. My basis solution focus, but I think, again, if we are client-led, we can't be SF. Right? I mean, my brain is very much geared for SF and I'll always look at challenges and say, "How am I going to overcome it?" blah, blah, blah, blah. But there's a time and place for everything. So we do with a lot of child protection, right? So I might ask the SF question of, if your social worker was happy to see that you'd make progress, what is it that they were wanting to see you doing? Or what is, why is this family worth saving? Why are you trying so hard? Because I love my kids. Okay, so if you love your kids, what do we need to do? Like, there is a lot of SF elements, but I think dip in and out is useful because A, it keeps us on our toes and we learn more. We're more open to learning if we can dip in and out of things because we're actually listening to what our clients are saying. And sometimes our clients are saying, "You're being solution-forced." I don't need to be asking a scaling question every week or even at all. It just, and you can't pre-plan being a good solution-focus person, again, okay, my view, you've got to be really good at improvisation because you can't plan ahead. Yeah, it's not like other therapies, most therapies where you have a list of questions. And you go, "Well, as long as I get the answer to that, we should be okay." And then, "Oh, there's a follow-up because you know, I'm now drawing a diagram. There's a follow-up here, follow-up there." So, it's not even about adopting narrative therapy or whatever therapy is about what does that client need and I need to adjust myself according to that person. So, I'm making up therapies or go along because the clients tell me what they need and I'm actually listening, but SF is always the foundation, but it doesn't always have to be, go down the SF line, especially when there's a child protection or call. Again, I will ask SF questions, but I'm wearing two hats. I need to make sure that safety's paramount here and this is person giving me a load of bull because you could be giving me a load of bull and if I make a recommendation, the children go back into your care, I could be completely wrong. So, I can't be wishy-washy with, you know, scaling questions and let's say miracle happened, children came home, at that point I don't care. I don't care. So, then what happens is that the office is that I will always ask someone to work alongside me. So, they can be the solution-focused therapist and I be the person that does all the safety and child protection stuff because I can't do both, but they need both. Just what I mean is because I can't split that, because one minute I'm, oh, you know, so how's it been? Oh, my God, amazing strengths. How did you manage to do that? Now, seriously, there's this point on the court document that said, you can't, you can't, so they're confused enough as it is most of the time, right? So, having the second person to work on on-side with is absolutely amazing. I'm usually bad cop, they usually good cop. That's just how it always is. But my biggest, my biggest opinion of SF is don't always be SF. It's not because I don't love it. It's not because I don't appreciate it. If you're too SF, you're not being quite led. It's how I see it. What is it that helps you to stay flexible and creative? Do you think? Do you know what I've been asked this question for years? And my staff shadow me and try and work, I think it really is a personality thing as well. I don't know how to teach it. What is it? I don't know. I think it's not being scared of change. It's not being scared to not be in control. It's not being scared to improvise as you go along. Really trust yourself that even if it's rubbish, just apologise and start again. So it's not having an ego. It's not about us. I remember a few weeks ago I was really stunk with a client because I'm thinking, do you know what I don't know what question to ask you? What might be a good question for me to ask you right now? And I'm seriously stunk because of what that client had just said. And I said, don't mean to make it about me, but I am a new fit. Because I'm still stunk. So that's my feeling, right? And then how about we start working from the point where you called me and I said, yes, to come into the appointment. I was like, actually, that's a really great start. How come you came anyway? Because you start at the beginning of the session that you didn't really need help. So why are you here? Why don't you cancel? So a little bit of humor, a little bit of, I don't know what I'm doing. Because how can you in every session? You're not that person. You're not, you're not the expert either. So working alongside your client and creating that alliance, you can't have a need for that, right? So I think it's a sprinkle of a lot of things, but I don't know how to teach it. I do, I do. I love the, that you're always coming back to, we're led by the client. We're led by the client. And there's two things that have stood out to me. One, it's amazing as we have these conversations, because there are things that just sort of run across every conversation. I'm sure Deon's heard it as well. So the first thing that stood out was you mentioned silent sessions. Now I've read your article on silent sessions. I actually watched a podcast with you on silent sessions, but I'm imagining that the people listening to this or some of them will have no idea what you're talking about in relation to that. And that came out, that conversation kind of started with Chris when we interviewed him, because we were talking about the idea that the client needs to hear their answer more than you do. And I'm imagining that's a little bit about the visualization and the other thing that you said came from Hazan Moon when we