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WRITTEN REPORT
Choice Theory and Reality Therapy
Therapeutic Process
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WRITTEN REPORT
Choice Theory and Reality Therapy
Therapeutic Process
Clients explore their total behavior and make their own evaluation of how
effective they are in getting what they want,
Following up on how well clients are doing and offering further
consultation as needed.
It is important to keep in mind that although the concepts may seem simple as
they are presented here, being able to translate them into actual therapeutic practice
takes considerable skill and creativity. Although the principles will be the same when
used by any counselor who is certified in reality therapy, the manner in which these
principles are applied does vary depending on the counselor’s style and personal
characteristics. These principles are applied in a progressive manner, but they should
not be thought of as discrete and rigid categories. The art of practicing reality therapy
involves far more than following procedures in a step-by-step, cookbook fashion.
Although these procedures are described in jargon-free language, they can be
challenging to implement.
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The Counseling Environment
The practice of reality therapy rests on assumption that a supportive and
challenging environment allows clients to begin making life changes.
Reality therapists begin by asking clients what they want from therapy. Therapists
take the mystery and uncertainty out of the therapeutic process. They also inquire about
the choices clients are making in their relationships. In most instances, there is a major
unsatisfied relationship, and clients usually do not believe they have any choice in what
is going on in this relationship. In the beginning the client may deny this is the case. For
example, the client might say, “I’m depressed. My depression is the problem. Why are
you talking about my relationships?” The client often does not want to talk about the real
problem, which is the unsatisfying relationship or lack thereof. Reality therapists explore
the tenets of choice theory with clients, helping clients identify basic needs, discovering
clients’ quality world, and finally, helping clients understand that they are choosing the
total behaviors that are their symptoms. In every instance when clients make a change,
it is their choice. With the therapist’s help, clients learn to make better choices than they
did when they were on their own. Through choice theory, clients can acquire and
maintain successful relationships.
The WDEP System
Wubbolding uses the acronym WDEP to describe key procedures in the practice
of reality therapy. The WDEP system of reality therapy can be described as “effective,
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practical, usable, theory-based, cross-cultural, and founded on universal human
principles”
The WDEP System can be used to help clients explore their wants, possible
things they can do, opportunities for self- evaluation, and design plans for improvement.
Grounded in choice theory, the WDEP system assists people in satisfying their
basic needs. Each of the letters refers to a cluster of strategies:
W- wants, needs and perception
E- Self – Evaluation
P - Planning
These strategies are designed to promote change. Let’s look at each one in more
detail.
Wants (Exploring Wants Needs and Perception)
What is it you want that you don’t seem to be getting from life?
What do you think stops you from making changes you would like?
Through the therapist’s skillful questioning, clients are assisted in defining what
they want from the counseling process and from the world around them. It is useful for
clients to define what they expect and want from the counselor and from themselves
Clients are given the opportunity to explore every facet of their lives, including what they
want from their family, friends, and work. Furthermore, this exploration of wants, needs,
and perceptions should continue throughout the counseling process as clients’ pictures
change. It is an art for counselors to know what questions to ask, how to ask them, and
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when to ask them. Relevant questions help clients gain insights and arrive at plans and
solutions. Although well-timed, open-ended questions can help clients identify their
counseling goals, excessive questioning can result in resistance and defensiveness.
Direction and Doing
The focus on the present is characterized by the key question asked by the
reality therapist: “What are you doing?” Even though problems may be rooted in the
past, clients need to learn how to deal with them in the present by learning better ways
of getting what they want. Problems must be solved either in the present or through a
plan for the future. The therapist’s challenge is to help clients make more need-
satisfying choices. To accomplish this, reality therapists focus on questions like these:
“What are you doing now?” “What did you actually do yesterday?” “What did you want to
do differently this past week?” “What stopped you from doing what you said you wanted
to do?” “What will you do tomorrow?” when clients talk about problematic feelings, most
reality therapists affirm and acknowledge these feelings. Rather than focusing mainly on
these feelings, however, reality therapists encourage clients to take action by changing
what they are doing and thinking. It is easier to change what we are doing and thinking
than to change our feelings. Reality therapy focuses on gaining awareness of and
changing current total behavior.
