Creating a New Part

One of the questions that we have asked over and over again since the beginning of our dealings with the field of psychology is «What is it about an experience that makes it therapeutic or not therapeutic?» Every school of therapy has within it certain elements which lead to change when used by some people, and don't lead to change when used by others. When used by a third group, those elements lead to change which is not profoundly useful. As far as I can tell, the ways you change people into behaviors which are not useful are not really different from the ways you go about changing them into behaviors which are useful. The kinds of techniques that are used by well–intentioned parents, probation officers, and teachers, to lead people into behaviors which will actually cripple them for the rest of their lives, are powerful and effective mechanisms of change.

This morning we want to teach you a third model of reframing: how to create a new part. Parents, educators and well–meaning psychotherapists don't create new parts as explicitly as I'm going to teach you to do. They mix the pieces up, and they do it over a longer period of time. However, those of you who are therapists will recognize the elements readily. This model has more steps to it than the six–step reframing model, and it's designed to accomplish something entirely different.

The presupposition of the six–step reframing model is that somebody has a part that deliberately stops her from doing a behavior, or a part that makes her do a behavior.

Yesterday afternoon we dealt with a second logical possibility: that there are two or more parts, and each of them is doing exactly what it is supposed to be doing. Their intentions are positive and their behaviors are appropriate, but when those behaviors overlap, they produce an unwanted condition such as insomnia. You have a part that takes care of business and methodically plans out everything, and you have a part that wants to go to sleep. When one part of you starts to go to sleep, then the other part goes «Oops! You forgot about X! What's going to happen if you don't do this?» The other part says «Don't worry about it now. Let's sleep.» However, you didn't find a solution, so as you begin to drop off to sleep, the other part says «But if you don't, Y will happen.» The negotiation model is adequate to deal with situations like that. You negotiate between the parts so that they work more cooperatively.

This morning we want to explore a third logical possibility: somebody doesn't do something simply because there isn't any part of her that's organized to do that behavior. There is no part actively stopping a behavior, and there aren't two parts interfering with each other. She has lots of other parts that work. Consciously she desires a particular outcome; however unconsciously she really doesn't have a part that can carry out that particular behavior.

All the other reframing models change a response, and that new response triggers a different sequence of behavior. For example, in verbal content reframing you just change the response and assume that it will fire off more useful behaviors. Of course you need to check to be sure that assumption is correct.

In six–step reframing, you change the response, and you ask the client's creative part to go on an internal search to find specific alternative behaviors. You anchor those behaviors into the appropriate context by future–pacing, and do an ecological check. When you negotiate between parts you assume both parts have appropriate behaviors already, and you just need to provide a way for them to sequence when they do their behaviors, so that they don't interfere with each other.

Content reframing, the negotiation model, and six–step reframing all presuppose that either 1) alternative behaviors already exist, or 2) some part can easily organize itself to carry out behaviors that will be appropriate. Those are very useful presuppositions, but they aren't always true. If I put one of you alone in the cockpit of a Concorde SST, you could be perfectly calm and alert with no parts interfering with your behavior, and still not know how to fly the plane. You just don't have the appropriate behaviors organized to do that. You need to go through some kind of learning process to organize and sequence those skills. That is the kind of situation in which you have to create a new part to do a specific behavior, and that is what most education and training is supposed to do.

A few years ago we were doing a workshop up in the Northwest, and one woman in the seminar had a phobia of driving on freeways. Rather than treating it as a phobia, which would have been much more elegant, we did a standard six–step reframing. We don't recommend that you use reframing with phobias, because usually your clients will get the phobic response as a signal. Once they've collapsed into the phobic response, it's very difficult to do anything else with them. However, we were demonstrating reframing at the time, and decided to demonstrate that it's possible to do reframing with phobias.

We said to this woman «Look, you have a part that's scaring the pants off you when you go near freeways. Go inside and reassure this part that we know it's doing something of importance, and then ask if this part is willing to communicate with you.» The woman got a very strong positive response, so we said «Now, go inside and ask the part if it would be willing to let you know what it's trying to do for you by scaring the pants off you when you go near freeways.» The woman went inside, and she reported «Well, the part said 'No, I'm not willing

to tell you.'"

Rather than go to unconscious reframing, we did something which may sound curious but it's something I do from time to time when I have suspicions, or what other people call intuitions. We had her go inside and ask if the part knew what it was doing for her. When she came back outside, she said «Well, I … I don't… I don't believe what it said.» We said «Oh, yeah? Well, go ask if it's telling the truth.» She went inside and then said again «I don't want to believe what it said.» We asked «Well, what did it say?» She said «It said it forgot!»

Now, as amusing as that sounds, I've always thought that was a great response. In some ways it makes sense. You are alive for a long time. If a part organizes its behavior to do something and you really resist it and fight against it, the part can get so caught up in the fight that it forgets why it organized its behavior that way in the first place. That's a real possibility. I don't know how many of you have ever gotten in an argument, and in the middle of it forgot what you intended to do in the first place. Misers are like that. They've forgotten that money is only useful if you spend it now and then. Parts, like people, don't always remember about outcomes.

Rather than going through a lot of rigamarole at that point, we said Look, this is a very powerful part of you. Did you ever think of how powerful this part is? Every single time you go near a freeway, this part is capable of scaring the pants off you. That's pretty amazing, you know. How would you like to have a part like that on your side? The woman said «Wow! I don't have any parts like that on my side!» So we said «Go inside and ask that part if it would like to do something that it could be appreciated for, that would be worthwhile, and that would be worthy of its talents.» Of course the part went «Oh, yeah!» So we said «Now go inside and ask that part if it would be willing to be responsible for being sure that you are comfortable, alert, cautious, breathing regularly and smoothly, and in sensory experience when you go on a freeway entrance ramp.» The part went «Yeah, yeah. I'll do that.» We then had her fantasize a couple of freeway situations. Previously she had been incapable of doing that; she would go into a terror state, because even the fantasy of being near a freeway was too much for her. When she imagined it this time, she did it adequately. We put her in a car, sent her out to the freeway, and she did fine. She drove happily for three hours and ran out of gas on the freeway.