spoke to her about you must have a really good reason. And she shared a story about Insu Kimberg working with someone who had murdered another person and had kind of taken that non-injectmental stance in that moment. So there's two, and I love it because they're the themes coming across. Could you give us some, give us some ideas so that people who don't know what a silent session is? And from reading the article, I show you, you kind of stumbled across it in a Zoom session. Was that right? Yeah, I mean, people have, therapists have been using it before me. It's not, I'm not the, oh, look what I've done. But I don't know, Bay, I don't read much. My colleague reads and he summarises. That's how he works in the office. I mean, that's true. This is a really good book joke. Can you read and summarise? But now I have chat GPT to do that for me. But during the pandemic, I was kind of sitting like this and there was a mum and a dad sitting on a sofa and six children sitting on the floor. And I knew that one of the girls was a self-harmour. I knew that one of them had serious sort of ideation and actually attempted a couple of times. So I'm like, okay, let's do this. And then, hi everybody, the, and the full year old is holding their teddy up to the camera going, look at my teddy, look at my teddy and I'm thinking, okay, I've got to navigate all of this. I can do it. One, the woman kicks in. I can do this. I did nothing right. It was failing miserably. All I asked is, what wouldn't you guys change about this family? Human me, like I really want to know, I want to get to know you guys. What wouldn't you change about this family? I hate you, I want to kill you, pulling hair, I'm on crying, dad looking upset. The four-year-old, Teddy, Teddy, Teddy. People walking off, I was like, "Okay, what do you do now?" "Not so Wonder Woman now, are you?" "Okay, what are we doing?" And then I just, right, everyone stop. You all look at my very tired menopause of face. And then just we'll start laughing. I mean, half the kids didn't even know what menopause meant. But they all started laughing. And I'm not looking to my eyes, looking to my eyes, and I'm going like this, looking to my eyes. I've really put myself forward towards the camera. And they all sat down and gone, "Right, it's silence." So we're gonna try playing a game. Yeah, we're gonna be laughing in a game. And then you think, "Oh God, please go to bed, your little child." Right? But wanted to be present. But for me, how am I going to hear every single one of them? Because they all have something to say. They all want my attention at that point. And I heard when they were arguing that once this is said to the other, "Everything's about you anyway, no one ever hears me." And I heard that's what I'm gonna do this. So I asked them just to all set, and then I said, "Okay, I'm gonna ask a series of questions, some funny questions at first to practice." And then what you guys put your thumbs up. So what is your favourite colour? Think about it, don't tell me. So they said, "Four favourite colour, turn character, we do do all of that." And then I made them laugh. If it's not sponge, bob, then we have a problem. Your favourite superhero, right? If it's not Thor, we also have a problem. So we had a bit of a balance, so they can all laugh. And then I thought, right now I'm gonna kick in. Did I know what I was doing? Of course I didn't. So if things were better for you guys, what would be different? And then I asked that question. So remembering that you can't change anybody, but you can only change yourself. However, you can influence other people's behaviours. What might you do slightly differently to help you guys in this household? Imagine if all of you made a slight change, what difference would that make? So I asked all of these questions, looking back, were they good questions? No, they weren't. I could have done a lot better. However, get outcome was good. There's a few weeks later, we met again. And the mum and the children have all squished into this big, big sofa. And their dad's not there. So guys, you can all look amazing. All of you and your pajamas sitting down, were you drinking? Why don't I have that drink in front of me? 'Cause the kids were having hot chocolate and the mum's had a coffee. I'm like, I was my coffee. Thank you. Where's dad? And the mum said, I kicked him out. That was my best time. He was having a affairs. She didn't have the confidence. And then after she did the sign-up session, she kicked him out. The girl stopped self-harming. They stopped arguing. It was a massive transformation. And then I had to really think, how did that happen? I don't understand how that happened. 'Cause you know when you're in the moment, you just do, you don't think. You just do. Again, it's that spontaneous kind of alliance, right? So I did it again with another person. And I did it again with another person. Again with another person. But what's really interesting about the sign-up sessions, especially in the last, say, year, because I've started to not master it, but get better at it. They don't actually remember it being a sign-up session. When they refer to it, they refer to it as a conversation that we had. But they don't remember the sign-up fact that they had that conversation here and not with me, which is very interesting. Sorry. It gives them permission to set their goals and also look for what possible challenges could you face while you're trying to reach the next number on the scale, for example, because let's overcome them. It's a great plan. Things aren't mushy-washy without interruption of other people in the family, other members of the family. Yeah, or you tried that before, but you didn't do it. Do-do-do-do, it's personal to you. And I set this kind