Self Evaluation
The core of reality therapy is to ask clients to make the following self evaluation:
“Does your present behavior have a reasonable chance of getting you what you want
now, and will it take you in the direction you want to go?”
Useful Question:
By doing what you’re doing, are you getting what you want?
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Are you breaking the rules?
Much of the significant work of the counseling process involves helping clients
identify specific ways to fulfill wants and needs. The process of creating and carrying
out plans enables people to begin to gain effective control over their lives. If the plan
does not work, for whatever reason, the counselor and client work together to devise a
different plan. The plan gives the client a starting point, a toehold on life, but plans can
be modified as needed. Throughout this planning phase, the counselor continually
urges the client to be willing to accept the consequences for his or her own choices and
actions. Not only are plans discussed in light of how they can help the client personally,
but plans are also designed in terms of how they are likely to affect others in the client’s
life.
Wubbolding uses the acronym SAMIC to capture the essence of a good plan:
Simple, Attainable, Measurable, Immediate, Involved, Controlled by the planner,
Commited to, and Consistently done.
Therapist Attitudes
◦ Being Positive. The reality therapist focuses on what the client can do.
◦ Humor. Reality therapists try to develop with their clients, humor fits in
rather naturally.
I was determined not to ask Teresa to tell me her story and, especially not to ask her
how she felt. I had to try to convince her that she was making ineffective choices in her
life, knowing full well that my claim that she was making choices, especially choosing to
depress, would be the furthest thing from her mind. If I couldn’t begin to convince her on
her first visit, there was little chance of any measurable progress. (Glasser, 2000a, p.
129)
Teresa was surprised when Glasser did not want to hear her story about her
husband leaving her with children and no money. She was initially puzzled by Glasser’s
questions about making choices. His kindness and friendliness allowed her to accept
his seemingly odd questions. Teresa tried to show Glasser that her plight was hopeless,
but he continued to focus on choice that Glasser sees as a positive move away from
choosing to depress.
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“But I had a marriage, I was somebody. I’m nobody now. Just a poor woman with kids
on welfare, and they’re going to take that away in a year.”
“I’ll admit your life was a lot better than it is now, but you’re still alive. And if you’re still
alive, you can still choose to have a life, The only person who can stop you from making
better choices right now is you. As long as you choose to depress, you no longer have
a life.”
“But what else can I choose? I just can’t go home and choose to be happy.”
“That’s right, you can’t separate choosing how you feel from choosing what you do.
They go together. But you can go home and spend the rest of the day saying to
yourself: Teresa, face it. Good or bad, happy or sad, you’re choosing everything you do
all day long.
I didn’t explain total behavior to Teresa, but this is connecting acting to feeling. It
worked. She caught on.
“But what difference will that make? I’ll still have the same lousy life.”
“What do you choose to do all day that keeps your life the same?”
“I sit home, watch my soaps, and eat. That’s what I do. That’s what a lot of women like
me do. I know quite a few of them from the neighborhood. Most of them are just like me.
Too old for love, too young to die.”
In print that “like what” seems cynical, but it didn’t come out that way at all. She really
wanted to know.
“All right, let’s start with one. What could you choose to do tomorrow that would be
better than today?”
“No, that won’t work. It’d be like trying to choose not to eat so much. I’m not looking for
you to choose not to do anything. I’m looking for you to start to choose to do something
better than you’re doing now. Something active, so that you have to get up and get
going.”
Then she said something that made us both smile. She was getting it.
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“I could choose to clean the house. It’s a mess.”
“What you just said and, I guess, the way you said it reminds me of something. Did you
ever see the movie, My Fair Lady?”
“I did, the play and the movie. I was married. I had money then.”
“Remember when Eliza started to speak correctly? Higgins and Pickering danced and
sang. Do you know some of the words to that song?”
“They sang, ‘She’s got it, by Jove, I think she’s got it.’ Or something like that. Teresa I
think you’ve got it. SO tell me, what do you know about everything you do? What do we
all do before we do anything?”
“Will you call me after you clean the house? In fact, anytime you choose to do anything
all week, call me and leave a message on my machine. Leave your number, and I’ll find
the time to call you back. Can you come next week at the same time?”