Dr. Diane Langberg now has her own website. Check out www.dianelangberg.com for more information about her speaking (both schedule and available audios–both free and for purchase) and her counseling practice. You can see a list of her associates and their specialties. Her resources page has lots of good book, article, and website suggestions regarding a wide variety of issues.
Category Archives: christian psychology
Diane Langberg on the web
Filed under Abuse, christian counseling, christian psychology, Christianity, counseling
Vernick on Domestic Violence.
Leslie Vernick wrote a nice summary posting on domestic violence at http://www.christianpsych.org. Read her comments here. She reminds us the truth about domestic violence and how Christians ought to respond to it.
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Filed under Abuse, christian counseling, christian psychology, Christianity
Fear and trust hand in hand?
This week I’ll be speaking to a group of counselors about complex PTSD. One of the hallmarks of C-PTSD is the combination of chronic relational fear AND chronic shame/guilt over having said fear. It manifests itself as, “I’m afraid of you but I know it’s my fault for being afraid.” (NOTE: the reverse is not necessarily true: that those who have chronic fears, trust problems, and self-condemnation have PTSD or C-PTSD.) My focus at that training will be on this question: How do you lead someone (in therapy) in the repetitive work of “Do not give in to fear”?
On Sunday, Tim Lane of CCEF preached a sermon about fear and disappointment. In that sermon he mentioned our propensity to “flail ourselves”–assuming that we must be doing something wrong–if we experience fear. Instead of focusing on the experience, we ought to examine our responses to fear. Do we shut down? Do we believe that we are alone and isolated? Do we turn inward and act only in self-interest?
He gave us this quote from CS Lewis (Screwtape Letters): “The act of cowardice is all that matters, the emotion of fear is, in itself, no sin.”
Here’s my question: Is it possible to be afraid and to trust nonetheless without much reduction in the level of fear? Don’t we assume that if we act in a trusting way that our fears should abate? Especially in light of trusting God? Is it possible to trust God fully and yet fear? What might such fear and trust together look like? If we could do both at the same time, would it reduce inappropriate self-condemnation?
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Workers’ Comp for Pastors?
The concept behind workers’ compensation (WC) insurance is that employees have coverage for injuries sustained on the job (and secondarily that if they get the compensation that they won’t sue their employer). Nowadays all US states have WC laws.
But, what if churches provided or paid into a fund to provide spiritual workers’ comp? While I suppose pastors could fall out of the pulpit on the job, strain their vocal chords, get a typing injury, most won’t. But, I would contend that most pastors suffer under the weight of the pastoral care needs of their congregation. Being exposed repeatedly to crises, conflict, attack, and other weighty matters, pastors may become broken themselves. Imagine if churches or denominations provided recovery care for these matters. Just as in worker’s comp, there might be requirements that the pastor go to a specific specialist.
Wouldn’t this be novel? Of course WC doesn’t do prevention work–which is what pastors need. But, it might get a congregation to admit that exposing a pastor to endless supplies of brokenness is going to create brokenness in the pastor.
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Teaching style and outcomes
My seminary, Biblical Seminary, focuses on teaching excellence when choosing new professors. We want teachers who are experts in their field but who can also teach. Hence, we had a daylong seminar yesterday about teaching adult learners. We discussed and explored a number of things (e.g., what do adult learners want, how do they best learn, the uses and limits of PowerPoint, etc.). But this one line stuck with me that I have re-written to apply to my own field:
Does how you teach counseling courses model the kind of counseling you wish your students to emulate?
For example. If humility and dialogical/interpersonal factors are big in counseling, do we teach that way or do we just do straight lecture and/or get defensive when others disagree with us?
I think we do a pretty good job with the attitudinal side of things. We try hard to model listening and humility. However, I think I still struggle with the interactive side of teaching. And here’s my defense for that struggle 🙂
1. Classes I teach tend to be higher order with complex and very specialized content (e.g., psychological testing, psychopathology, reliability, validity, research, ethics, etc. ). Some information has to be delivered by me via lecture.
2. Several of these courses last just 6 weeks. There is no time to meander and muse in these classes.
3. The emphasis on PowerPoint leads to spending inordinate time building quality slides and away from contemplating more interactive learnings.
Despite these complications I’m going to try to pay more attention to hands on learning. I want us to emulate our kind of psychological practice.
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AACC revisited
Not much time today for any significant posting on psychological assessment and/or the AACC world conference I’ve just returned from. 5 Days away from home leaves way too much other stuff to do!
However, here’s one small reaction question I pondered on the plane ride home: Which is better: a conference where I agree with most speakers, OR, one where there is wide diversity and quality of work (and some work that is downright bogus)?
I attend two different counseling conferences. One really scrutinizes speakers and makes sure they are in agreement with the organizing agency. The other seems to let any counselor teach if they can write a decent proposal and outcomes statement. The first one protects from outrageous presentations but most likely limits new voices and/or progressive ideas. The second one gives many ideas an opportunity but the listener bears the responsibility to figure out whether the speaker has any basis for their opinion.