of not rule, but I kind of advise them. Don't tell each other what your thoughts were. Because you've set yourself your best hopes. You don't need to tell people what that is. Let's see if they know it is. And they do, because they look for it. So rather than start looking for things that we have as we don't want, which is a usual thing to do in a home, we start looking for behaviors that we like, that we enjoy, that we do want, because we're trying to notice what the other person's best hope was. Ah, they put their clothes away today. Was that their best hope? Well, no, but also be this, because they've done that. That's unusual. Is that their best hope? So the rule is you never tell the other person. So they're working and basically supporting each other every single day until your next session, just by trying to guess. So it's so. I don't know if you still got the idea. Yeah. But they just don't remember the conversation. It's really interesting, because my colleague, Joe, was not into you, but having a conversation with one of my clients who I showed a video at the conference, because he really wanted to share his story. And I said, yeah, I should know I had a really good conversation about the librarian in my head, and where I should put the fine camera. She suggested I put them at the back. And then when I have these intrusive thoughts, she told me to do this and I didn't know such thing. I'm like, no, I didn't. And luckily, I have someone shadowing me trying to learn how to deliver a silent session. I was like, did I? Did I? Did I tell them where to put the fine camera? No, you didn't. You didn't get them any instruction. I was like, it's so interesting when you go back and he's not asking your clients, right? Do you remember how we came to that? Yeah, we spoke about, did we? It is so so at the moment, what I'm doing now is I'm going back to all my clients and asking them what they remember. Awesome. And what? It's fascinating to me now. What do they remember? They remember a conversation, but not a silent session. It's absolutely fascinating. All they think I guided them words, but the fine and cabinet saw, I did it. I just said, imagine how fine and cabinets, which ones are around you? Where do you want them? I never times cry about it. See, this is, this fascinates me as well. He could think about some of the research and things around microanalysis in SF, you know, and it's like, I'm dialogic orientation, link, choice, grounding. But if you're not hearing the answers, you can't use something. Yeah, that's. But then sometimes it's more effective not hearing the answers. Yeah, obviously. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, depending on the client again, and I think that's where I try and drum it into when we're delivering training. And it's just so hard to train though. You can't. It's being client-led doesn't just mean being able to listen. It means you changing your style, maybe every second, every minute, you've got to just go, it's, but it's difficult to teach, right? It comes with years and years of practice. And that's if you open up your mind. That's if you're willing to not have control of this is my style. We should not have a style. Our style should be changing, depending on who's sitting in front of us. You know, so we can't, I would never say, well, my style is, you know, I'm funny. And I do a lot of drama and I do this and I do that, no, that fits that client. And more serious in, maybe one aspect because that fits this client. So we don't really have a style, we shouldn't have a style. But I don't know how to teach that. So if anyone's got any ideas, please contact me. - One of the things I do in supervision is really, you know, I observe a lot of people doing really good work. And I ask them lots and lots and lots of questions about how, you know, what people would notice, how they're doing it, what do they notice? Anyway, I'd be fascinating. I'd love to have a conversation with you like that one day to, you know, because I don't know if you're familiar with the idea of self-efficacy, but you know, the idea of belief in a set of behaviors is that, you know, there's a set of behaviors that you're using to achieve these outcomes. But you're maybe, what you're saying is you're not necessarily aware of those. And most of the time we're not. And so, you know, that's one of the things I love to ask people about is, you know, how they're doing what it is that they're doing and try to unear some of that stuff. But yeah, fascinating. - Yeah, I think self-reflection is something that I'm a huge fan of because we have to keep learning, right? We're never gonna stop learning. And our biggest educators are our clients. You can go and do so much theoretical work and you can sit in front of all these great SF people and learn and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, but I'm learning deeply squat compared to what I'm learning from clients. Yeah, they stumped me sometimes and I love that. Ooh, you got me there, yeah, because, you know, you're hungry for learning. But when I'm self-reflecting or I'm helping staff, reflect or tell me about that session. I want to know not how the general session went but about you as a human being demonstrates me how will you client-focused? I want to know how you were client-focused. And sometimes it's quite hard to articulate and discuss you know you need a little bit of time and then you know you scale yourself but I think anyone that and I say this to educators all the time if you are not willing to bring your to for your own child to be part of this education institution then you need to make changes. So teaching educators and social workers and anybody how to self-reflect on their practice are they being fair are they actually