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2nd / 3rd September, 2024

Direct Therapy Methods and Cheek’s Ideomotor Signaling Approach - No. 6

Rubin Battino - Master Class Outline 

September 2, 2024  7 PM EDT

A. Introduction

Several direct therapy approaches will be discussed. We start with a reading of the comic Bob Newhart’s “Stop It” approach in working with a woman who presented endless personal difficulties. (You can see the entire 6 minute session

on YouTube using his name and “Stop It.”) This will be followed by a short presentation of one of Erickson’s direct therapy approaches. Finally, I will be presenting some of the things I have developed in my new (unpublished) book. 


B. Bob Newhart’s Stop It! (Newhart is Dr. Switzer and his client is Katherine)

KATHERINE: I’m bulimic. I stick my fingers down my throat.

DR. SWITZER: Stop it! Are you a nut of some kind? Don’t do that.

KATHERINE: But I’m compelled to. My mom used to call —

DR. SWITZER: No, no. We don’t go there.

KATHERINE: But I —

DR. SWITZER: No, we don’t go there either.

KATHERINE: But my horoscope did say —

DR. SWITZER: We definitely don’t go there. Just Stop it. What else?

KATHERINE: Well, I have self-destructive relationships with men.

DR. SWITZER: Stop it! You want to be with a man, don’t you?

KATHERINE: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm, yes.

DR. SWITZER: Well, then, Stop it. Don’t be such a big baby.

KATHERINE: I wash my hands a lot.

DR. SWITZER: That’s all right.

KATHERINE: It is?

DR. SWITZER: I wash my hands all the time. There’s a lot of germs out there. Don’t worry about that one.

KATHERINE: I’m afraid to drive.

DR. SWITZER: Well Stop it. How are you going to get around? Get in the car and drive you, you kook. Stop it.

KATHERINE: You stop it. You stop it.

DR. SWITZER: What’s the problem, Katherine?

KATHERINE: I don’t like this. I don’t like this therapy at all. You are just telling me to stop it.

DR. SWITZER: And you don’t like that?

KATHERINE: No, I don’t.

DR. SWITZER: So you think we are moving too fast, is that it?

KATHERINE: Yes. Yes, I do.

DR. SWITZER: All right. Then let me give you ten words that I think will clear everything up for you. You want to get a pad and a pencil for this one?

KATHERINE: All right.

DR. SWITZER: All right. Are you ready? Here are the ten words: Stop it or I’ll bury you alive in a box! 

KATHERINE: Mm-hmm.

Commentary: Quite a remarkable session, but I would not use the last statement!

Comments and Relevant Attendee Experiences


C.  Erickson’s “ Procreative Shock Therapy” ( Battino, 2008, pp. 149-151). E. L.  Rossi summarized this case as: 

“A 30-year-old university professor attended a university dance and saw a 30-year-old single woman on the other side of the room. She saw him, and they rapidly gravitated toward each other. Within a month they had planned their future and were married. Three years later they appeared in Erickson’s office and told their sad story. They wanted children, but after three years they were childless despite medical examinations and advice.”


Erickson’s shock treatment was:

This will be rather simple to administer, but you will both be exceedingly shocked psychologically. Sit there in your chairs, reach down under the sides of your chairs, and hang tightly to the bottom of the chair. Listen well to what I say. After I have said it, and while I am administering the shock, I want the two of you to maintain absolute silence. Within a few minutes you will be able to leave the office and return to your home forty miles from here. I want the two of you to maintain an absolute silence all the way home, and during that silence you will discover a multitude of thoughts running through your minds. Upon reaching home you will maintain silence until after you have entered the house and closed the door. You will then be free!

Now hang on tightly to the bottom of your chairs because I am now going to give you the psychological shock. It is this: For three long years you have engaged in the marital union with full physiological concomitants for procreative purposes at least twice a day and sometimes as much as four times in twenty-four hours, and you have met with defeat of your philoprogenitive drive. Now why in hell don’t you f**k for fun and pray to the devil that she isn’t knocked up for at least three months?


Commentary: Three months later the husband called Erickson and said, “We found that we couldn’t wait to get to the bedroom once we got inside. We just dropped to the floor and we didn’t engage in the marital union. We had fun. And now three months are barely up and my wife is pregnant.” Direct shock therapy works!

Comments & Queries


D. RB’s Direct Therapy Approaches

Please have something to write on for this exercise. If you are willing to experience a direct therapy approach, this direct approach based on Rossi’s moving/mirroring hands approach then write out your responses to each step.

This is a rather simple way to effect changes in your clients by directly asking them what they want to change and also what they are willing to change. You can directly ask them about the various ways that they can bring about those changes. Here is an outline of what the therapist might say (done as a group exercise and details of individual work):


1. There is a simple and interesting way to bring about the desired changes you want in your life. The first step is for you to (write down) tell me the thing or things in your life you would like to change—I will write then down for the record.

2. Now, tell me which of those things you are willing to change today, and I will write them down.

3. The next step is to close your eyes and carry out a brief internal review of all of the relevant factors relating to those changes (and write them down). When you have completed that internal review, please tell me those factors and I will write them down.

