So during a break in the afternoon, I went in another room with Dave, Dave's mother, and Pam. I didn't have much time, so I went straight for rapport. Since I'm the oldest of nine children, I have no problem getting rapport with kids. By the time we sat down I had gotten rapport by the way I walked into the room, touched, and so forth.
Rather than going through an extended information–gathering phase, I immediately asked "What color are the monsters?" 1 didn't ask him "Can you see the monsters?" "Are there monsters?" "Do you have dreams?" "Are you upset?" "What is the problem?" The question I asked jumped past all that. "What color are the monsters?" presupposed all of the things I just mentioned. It's a huge leap, but since the kid and I were in rapport, it wasn't a problem. Dave replied by listing several colors. I said "I take it they're really big and really scary–looking." He said "Yeah!"
I asked "Who, of all the people and creatures that you know, would be tough enough to deal with these monsters?" He responded "Oh, I don't know," so we began fishing around. "Would the six–million–dollar man be strong enough?" He said "Nan."
Then I happened to hit upon one. I asked "Have you seen Star Wars?" This was several years ago when every nine–year–old kid was going to see Star Wars. His face lit up at the mention of that movie. I said "I'll bet I know which of the characters you like the best." Of course he asked "Which one?" I said "The Wookie." "Yeah, that's the one."
1 said "By the way, let me teach you something about your dreaming arm that will be useful, so that you can control your dreams. I reached over, lifted his left arm, and asked him to see an image of the Wookie in a particular movie scene. With his arm in the air, cataleptic, I said "Now this is your dreaming arm, and let it drift down only as quickly as you watch, and see once again, the part of the movie that you especially like where the Wookie was doing things."
1 could see rapid eye movement as his arm started down with unconscious movements, so I knew he was visualizing. I said "Hold it there. Can you see the Wookie?" He said "Urnhum."
"Ask him if he'll be on your side, and be your friend, and be there to help take care of you." 1 could see him move his mouth and lips as he asked the Wookie the question. When he came back, 1 asked "What did he say?" Dave said "I couldn't understand him; he just made a sound." If you saw Star Wars, you know that the Wookie's speech was unintelligible. So I said "OK, have him move his head up and down for 'yes' and sideways for 'no.' Ask him again." So Dave went back and asked, and the Wookie nodded his head "yes." I asked "Look, is the Wookie tough enough to handle these monsters?" He thought about it for a while and then said "I don't think so. They're even bigger and meaner than the Wookie is."
I said "But he's faster than the monsters, right?" Dave said "Yeah." I put my hand on Dave's shoulder and said "OK. The Wookie's going to be standing there, and you know he's going to be there for you because you'll feel the pressure on your shoulder as he stands next to you with his hand on your shoulder, knowing that if worse comes to worse, he'll sweep you up into his arms and run, because he can outrun the monsters. So you'll always be able to get away if you need to." He processed that and nodded.
"However, we haven't dealt with the monsters yet. Who else could do that?" We cast about for other possibilities, and he came up with the answer, as the client always does if the therapist is smart enough to arrange the context. He chose Godzilla.
I said "OK, go in and sec Godzilla." Dave closed his eyes immediately and raised his arm. It was one–trial learning; he understood exactly. I again saw rapid eye movements as he went inside and watched. Then he stopped and said "I'm having trouble getting an answer." I said "Well, watch his head." Dave said "But he's facing the other direction." "Tell him to turn around!" I said. So Dave went "Turn around."
Now that in itself was a very important change. He was now controlling powerful creatures in the domain in which he had been terrified. I was operating entirely within his belief system, his own metaphor.
Godzilla turned around and nodded "yes." I said "Now there's only one problem left. You've got someone to defend you and take care of the monsters if you need it. But Godzilla is big and clumsy. He's strong, and he'll take care of you, but you don't want him tromping around in dreams when you don't need him."
Listen to the presupposition in that statement. That statement said to him " You will have dreams. Some will have monsters and some won't. Godzilla will be appropriate in some dreams and in some he won't be." I was beginning to convert dreaming back into a normal, even enjoyable activity, rather than the time to have nightmares. At that point Dave told me that in the story about Godzilla, there's a kid who wears a special necklace. When this Kid wants Godzilla to arrive because he's being threatened by other monsters, all the kid does is touch the necklace. That's the signal for Godzilla to arrive.
I asked Dave's mother "Would you be willing to spend an hour this afternoon taking Dave around to some jewelry stores to find a necklace that will work for him as a signalling device?" I needed to be careful about over–all ecology here. In his town a little boy running around wearing a necklace wouldn't go over very well. I told him that he was only to wear it on evenings when he knew he would need it. Again, this was a way of putting the whole thing under his control.
In this example I didn't challenge the child's belief system; I didn't challenge the way he labeled things. I did no interpretation, but rather had the flexibility to enter into the child's world of beliefs. I then used devices within that world that were appropriate for getting the choices that the child needed at the time.
Man: What if the nightmares were just a symptom of something else?
All you know about when you work with an individual or family are the symptoms. My guess is that the nightmares did represent something going on within the family system, though I have no idea what. I asked Pam to keep a watch on the family to find out if any other symptoms emerged. Six months later she reported that there were no other symptoms. If other symptoms had emerged, I would go to reframing.
By responding to Dave's nightmares the way I did, I changed their meaning. In essence, I reframed them. The fact that I did this in the mother's presence was also important, because that changed her response to the nightmares. I gave her an example of a different way of responding to the nightmares.
Woman: Why did you use the dreaming arm technique?
It's just a game, and I wanted to begin with a game. With children, framing things as games produces a much more useful response than framing them as problem–solving. The dreaming arm is particularly useful in dealing with nightmares because it places visualization under the control of the child.
Benediction
Man: You have about eight minutes for your benediction. I just thought you might like to know that.
You want us to put you into trance, huh? We decided not to do it this time, We were going to give you lots of post–hypnotic suggestions, but we decided we wanted to find out what would happen if we just left you hanging. We wanted to know if we could come back here next year and you'd all still be sitting here.
OK. During the course of the past three days you have gone through a whole variety of experiences and learnings. There, it feels much better already, doesn't it? Now take a few moments and think about the sequence of what has occurred here. Go back to the beginning—three days ago—and quickly run through and review internally the things you learned. What are the things you want to take with you when you go back to your office, your home, your family? … Because the learnings you had here in the Grand Ballroom could stay in the Grand Ballroom, but they won't if you notify yourself when and where you want them to go.