listening to understand rather than respond are there deadly assumptions within all of this don't assume things ask questions but that's quite hard when you're institutionalized right so I mean I remember I got into a little bit of trouble which I don't mind saying a few months ago because a social worker wanted to put these two beautiful children into adoption up for adoption even though the mum had met all the targets because she saw target right she met all the targets plus loads more plus I should say well you know I just I said well can you give me a reason that would that would tell me that this decision decision was a right decision before it goes to court because I don't want you looking like a falling court and she went what I don't have to give you that I said well I can challenge you so I'm challenging you on what grounds are you putting these children up for adoption as you can ask me so I simply said I'd like you to just remove your social worker out for a minute put yourself in the parent's shoes and start listing everything you've done the children were rightly removed in the process at the beginning but now things are changed and change as possible so just put yourself in her position so they put in a formal complaint because I'm also to remove her social worker health right so what I'm saying to you is when you're institutionalized you're almost told to just look right in front of you but not see what's in front of you you see what you want to see was what you've been taught to see and that's scary but that also applies to solution focus if we are just stuck with the same questions what are your best hopes the miracle day where we just gain it between now and next time I see you what are you gonna do that's gonna tell yourself that you get your moving towards the next number that's deadly because that's not being real is it it might be real for a few people but not for the rest you said at the beginning solution focus is a way of being we're coming back to clients and it clients in it how like if you I know walked out of the office at the end of the day and you ran into your next door neighbor and they said so what is it you do this solution focus stuff how would you describe it to them oh if it was my neighbor or someone just randomly in a supermarket asking me what SF is I would say that solution focus is all about looking for what we want instead and how to overcome challenges and I would keep it to those two sentences it's all about what we want instead and how to overcome challenges because I could go into what we want instead how we're gonna get there blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah if I had to really cut it down because I think yes we need to know what we want instead but we also need to understand in the same time how do we overcome challenges in a healthy way the mindset for overcoming challenges because if we just focus on what we want instead and just focus on how I'm gonna get there to that point we're still sustainable unless we change our mindset to understand that problems are actually challenges and to overcome it so it's equally as important so I will always ask let's imagine you didn't meet your rest time since we what could have possibly stopped you from doing it let's explore that well this could happen that could happen that okay so let's try and minimize those risks of what could you do if that were to happen I want I want you to have a create a finding cabinet in your brain that says for back plan just in case so then you don't have to think and you don't have to worry because you've already discussed it and you know what to do now so your little alien you look like a bravering go right I've got the filing cabinet I don't have to think about it I've already discussed it I already know so it is about I want to know well I want to work towards what I want instead and I need to overcome challenges because that's life that's so important bit of doom and gloom I guess sometimes for some but I think being real is respectful yeah it's fantastic um one of the things that we really wanted with this podcast is that people who listen to it can you know pick up a new idea that they can then go try in their you know in their world what's something that you you know you can teach us that that we could go away and try wow Dion right put me right in it well something that you guys could try I think in your next sessions if is therapists listening to this and coaches and whatever I think practice not being SF for 10 minutes and when I say not being SF I'm not saying be problem-focused I'm not seeing that but I'm not I'm saying don't be using SF2's true form so what I want to teach you guys is in the 10 minutes that you choose I just want you to think at that point what I'm gonna do that's very very very different to what I normally do so maybe think about before you guys go into a session so it could be introducing in from no drama it could be introducing um I don't know talking about them when they were a child but in a funny way right I add humor to anything right it could be whatever it is but just for 10 minutes not practicing just switching things up a little bit and not to be too comfortable with what we do right but also the best hopes questions I would like people to know you don't need to ask in my opinion sometimes I do sometimes I don't if you have really good problem-free conversations you get in the answers anyway and they're giving themselves the answers so you don't have to stick to a script what's um the same again but what what what would you say guides you you know in a in a direction so obviously you're thinking well maybe you're thinking about best hopes but you're just having it in a conversation you're not actually saying like what are your