Now, I don’t know this for sure, but I’m guessing the first one suffers from highly critical followers who make sure that no speaker ventures too far from home. And I also guessing that the second group has a large following that does not discern truth from simplistic pop psychology.
So, which is better? The first one rarely ruffles my feathers. The second one has speakers that make me want to scream but also exposes me to new ideas and research.
As I said, I’m not sure which I prefer. Both tempt me to have arrogant thoughts…which reveals more about me I suppose.
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Engaging Biblical Texts in Trauma Therapy
Today I present my 1 hour CE training at the AACC conference. In this presentation I briefly review (a) complex PTSD and its typical symptom presentation, (b) material from my recently published work on best practices for using Scripture in counseling. Then I consider the particular application to therapy with trauma survivors. The goal is not get individuals to believe the truth but to experience it via the interpersonal relationship of therapy.
If you are interested in more, see the pptx slides I have up on my page “Articles, Slides, Etc.” (# 15 on the list).
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Pastoral sexual abuse training
Today, Diane Langberg and I provide a 3 hour presentation entitled: Pastoral Sexual Abuse: Trends, Challenges, Issues & Treatment. Click here (#14 on the list) for presentation slides (ppt format). The presentation covers issues such as “the setup” that leads some pastors to abuse parishioners, the impact on the various parties, victim related interventions, offender related interventions, as well as focus on the kind of issues counselors run into when either counseling various parties or consulting with the local church going through such sufferings.
Along with the slides, we will also pass out a tiny print decision tree for those who like to have a visual for what needs to be done (see link above for that item as well). I’m still playing around with this and could add things like communication with media, interactions with legal team and notification to law enforcement if abuse of minors has taken place.
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Psych assessment and the new semester
And so we begin the new semester today. I’m teaching Psychological Assessment tonight to our advanced professional counseling students (recent grads looking to complete licensure courses). Psych assessment covers a wide variety of formal and informal assessment techniques for counselors. Among them are the use and interpretation of psychological tests. It is my experience that most people with superficial exposure to psychological tests have one of two responses
1. Inordinate value of testing and what it can do
2. Inordinate suspicion of testing and what it can do
Most of these responses come from quick reactions to some personal exposure to tests. Those who give too much value to tests may have taken a test and had it “nail” them. For instance, someone takes the Myers-Briggs (MBTI), finds out they are an INTJ and that it explains why they nearly lose their mind around their boss who is an ESFP. Those who are suspicious of testing often have had a bad experience of testing (test mis-use, a negative evaluation or they have had a course that exposes them to the weaknesses of some test construction and research.
The truth is that tests do have both limits (some way more than others) and value. Never underestimate the power to abuse a test or the data that comes from one. A relative of mine once was turned down from a job because some wacko decided he had repressed issues from a simple drawing.
However, those who say that they can get all they need from a clinical interview fail to recognize the value of learning how one functions in comparison to a large sample of peers. And several data points like that can really flesh out a personality or learning profile.
I’d be curious to hear reader’s experiences with testing (their administration and/or interpretation). Did you have a positive or negative experience and why?
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Filed under christian psychology, counseling, counseling science, Psychology
The danger of “why” questions
Most thoughtful counselees want to ask “why” questions. Why do I do what I do? Why did she do what she did? Why am I the way I am? Why am I so depressed? Why isn’t my life going the way it should or seems to go for others? Counselors too ask “why” questions. Why did you blow up at her? Why is this child afraid of going to school? And closer to home, why did my client drop out of therapy?
On the surface why questions seem to want to get to the bottom of things. We assume that if we understand the nature of the problem, we’ll know how best to respond. And there is much truth in this assumption.
But consider their danger. Some answers to the “why” are so complex that the answer to the “why” doesn’t really point to any one answer. Further, we frequently prejudge the question with implicit answers (e.g., it is because something is wrong with me…I’m a loser…God doesn’t want me to be happy…I can’t help it that I’m this way…).
Why questions also make us passive. We look for answers; we mull over the “facts.” We are less likely to become active to do something about our situation when we are in a “why…” mode.
Let me suggest a better kind of question: What questions
What is happening? What am I feeling/thinking/doing? What is it that I want? What do others want? What am I doing about my situation? What goals do my behaviors emphasize? (this is a why question that forces us to look at our behaviors and see if they match up with our stated desires) What options are before me? Be descriptive rather than interpretive. Notice that why questions jump to interpretation but seldom activate a person to do what is in their power to do.
Frequently, by asking descriptive “what” questions, we find it easier to activate the will and begin doing something about our situation. In addition, we often come to posthoc understanding of the “why” when we have some distance from the situation.
So, the next time you find yourself stuck in the “why” set of questions, stop and try to ask yourself some what questions instead. Observe the impact of distancing from the passive whys? Does it help?
Musings on Faith and Psychology 