How therapy works Archives

6 Solution Focused Questions in Brief Therapy

September 2, 2026February 20, 2026 by John Eaton

Using solution focused questions Brief therapy is often (but not always) associated with the employment of solution focused questions. Which are designed to draw attention away from the problem state and towards desirable changes. For example, a client with anxious thoughts might be asked if she is aware of a time when she was able … Read more

AI Therapy versus Human Therapy

September 2, 2026December 16, 2025 by John Eaton

AI Therapy and Psychotherapy are not alike Recent publicity surrounding the AI boom has raised a familiar question: Can AI therapy replace psychotherapy? To my mind, this is a false question. It assumes that AI therapy and psychotherapy are fundamentally similar activities—differing only in efficiency or scale—when in fact they are categorically different. They do … Read more

What is Solution focused brief therapy?

September 2, 2026November 30, 2023 by John Eaton

Solution-focused therapists look for ways in which their clients have already changed, and utilise that learning in the service of further change. For example, many people have resolved some conflicts with other people; their experiences in the past can be applied to their relationships in the present.

3 most important changes in psychotherapy

September 2, 2026August 22, 2023 by John Eaton

Changes in psychotherapy The aims of psychotherapy are manifold. The resolution of mental health problems is what it is best known for. But alongside that goal there are several others: self-understanding, personality change, healing, self-mastery, life-improvement, happiness and resilience to name a few more. In this article the focus is on the three fundamental types … Read more

Looking for a good therapist?

September 2, 2026June 30, 2023 by John Eaton

What is a good therapist? A good psychotherapist is one who shows clients how to be successful in therapy. That opening sentence was carefully phrased. It points to the fact that, in psychotherapy, it is the client who (mostly) completes the work of recovery. Research shows that around 40% of successful outcomes in therapy are … Read more

Solution focus: goal setting

September 2, 2026June 9, 2023 by John Eaton

Why is goal setting important? Evidence based-therapies such as those described in this blog seek to achieve measurable results that can be verified by clients themselves, as well as by external observers. If we were training people to throw darts we would want to know at the end of a few sessions how many darts … Read more

Finding solutions: the miracle question

September 2, 2026March 2, 2023 by John Eaton

What is the miracle question?

The miracle question is a technique used in Solution-focused brief therapy. It prompts clients to imagine an ideal state in which their therapeutic problem has either been solved or significantly improved. Thereby providing clues to solution in therapy. The miracle question is one of many techniques used to direct the client’s attention to possibilities rather than problems, as described in Bill O’Hanlon’s self-help book A Guide to Possibility Land.

The changes elicited from the question come from the client rather than the psychotherapist. Thus making it more likely that therapy will be a collaborative enterprise, rather than one directed by the therapist.

How does the miracle question work in therapy?

Solution-focused brief therapy assumes that most clients already possess the resources required to overcome mental health issues and life problems. It seeks to uncover the inner wisdom of the client.

Too often, clients get bogged down in worries associated with the problem-state: their ‘bad’ thoughts, unhappy feelings, repetitive habits, and general stuckness. The conscious mind is biased towards analysis (sometimes over-analysis) of problems and can develop negative thoughts that create a hopeless mind-set. This can make it difficult for them to imagine what change could look like.

The miracle question bypasses the critical mind and unveils what change would look like. Thus indirectly setting the goals for therapy. From there therapists and clients can focus on implementing changes, leaving the problem-state behind entirely.

The miracle question draws on our creative intelligence: our innate capacity to re-imagine the future in a way that provides forward movement in work, life and relationships.

Miracle question examples.

One version of the question asks clients to imagine they have woken up to find the problem has disappeared:

“Imagine that you wake up tomorrow morning and find that, overnight, a miracle has occurred. You are now free of the problem in a way that you never thought could happen. What is the first thing you would notice about yourself?”

9. Reframing problems and stories

September 2, 2026November 21, 2022 by John Eaton

What is reframing?

Reframing relies on our ability to switch attention from one way of looking at something to another way. The duck-rabbit illusion on the right is a famous example. When you look at the picture from right to left a duck appears; in the reverse direction a rabbit emerges.

But, where the duck-rabbit illusion is a perceptual change, reframing works through language. Reframing observations, ideas, judgments, problems and stories. Using it, we draw attention to another viewpoint. Too often, our thoughts seem to us to be the only way to look at something; reframes enable us to try on others for size.

Many jokes are actually verbal reframes, as the punch-line reverses our initial expectations. Example:

“I keep missing my ex. But my aim’s slowly getting better...”

The human tendency is to get stuck stuck in rigid judgments. For example:

‘I am a failure.’

‘She is a freak.’

‘He is a narcissist.’

‘You are evil.’

‘They are persecuting me.’

Do you need psychotherapy?

September 2, 2026November 12, 2022 by John Eaton

What is psychotherapy for?

I was recently at a party when a sceptical neighbour (a lawyer) challenged me about my profession.

“Why do people need therapy?” he asked.

My challenger pointed out that, in the UK at least, less than 5% of the population will receive therapy at any one time. What, he asked, are the other 95% doing? Are they all going slowly mad? Or are they making their own way without the help of a therapist?

In this connection, he reminded me that psychotherapy is a fairly recent invention (the first use of the word in print was in 1896). What were all those people doing about their mental health for three thousand years before therapists came along?

Good questions, I thought, and I gave him some answers which I will share with my readers.

Therapy before psychotherapy

It is not in fact true that there were no psychotherapists before the twentieth century; it is just that people didn’t call them that. We know that the ancient Greeks practiced a form of talking therapy and, in fact the word ‘psychotherapy’ comes from the Greek therapeia psyche, or ‘care of the mind’. We know of a philosopher in Athens 2500 years ago called Antiphon who, for a fee would banish personal misery by arguing his clients out of their thoughts. Rather like a Cognitive-Behaviour therapist today.

In the same way the Stoic philosophers in Rome held tutorials in mental health which survive today in the journals of Marcus Aurelius. In India, China, Persia, the Arabic world, and in the West there existed wise men and women, learned in philosophy or the healing arts who offered their wisdom, with or without a fee.

7. The easy way to solution-focused change

September 2, 2026September 24, 2022 by John Eaton

What is solution-focused change?

In solution-focused change we move from problems to possibilities and solutions. First establishing the goals for change, then exploring existing solutions, before looking at possibilities for improvement. While problems are taken seriously, the focus is not on problem analysis but on creating new directions.

The whole approach is based on the premise that most clients already have the skills, resources, opportunities and solutions required to overcome their problems. All that is required is to bring these to their conscious attention.

Solution-focused change revolves around open-ended, solution-oriented questions. In what follows, each intervention is based on a specific question.

Exploring solution-focused goals

On first meeting my client I like to use an open-ended question: What would you like to achieve in these sessions?

I encourage my client to answer in terms of what could be thought, seen, heard and activated when the desired changes are accomplished, building up a complete picture of what success might look like.