best hopes what what kind of signpost or guides do you think you use in being out of draw the you know best hopes out of somebody without asking that direct question I think it comes out that actually when that's when you're having a problem-free conversation anywhere or even a problem-focused conversation about their history and as soon as they start saying you know I just want to feel better about this okay so what would that not like well there's your best hope you know what they want to work towards I don't want to feel like this I want to feel like that and then at the end of the session so okay so you said during our conversation that you wanted to feel like this is that is that am I getting that right yeah you also said that you want your child to be able to am I right yeah so how are we gonna influence that to happen because you can't change people's behaviors but you can influence it how well how might you influence that well I could try this do you think that would make a difference would that be unusual and you kind of if if it's unusual how come you decided to do that today how come you didn't do before let's just say you did it what difference would that make you just ask those questions and then okay cool we've got a plan so you're doing this and you're doing that done so it's just firing that oh okay so you said this let's do that but I will ask some clients what are your best types and I won't ask the other clients I'll just repeat what they said and ask if that's what we are doing right so it's just essentially asking the best types in a different way but I don't know how or why I do this I'm not very good at kind of articulating things like this because I'm just a doer is I get a vibe it doesn't suit you on this occasion I'm definitely not asking the when you're at your best on this occasion let's talk about masking before I even go there let's talk about layers of masking what that looks like and how we keep ourselves safe first and then get them to introduce me to the bottom layer mask what they want me to see blah blah blah blah and then on awesome when they're at their best right if I ask the miracle day or when you're at your best before then what which mask am I talking to right so it's a vibe that I get Dion is really I don't know but I think if everyone just practices doing 10 minutes of something different in a session that will help because I do that with my stuff here that will really help with leaving your comfort zone yeah and you've got to leave your comfort zone don't be comfortable if you're comfortable you're not working hard and if you're not working hard you're clients are not benefit great I love I love hearing about your your I don't know I've heard it talked about practice wisdom or you know your intuition it's I find that really fascinating you know how we develop that and what we're doing and how we how we know what to do. John, I think John Henders probably going to, from the UK, is probably going to analyze me. He joined our session and he said, "You've given me a headache. You're making me re-evaluate everything I've done. How do you do this?" And I went, "I don't know, I just do it, John." He went, "No, break it down. How do you actually do all this?" I went, "John, I seriously don't know. I make it up as I go on on and I'm genuinely not lying to you. I make it up as I go on long. It just somehow works most of the time. But how do I learn that? I don't know, John. I just make it up." He said, "We need to talk. I'm okay. So now I'm thinking he's going to put things on my head and try and draw something out." But it is sometimes an intuition thing. It's a character thing. It's a personality thing and I think the biggest is just the, I think people just need to keep their mind open and practice something you don't be comfortable. It's okay. And it's okay if he doesn't work. You just apologize and carry on. Yeah, love it. I love it because I'll sometimes describe it like the dance. Like you're there and you kind of know the next step. Anyone else on the dance floor is going to be. And that next piece kind of emerges and this pathway emerges as you go. I coach, I don't do therapy, but I do a lot of facilitation and strategy stuff with teams and things. And you'll have people coming out. "Can you send me the templates that you use? Can you send me the?" And it's like, "Well, we kind of, it's a bit messier than that. Are you prepared to trust that we can, we will come out with what's needed?" Yeah, yeah. It's individual or whether it's a team or others, but it is that trust that there's the dance will emerge and there'll be something useful at the end. And it is difficult because when I'm asked how, you know, I've had part of SF practitioners join my, the parent workshop that I deliver just so they can see how I deliver it. And when schools get really good feedback from the parents that I was really good, I learned a lot that, "Well, what do you use? What templates do you use? What program do you use? Well, you know, can you send us something?" I don't know, I just look at the room and I'll make a decision. And I might start off with an anecdote because my daughter's 16 and extremely messy. So I might start talking about that just to get a bit of humor into the room. I might start talking about masking or my stutter. I could talk about anything, but my one number one rule is always add humor to it, right? But I can't tell you what I do week one, week two, week three, week four because I don't know myself. Make it up as you go along, right? You just look at the room and you just look and you see. So you're going to be, I mean, despite some SF people saying, "Body language does not matter." Well, I can't function if I don't read body language because that's my cue for