I'm Done! But, still stretching!

I just completed my last project and class last night!!!  I feel a lot of weight lifted off of my shoulders now that this counseling degree is finished.  I didn't feel this way after my bachelor's degree because I was already enrolled in graduate school and I didn't experience relief after the M.Div. because I was still taking courses for the counseling degree.  I defintely didn't feel this way after high school because I was still like a disoriented looking chicken cracking out of the egg shell.  But, at the age of 34, it's like I am finally an adult now and I can move on with life in the real world.  But my desire to grow is still strong.  Experiencing an achievement or goal doesn't mean as much if I can't defend it or continue to live out that success. Leadership guru, John Maxwell, said, “Success is due to our stretching to the challenges of life. Failure comes when we shrink from them.”     
     
My last course was in Test and Measures and my class had to take a battery of tests to gain the experience of administering, scoring, and interpreting tests so that we can make better assessments when we are in a therapist position.  One of the common patterns that surfaced in my tests was anxiety.  This has been a tough year with some experiences positive and some negative, but all causing stress (a lot of material for stretching) with moving into a new home, having an adorable healthy baby boy, working an internship and a full-time job (days and nights), troubles with our rental in Kansas, and finding time to spend with family and friends.  Even though I have a great wife and awesome/squirly boys at home, raising a family brings its own kind of stress as well.

I look forward to having a more balanced life; though, I haven't experienced what that's like without being enrolled in class since I was four (save for a year in-between HS and college).  Am I going to fill the void with something else and continue to manage a high level of stress/anxiety or am I going to relax for a period of time?  What is life like without having deadlines to complete projects, papers, and other assignments alongside all the other demands/opportunities in life?
I enjoy the product of what God has blessed me with; can't wait to see what else is going to stretch me!

Success is best achieved in community.  Thank you- Family, friends, professors, and colleagues that have spotted me on some of these life stretches!  Honorable mention- My wife, Shanda!    

Tony Nichols

 --I find joy in helping other's experience hope and peace in their life. 

Solution Focused

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"A tourist driving through rural Ireland got lost on the small roads.  Frustrated, he eventually stopped and asked a farmer how he could get back on the main road to Cork City.  'Ah,' said the farmer, 'If I was going to Cork, I wouldn't start from here.  I would start from somewhere else.'*  This Irish joke can illustrate how unhelpful people can be when we don't meet people where they are at in life.  In the human services field, it's important to meet people where they are at, not where we think they should be.

If the client feels that the counselor is attempting to put himself in her shoes by meeting her where she is at then she will begin to develop trust; this can foster a strong therapeutic alliance. Developing that alliance is extremely important when giving counsel to someone that might be searching for a better life but doesn't know where or who to turn to.  There are times like these when solution focused therapy proves to be the best method to help others navigate toward the right road for them.  Whenever I have been lost in an unfamiliar place and my wife finally demands me to go into a gas station to ask for directions, the attendant has never asked me, "Well, how did you get lost?"  The attendant usually shares with me how to get us on the right road so that we can end up at our desired destination; this is how solution focused therapy works.

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Solution Focused Therapy includes a few different helpful techniques including: 1. Establishing goals; perhaps through asking the miracle question (If you were to wake up today and your life or triggering situation be the way you want it, what would be different?); 2. Finding exceptions to one's problems and then working on how to experience those exceptional moments more often so the goal can be met (I noticed that you don't have as much anxiety, you feel better, and your more productive when you go for a walk after work, I wonder how you can fit that in more?).  3.  Monitoring progress or effectiveness through scaling questions (On a scale of one to ten...).

If someone has experienced major trauma they will need to go back and examine their trauma narrative, but for clients that need to move forward, Solution Focused Therapy is extremely effective and helpful getting someone headed in the right direction.        


*Becoming a Solution Detective: Identifying your Client's Strengths in Practical Brief Therapy. The Haworth Clinical Practice Press. Binghamton, NY.  John Sharry, Brendan Madden and Melissa Darmondy 2003.