Summer Intensive 2023 is Coming in July!

Teri Pichot, LCSW, MAC, LAC:

I was originally trained as a drug and alcohol counselor back in the late ‘80s. I chose this profession because I had a passion for helping people, and I’ve always wanted to push myself to be the best at whatever I do. Learning to work with those who struggle with addiction seemed like the perfect fit to hone my skills due to the inherent challenges and complex problems that come with addiction.

However, I soon became disillusioned with this field. I, like my colleagues, was trained to be the expert and to help clients solve problems. I was taught tools to break through denial, confront cognitive dissonance, help create functional family patterns, etc. What seemed simple in the classroom was exhausting in real life. Clients often did not share the professional view of the problem, and prescribed solutions most often were not an effective fit for the clients.

Burnout and negative thinking toward clients were common in professional crowds, and all of this lead me to question if I could do this . . . if I even wanted to do this. I loved working with my clients, but quite frankly, working in settings in which professionals were highly skeptical of clients’ prognoses was challenging. I tried working with other populations such as domestic violence victims, those involved with child welfare, adolescents, and families, as well as different settings such as residential and in-home treatment. Everywhere I went I found professionals who were frustrated and burned out. I did not want to become one of them.

In 1992 I attended a workshop on how to work with couples who were experiencing domestic violence. It was a controversial topic, yet this idea of listening to what clients are truly saying and becoming curious about what they think might work was deeply attractive to me. This workshop turned out to be all about Solution-Focused Brief Therapy. There . . . for the first time, I heard the trainer speak with such profound respect for and hope in clients. I knew instantly that this was a turning point in my career. I went up to this instructor and asked to become part of his group of therapists, who volunteered their time working with couples. Initially, he said there wasn’t room, yet I was desperate to learn this revolutionary way of thinking about and working with clients. Every break, I went back and kept asking. After much convincing, I was allowed to join.

It was in this group, I met Insoo Kim Berg and Steve de Shazer (the founders of this model) and ultimately learned the art of using Solution-Focused Practice. Watching them work was inspirational. Clients who were angry, resentful, mandated into treatment, etc., transformed within minutes into motivated clients who readily identified strategies for lasting change.

I knew then, that through using this powerful Solution-Focused model as I saw modeled by Insoo, it was possible to maintain one’s passion for helping others and to leave a work day energized and hopeful. I was blessed to work with Insoo, Steve, and many other mentors for the next decade, and it is because of them that I not only remain in the mental health field, but that I’m still passionate about my work. In fact, I am so passionate about Solution-Focused Practice and what I learned that I want to pass it on to you today.

The most memorable and influential trainings that Steve and Insoo offered were their annual Summer Intensives that they offered each July in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. They were small gatherings of people just like me. . . those who were desperate to learn more about this powerful approach. They always kept the Summer Intensive trainings small and personal. Insoo and Steve engaged with us personally about the model and how it worked . . . helping us learn it in a very profound way. People came from around the world, and the focus was on discussion, demonstrations, and practice. It was “practice changing!” It was designed in a way that it didn’t matter if it was one's first year, or the fifth time attending. It was always magical.

This is the experience that we want to offer to you . . . this personal, practice-changing, immersion experience. While Insoo and Steve are no longer with us, it is our hope to continue this powerful tradition. I hope you will join us!

Amanda A Bushek, LPC, MAC, LAC:

I wanted to become a therapist because I found people and human behavior fascinating. I was so inspired that as humans we seem to inheritably want to grow and become better, and that so many of us want to help each other to do so.

During my last year of graduate school and working in my second internship, I began to struggle with the notion that the completion of my graduate program was in sight, yet I did not feel like in my clinical skills were actually very helpful to my clients. It seemed the skills I had developed up to that point helped me be a very good listener, to be compassionate, and to offer advice or instruction about how someone might create lasting change. While this felt like a nice thing to offer my clients, I was not convinced that this was in fact effective enough or provided evidence that someone had measurably changed because of our work together.

I consulted with my peers and my college advisors and discovered so many others had adapted theoretical approaches that guided their clinical work in a meaningful way. I assumed that perhaps I had not found the right approach for me, or perhaps even that I did not have what it takes to be an effective therapist.

Luckily for me, in 2006 the Solution Focused Brief Therapy Association was hosting their annual conference in Denver, Colorado. One of my professors encouraged me to check it out, noting that Solution Focused Brief Therapy (SFBT) was different than many other approaches and something I might want to learn more about.

Different was an understatement. During the conference I felt like I was in "opposite day." Instead of focusing on what was wrong with people, SFBT was focusing on what helps people to create desired futures free from the problems that currently plagued them. Solution-Focused therapists were not prescribing what people needed to do to create change, rather providing a pathway for people to find their own insights and realistic measures for change. The solution-focused conversation itself was designed to help create change, and change was evident within minutes of a solution-focused conversation. I was hooked!

I then began attempting to use Solution-Focused Practice in my intern therapy sessions. While I was certainly a bit (or a lot) clunky, it was clear to me that if I could get better at using this model this might be my best shot at becoming an effective therapist. Lucky again, the Substance Abuse Counseling Program directed by Teri Pichot was hiring a new therapist that next summer. The clinic was providing a very high level of effective client care using only SFBT in some of the most difficult circumstances (with dual diagnosis mandated clients - a particular subset of people that the entire behavioral health industry struggles to be helpful to). Landing that job changed the course of my work, and my life really. All these years later Solution-Focused Practice has proven to be inspiring, effective, and limitless in application. My fascination with humans has evolved into a deep curiosity and respect for what people are capable of. This model has given me the foundation and the tools to help support people and systems to reach their potential, and beyond.