stop-ish, stop is terrible or keep going, you're on the right track. So body language is important. So it's ours, but it is. So looking around the room, especially when you're delivering training guys, right? You know, you're delivering training or you're coaching the team, you are looking around that room and you're thinking, "Okay, I'm going to switch things up right now. I think they're ready for another breakout room. I think we're going to do this. I think they're now fed up of breakout rooms." But it's, I think all that comes from allowing yourself to make mistakes and being open for that. And I've got no problem and I show this to what I'm in training. I have a video of me conducting the solution focus session five years ago and it was the worst solution focus session I've ever conducted in my life. And I show that as a training exercise. What should I have asked instead? Because she said to me and she was, she had her children removed, she wanted to kill herself. And three days before we met, she attempted suicide and it failed. She was found and she said after his phone conversation, when I booked her, I might kill myself again and then she tried. So our meeting was delayed and it was during the pandemic. And the first thing she said to me when she joined Zoom was, I'm going to go kill myself after this. So my whole session was led on the fact of I need to get it right. So because I was, I had an agenda, I didn't get it right, did I? It was rubbish. But the outcome was still good. She's now an SF trainer by the way. I know, I know. Because I stopped talking to her as a coach or a therapist. I started saying, you know what, I'm just going to train you how to use our self. You get on my nerves. So, and it worked. But because I had an agenda, my own agenda, it was a bad session. She did everything perfectly well because she can't do anything wrong. She's a crime. I was terrible. So I do often show that video and say, good example, what not to do. Let's break it down. Let's analyze it. So being able to just go, guys, yeah, I can, I'm not perfect all the time. I don't get it right all the time. It's okay. Like, wait, I'm going to learn. And if I don't know what the client's talking about, like when they are saying that they're having an episode of psychosis, I've never had psychosis. I don't know what to do. And they're sitting in front of me and they're looking very disturbed. You wait for it to pass. And then you ask your client to educate you. What does it look like for you? And in those instances, what, and you know, what would you like me to do to support you? Because I, I've never been through it. I need you to educate me. And they're happy and willing to do so. And they're actually really happy that someone's admitted that they don't know everything. I have no idea. I can just about spend it. I don't know what it is. Tell me, educate me. So then I can then try and help you with that. But you have to guide me with this. No problem. So they guide you. So be open. Make mistakes. Ask questions if you don't know. Get them to educate you because they're the experts. That's my biggest advice in your 10 minutes. I've got another question. And it's probably, I'm wondering if it's off topic. But you, so you run, you run family-based solutions, you run rewind. So I imagine you're at some level. So rather than the coaching and therapy and that level, you're writing things for whether it's government, whether it's external funders and things like that. Being so flexible in session, how does that help you write those more macro things that keep things going? It actually really does because there's honest and as thought thought as I am in session and adaptable, we're also Joe and I because we kind of do all that paperwork together. We love paperwork. Who doesn't love paperwork? I mean, you know, what is the passion for keeping the charity going? Right? We are a charity and we are a small charity and what we do is quite large. Right? Because you know, it's worldwide. We train people worldwide or we'll have conversations worldwide. So we are very lucky that we have so many friends around the world. Because if we relied on what we were being told or new or people to support us in our local community, we would end up nowhere. Right? So I could contact Eve Lipchick. I meet him with her once a month and say, "Eve, I've got to write this funding application and this is a question that they're asking. What do you think if I wrote this?" And she'd probably say try again, that was rubbish. Right? Because that's how she speaks to me. I could just call any one of you and say, "Guys, Dion, you've got a lot of experience with social care and I really want to write this down, which you think." So those are allies. So it's not just Joe and I writing them. Everyone has an input. Everyone does and we are so lucky to have this extended family to support us. But we're funding. We try and do as many crazy stuff as we possibly can to raise money. So we've had two solutions, three solutions, four singles out. And again, people at Montvercog go and go and vote. So many people were involved. Johnny Sparrow's been involved. Tarrow. Grethler, Liza people, Russ Sibel was involved. Liza people were involved. So we try and use the booths. Everyone's skills as much as we can. I'm not selfish. I don't keep it to myself. I'm like, yes, you have a skill. Come here. I need you. But that's what builds the community as well, doesn't it? Yeah. Right? So yeah, we are flexible because we draw other people in that might have more of an expert view than maybe I have on something. Of late, we haven't needed to do that as much. And this is, you know, a very honest platform. podcast that we're on, you know, since chat GPT has become a bit of a thing. But when