copyright edyoung, PhD, LPC 105 PART IX A GOAL SETTING AS AN AID TO PSYCHOTHERAPY TO ANALYZE YOUR LIFE, WORK, AND THERAPY GOALS, USE A STRUCTURED DECISION MAKING PROCESS TO ASSIST YOU IN CHOOSING GOALS, SETTING PRIORITIES, DETECTING PROBLEMS AND BARRIERS, DEVELOPING STRATEGIES, AND SETTING SCHEDULES. USE THE PERSONAL GROWTH CALENDAR TO SCHEDULE YOUR LIFE AND WORK GOALS AND TO SET GOALS FOR PSYCHOTHERAPY OUTSIDE OF THE HOUR SESSION AND RECORD AND OBSERVE YOUR PROGRESS.

copyright edyoung, PhD, LPC 106 Phase II. Journalizing and the Think-aloud Method: Decision Making Self Retroflexive Journalizing: (CONT.) ENVISIONING. – DECISION MAKING, GOAL SETTING, PLANNING AND STRATEGIES: Making decisions is something that is, in a sense, occurring all the time. However, there is seldom a problem. Deciding happens quickly and is forgotten. The alternatives for decisions also are not what we are going to focus on here. Rather, we are focusing on the process of decision making. Most people have some ways of making decisions, usually tied to certain types of recurring situations, that are ineffective and self defeating. These problematical decision making patterns are also a result of one’s early life history such as: how much decision making was allowed, in what manner, with what reactions to the outcome or what kind of corrective feedback was provided. When parents always make the decisions, the child does not learn how to make decisions, avoids it as much as possible, or turns to others to make decisions for them. Naturally this pattern continues into adulthood. Too much emphasis on making your own decisions, followed by harsh reactions when the decision was wrong, makes the person fear decision making. Artificially holding the child to a wrong decision where, if they had been an adult, they would have the option to change makes a child hesitant to make decision or to obsessively weigh alternatives. Pressuring the child to make up its mind quickly without assisting the child in learning to assess and negotiate and afterwards criticizing or ridiculing the child can cause the child to turn against its own decision and be unhappy with it, as though it were a ball and chain sentence. Pressuring the child to give reasons for a decision and then attacking rather than exploring those reasons forces the child to avoid exploring its rationale for decisions and alternatives. These and many more styles parents and other significant person use with respect the young child’s decision making processes have a lasting, but unconscious effect on decision making when the child becomes an adult. For you, it is important to reflect on your decision making processes, observe other styles of decision making, be brutally honest in determining your own ineffective styles, retroflex on their origin, restructure your understanding of the scenes of origin, and reconstruct and then practice new styles of decision making. INHIBITED RATIONAL IMPULSIVE

copyright edyoung, PhD, LPC 107 Phase II. Using Journalizing and the Think-Aloud Method for Decision Making DECISION MAKING, GOAL SETTING, PLANNING AND STRATEGIES: Select the alternatives below that apply to you and use Journalizing to explore them: –A. Making a decision and later finding out it was bad and not being able to give it up. –B. Deciding and fearing or having no confidence in one’s decision making ability and so backing out or giving up. –C. Being incapable of going through the process of weighing the alternatives and therefore deciding impulsively. –D. Always preferring the lower risk alternatives. –E. Always preferring the higher risk alternatives. –F. Always preferring the alternative that is too little in some sense or too much in some sense. –G. Delaying excessively, putting off or weighing the alternatives endlessly. –H. Having once made the decision and feeling the alternative may have been better; not being able to enjoy or put one’s heart into the chosen, or turning on the chosen because of ‘the grass is greener’ syndrome. –I. Thinking you have made a rational decision with a strong conviction that has strong reasons to not give in to an addiction or to behaviors that are a part of the pattern and later finding a compulsion or surge of overwhelming emotion over rides the rational decision. In other words, thinking a rational decision will work with an emotional or physiological compulsion. –J. Knowing you are making a wrong decision but finding a rationalization that makes it seem OK. –K. Refusing to decide what is right because you want to frustrate someone else, perhaps to get back at them through your self destructive decision. –L. Not deciding at all, yet subconsciously maneuvering oneself into a situation or position where the decision is virtually made for you, or deciding against something and then getting in precipitating situation and playing like you are safe. –M. Deciding in a partial way, e.g. just a tiny bit of something you have decided against, and then, to your apparent surprise, finding yourself completely surrendered to a compulsion. –N. Deciding wholeheartedly to do or get something or be some way without any consideration of the cost to achieve the goal, or having given no thought to a realistic plan to achieve the goal. –O. Deciding for an end result but being turned off by the steps to reach the end result, not willing to endure or pay the cost. –P. Deciding on what you should want or what others think is best when it is something you dislike or have no interest in. –Q. Not dealing with the negative in a serious approach-avoidance conflict or denying the negative when ambivalent. Decision making that is mature involves conscious, thorough, honest consideration of alternatives, has examined conflicts and potential barriers, appraises all of the potential consequences, sets priorities, has a realistic goal that can be accommodated into your life style and current commitments, has a plan with realistic schedules and manageable costs, and solid, practical strategies for achievement.

copyright edyoung, PhD, LPC 108 WORKSHEETS FOR GOAL SETTING GOAL CATEGORIES REASONS SUPPORTING ALTERNATIVE GOALS GOAL PROS AND CONS, ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES DEALING WITH BARRIERS TO GOAL ACHIEVEMENT CHOOSING AND SETTING PRIORITIES SETTING SCHEDULES FOR STEPS AND STRATEGIES USING THE PERSONAL MONTHLY PLANNER

copyright edyoung, PhD, LPC 109 Using the Personal Growth Calendar Use of Personal Growth Calendar –Deciding what goals can be worked on outside of the therapy session. –Learning to set reasonable, short term, achievable goals. –Listing goals for the one or two week period. –Recording progress after each week. –Learning to set longer term goals with steps toward achievement. Scheduling therapy related events on the monthly calendar. –Deciding on realistic, therapy related events and activities to participate in, or to avoid, during the month and jotting them on the Calendar. –Checking off events successfully attended. Using journalizing and think aloud to examine the struggles, experiences, and successes related to Growth Calendar goals.

copyright edyoung, PhD, LPC 110 Tracking Therapeutic Progress Integrating Insights from the Past and Present and Mastering New Self Enhancing Ways of Being and Doing and Transcending to Higher Levels of Being Approximately every two months, step back and review your whole journey toward personal growth. Imagine where you were and how you were and then imagine where you have come to and what your way of being is now. Try to sense, however vaguely, where you want to go, what you want to become and be as a person in the future. Compare your gauge of the past, present and future to see if you feel you are unfolding in the right direction. If not, question what you must begin to do to set yourself on course.