4. The next part is for you to think of at least two or more realistic ways to bring about your desired changes (and write them down). Please open your eyes when you have come up with several practical solutions, and then tell me what they are so I can write them down.

5. Finally, close your eyes, review what you have told me, and then nod your head “Yes” (to yourself) if you are actually going to use one or more of the ways. [Assuming the client nods their head “Yes”, then say “Thank You” and go on to the following comments.]

6. I asked you to tell me your thoughts so I could write them down and then send you a copy (or make a copy now) of what you have discovered about yourself today. You have done some remarkable things for yourself today and you need to have a copy.

Comments & Queries



E. More Direct Therapy Ideas and Comments

Both Milton Erickson and Frank Farrelly (provocative therapy approach) talked straight to their clients. Farrelly worked with institutionalized clients and told them directly that they were acting crazy and that it was time to stop and that they had control over their behavior. This is going from “I can’t.” to “I won’t.” and is an important bit of information and challenge for clients. 

An obese client walked into Erickson’s office and was greeted by, “You are the most disgustingly overweight and obese person I have seen in a long time.” Here was someone who spoke the truth to her and so she listened to Erickson.

A client wheeled herself into Erickson’s office (she was paraplegic but could use her chair). Erickson said, “You may not believe this, but romance is just around the corner.” She had come to see Erickson as a last resort before she killed herself because friends had recommended this. Erickson was able to help her and she ended up marrying her physician and having children with him. His startling comment changed her life!

Another direct action you can take when you are stuck in working with a client is to switch roles with them by changing chairs and acting out their behavior (generally a bit more strongly) with the client now being the therapist. 

One more thing I do sometimes when I am stuck in a session is to tell the client, “You know, you are really challenging me now. Let me think a bit about what to do next.” Note that the word “challenge” makes the client special!

Story about the “power of positive hysteria” and RB getting a Cadillac.


F. Cheek’s Ideomotor Signaling

First—read the two relevant books in this area: Rossi & Cheek, Mind-Body Therapy, 1988, Norton - info in many sections; and Ewin & Eimer, Ideomotor Signals for Rapid Hypnoanalysis, 2006, Charles C. Thomas Publisher - both were students of Cheek, and the book contains much useful information. 

Demonstration of the use of the Chevreul Pendulum for rapid change. (Note that we designate the index finger as YES, the middle finger as NO, and the thumb as I AM NOT READY TO ANSWER NOW.)

Group exercise of those willing to do so. Guide them through Cheek’s approach of going back in time to the start of a behavior they would like to change. They are older and more experienced now and no longer need that behavior.

There are two uses I make of ideomotor signaling: (1) to bring about rapid change; and (2) to teach clients how to do scans of their body or well-being or emotional states by asking their own fingers for yes/no/not ready to answer responses. Note that unconscious finger movements are small and jerky. Conscious ones are larger and smooth. Always acknowledge finger movement responses by saying “Thank You” after each response.

Cheek was an obstetrician/gynecologist who did a lot of research on patients being able to hear what went on in the OR, even under the plain of total anesthesia. He recommended a large sign for every OR that said, “Remember. Patients can hear what you say.”

Comments and Queries


G. Some Additional Comments - Again!

1. Pause Power - Clients need time to process what is going on in the hypnosis portion of the session. Add many pauses so that they can do this internal work. In essence, they drift off when a particular suggestion is significant to them, and then return to hearing you. 

2. Special Words or Phrases - The “magic” word that I like to use when doing hypnosis is “somehow.” That is, somehow these changes will occur: the client then fills in how this happens! Other good word are “and,” “when,” and “then.” In Michael Yapko’s 5th edition of “Trancework” he emphasizes how the query “how” initiates change. That is, “How do you or how did you do that.” Example: “How are you depressing yourself (changes a noun to a verb—you can insert other difficulties for depression).”

3. Expectation and the Placebo Effect - My expectation, and thus that of my clients, is that we will be able to resolve what troubles them in one session. Also, note that the Placebo Effect is always in the background in ALL therapy sessions, i.e., both clients and we expect change!

4. Mary Goulding’s Opening Query is “What are you willing to change today?” Followed by “Just let that question rattle around the back of your mind during this session.” This is a wonderful way to start a session. 

Another good opening query is “What do you need now?

5. Importance of being passionate about being a therapist, and giving your clients your complete attention.

6. Importance of smiling and occasional humor.

7. “If what you are doing is not working, then do something different.” Steve DeShazer.

8. “If what you are doing is not working, then do something different that is  unusual or unexpected or surprising.” Rubin Battino


H. Next Session #7: Methods of Eliciting Solutions From Clients, Solution Focused Therapy, and Gestalt Therapy Two-Chair Approaches

Monday 30th September. 7pm. EDT USA


I. Some More RB Poems


in the full moon light*

how could I sleep

without dreaming

hazy high moon

blue clouds blend into          purple

a lone goose cries

across the morning*

half moon greets the sun

the meadow wakens

moonshine on my quilt

illuminating an old            pattern

I sneak a look

perfect half moon

illuminating that tree

lights my wonder

thinnest sliver of the moon

and the morning star

infinity!

*The three lines can be read in any order.


J. Closing Healing Meditation   


THANK ROB AND ATTENDEES!

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