we're writing, we don't use any AI, I just want that notice just in case Routledge is listening, we are not using AI at all. So that's where we're with that. But yeah, I think pulling all your resources together, whatever that is is incredibly useful because time is of the essence. Yeah, we have clients, we have training, we have consultancy, we've, I've got to do the social medias, I've got a network with people, we're a very slow community, a wider community, I've got to spend a little bit of time with my family, you know, when you have that time, you've got to do funding applications, then you've got to send reports for the funding applications, and we have a great team. So Joe and I Friday's, we just lock ourselves into this room because we're writing a book. So on Friday's, it says do not disturb unless you're bringing me tea. Do not disturb. You don't talk to me. You know, the world could be on fire. I don't want to know. Because we have a very tight deadline. So I think it's just pulling in those resources and not saying I can't, it's more about, I know someone that can. So you said, you know, you're training people worldwide, you're working on a book. What, you know, where, where can people find out more about your training, where can people find out more about, you know, what you're doing and yeah, access that. So we've got on and on all our social media platforms, family-based solutions that can find access to our link trees or event brides, everything's on there. So on link tree is, so that's on the footer of my email, Dion, that give you access to free resources or the training, any events coming up, it's just all in one, on one platform. The book thing, we're not, I'm not a writer. I kind of say it insinuated it, I think a few times. See, I'm very much a doer. I don't even want to analyse, I haven't got time to do that. Did it work? Yes, that's all I need to know. If someone else wants to analyse my session, go for it, but I'm not that sort of person and I never, I never will pretend to be. However, Eve Lipchick said that she wants to read a book that Jo and I write before she dies and she's 93 and she said that two years ago and every time we see her every month she says, I'm a day closer to death and we're like, okay, we'll write a book. Do I want to write a book? Not really. But I'm doing it for her, mainly, but the books basically about child-prone abuse using SF. So it's all case studies, how we work with social care, we love the therapist, we've real life stories in there and the type of questions we use, why we are so flexible. So it kind of covers, but it's based on child-prone abuse, which obviously Eve is like, yes, I love it. So we kind of started humoring her and said, we're going to do it. Humoring basically means lying to her and saying, yeah, we're going to do it. And she said, right, email, route, let's email route, let's and get the opinion. So we did and she made me see see her into the email, blind, see see her. Because I lied and said, yeah, but they're not getting back to me, Eve, so then again, put me in the email. So I did, she's very controlling. So we did that and then they got back to us and said, yeah, we want to propose a sentence proposal, I'm like, yeah, okay, whatever. And then you got back, you know, the decision this book has to be written. Well, oh no. Oh no. No. And then Gil Green from Ohio in America is like, what did they say? And I'm like, they said, what this is, yes, but I don't want to do it. So now a child stamping my feet on the floor, I don't want to do it. But we were told not asked, not advised, told not to work on Fridays. And now that's what we're doing. And I'm getting anywhere, not really. We spend most of the time arguing Joe and I, but you know, we're going to meet the deadline somehow. But so it is, it is for Eve and Gil, I think this book because it's their best time. Yeah, look, I, there's been a whole bunch of standouts for me, just the SF as a way of being as that, as that, that staying with the client, letting them take the lead, silent sessions, not hearing the answers, but people experiencing the conversation as if it's very, very real and it bringing change. And that family of SF around the world, we're kind of just learning about where we're way, way out here in Australia. And you know, one of Deon's other roles is as the president of the Australasian Solution Focus Association. And I hang out with him a bit as the vice president. And that's not why we do this podcast, but we're learning the network that's out there and the, the generosity, the generosity of the SF community. Oh, 100%. I mean, David Haines is the kind of delivered training for us before and he was part of one of the videos, the singles that we did. And because it was our mind thing that we did the second one was, but the generosity is mind-blowing. Like it really, really is. It comes back to that, you know, why do we love it? Because we know it works, we know it's incredibly useful in so many contexts. Why would we not want people to know? Stand out for me, I think I really enjoyed listening to your, what sounds like your creativity and intuition and how you use it. And you know, stemming from being willing to not get it right and just have it have a go. So I think that's that for me, I think is, yeah, really great. You guys are both of you. Absolutely amazing. Just felt like being at home and having a conversation. Thank you for joining us on the Toward Solutions podcast. We hope today's insights inspire you to apply solution focused in your own life and projects. Whether you're applying these strategies in your personal life, professional practice or community projects, we're excited to see the impact you create. 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