Say to the PWS: “Know that this negative emotion offers an evaluation of your current experience and your model of the world.”
Ask the following questions:
“What was going on in your life when you created this emotion?”
“What should you have expected from that time? Should you have expected any other reaction or anything different?”
Many PWS have told me they can tell just by looking that other people think it funny to hear them block and stutter: they may snicker, seem embarrassed, not know what to do. Ask, “What do you expect?”
If you had never heard or seen someone block and stutter, and then when they try to speak to you they lock up in a block, how do you expect you would react? Perhaps with the laughter of embarrassment? The majority of people do not intend to make fun of you. Some may feel sympathetic toward you, some may even feel empathy – they feel your hurt, they struggle with you as they see you struggle. Even if someone makes fun of you, whose problem is it? It is only your problem if you make it so.
Once the PWS has answered your question about their expectations, get them to evaluate what they have said in terms of whether or not it is logical or reasonable. The fact that you are asking them to witness their own thoughts suggests that they need to consider their answer, and decide how appropriate it is.
3. Recognize the triggers that evoke the blocking.
Discuss the following questions with the PWS:
“Where do you block worst? What is going on when you block?”
Step back from those times of blocking and note what is going on that triggers the fear and anxiety, those negative emotions that cause you to freeze up and block.
“Knowing that you do not always block, that in certain situations [name them] you are fluent, what has to happen in order for you to experience fear and anxiety and then block?”
“What do you have to see, hear or feel in order for you to know that it is time to block?”
If it is a feeling: a) what emotion is behind the feeling? b) what thought is behind that emotion? and c) what triggers that thought?
“Does the interpretation you are putting on the events that trigger you to block accurately represent what is happening? Or are you responding to some old learning from childhood that is no longer relevant today? If so, know that that emotion is just an emotion.
4. Say to yourself: “It’s just an emotion.”
Lead the PWS to use their most resourceful voice to say something like, “I am more than my emotions. I experience emotions, but I am more than just my emotions.” It is OK for them to put this in their own words. It is vital that the PWS be able to separate their identity from their emotions as this is a vital step towards their learning how to control their state. Then ask them:
“If that emotion is just information, what does it tell you that will help you change what you do?”
Ask them to consider:
“Who is in control here? You or your emotions? Who’s running the show?”
Suggest that they refuse to treat their emotions as being the final arbiter, or as providing a final report on their standing, status, destiny and identity. Instead, “Decide to learn from your emotions, treat them as signals and messages about the relationship between your perception of the world at the particular moment when you generated the emotion. Keep the emotion to the context in which it originated. Do not let it color your life.”
5. Give yourself permission to change the meaning that drives the emotion.
Ask the PWS to go inside and make appropriate changes to anything that is no longer useful.
“Go inside and give yourself permission to change the meaning of this emotion. Should any internal objection come up, welcome it, find out what its intention for you is, and find another way of satisfying it. (See step 7 for reframing any objecting parts.)
“What new meanings for that emotion will permit you to minimize its effect?”
For example:
“I learned this emotion when I was being made fun of as a child for my stuttering. I am no longer a child. I am an adult and I can handle anyone who thinks it is clever to make fun of me today. They have the problem – not me!”
“I give myself permission to feel fear because it allows me to recognize things that are a true threat to me and to take appropriate action early.”
“I give myself permission to feel the tender emotions because it makes me more fully human.”
6. Use a positive resource.
Ask the PWS to find a resource which will override that negative emotion and minimize or eliminate its power.
“Which resourceful state could you use to override that negative emotion, and would minimize or eliminate its power.”
“You may like to consider this list of resourceful states: calmness, courage, faith, persistence, determination, being centered.”
“Access the resource state that you choose and then find a way of amplifying to make it even more powerful. Then, holding this resource state, allow it to overpower the negative emotion that you do not want. Feel this sense of calmness, courage, faith … [use their actual words] permeating the whole of your being, and replacing that unwanted emotion with this positive resource state.”
“Meta-State the
