Refueling Your Practice – A Therapy Sampler
Handout
“3 Questions” art activity:
Begin with centering through focused breathing. Then ask client to draw (not write) the answer to
the first question. Each drawing is to be on a separate piece of paper.
o How Am I?
After completing the first drawing, center again if necessary then ask the second question.
o How do I want to be?
After completing the second question proceed to the third drawing.
o What is the solution?
Process the drawings with the client, asking them to tell about each.
Essential Worth is:
The basic or inherent value of you. It is the value you have just because you exist. It is not based on
accomplishment, wealth, power, position, or anything other than your existence. It is not something
that can be increased or decreased. It is your very being-ness and it just is.
Enough! Finding the Connection to Your Essential Worth by Kathryn L. Boone
Guided Meditation:
 Imagine yourself as a beautiful vase or piece of pottery. Notice the details of the
container — its shape, color, size, and design. Imagine that the inside of the
container holds the beauty of life. Perhaps it is experienced as a color, a light, or an
object. Imagine that however it presents itself the container holds the beauty of your
existence. Sit with this for a few minutes, imagining and experiencing.
 Now imagine the container holding the beauty of someone else’s existence —
someone you know and care about.
 Focus on this experience for several minutes.
 Journal about this meditation
Enough! Finding the Connection to Your Essential Worth by Kathryn L. Boone
Incomplete Sentences:
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My inner critic is…
And its usual message to me is.. (now say it louder)
My usual response to my inner critic is…
I feel most powerless before my inner critic when…
A voice from my past that is especially evident in my inner critic is…
How old I usually feel when my inner critic is at its harshest is…
I most readily believe my inner critic when…
“Knowing your Shadow” – Robert Augustus Master
Guided Meditation:
Speak to the inner critic (IC) in statements not questions.
 Imagine the IC is sitting facing you
 Choose a name for the IC
 Speak to it spontaneously noticing your posture & tone of voice
 Every time you ask it a question change it to a statement
 Switch seats, sitting in IC’s seat. Speak to your self as IC does using its tone of voice. Don’t be
careful. Tell self exactly what you think and what self should be doing. Raise the volume, point
your finger, lean forward. Do this as fully as you can
 Switch back to self. Immediately respond to IC. Don’t edit or be polite. Respond as you would
for a hurt child who is desperately in need of protection.
 Breathe deeply, sit up straighter. Speak as strongly as you can.
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Call IC by name
If you feel self conscious get more dramatic
You may have lots of emotions surfacing – hurt, fear, anger. If you feel anger squeeze your fists as
you express it.
 Give yourself permission to tell IC where you are with it. “You are not in charge”
 Notice IC’s volume fading and its declarations not being so important
 Notice the interplay between IC and self. See it with clarity and compassion, aware of the painful
drama. Tenderness and compassion
 Be conscious of your breathing. Stay with it for a bit.
Journal about the experience
“Knowing your Shadow” – Robert Augustus Master
Guided Meditation: “Closet of Beliefs”
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Begin with the breath. Riding the wave of the breath in and out.
Imagine that you are in a closet. Notice the size, shape, color of the closet. You may also
notice the smell or sounds of the closet.
This closet stores your beliefs. Notice how they are arranged in the closet. Is it organized or
chaotic? Are there boxes, shelves, hangers, etc?
Look at the beliefs noticing ones that you cherish.
Notice the ones you think you may have outgrown. Pull one out and look it over. What does it
look like? Smell like? Feel like? Sound like? Maybe you need to try it on.
After some time of looking at this no longer wanted belief, are you are ready to get rid of it?
If so, choose how you would like to eliminate the old belief. Do you want to throw it away?
Burn it? Box it up and send it away? Perhaps you want to let it just float away.
After you have done that look around your closet again to see if there are any other beliefs you
would like to get rid of. Use the same process to get rid of them.
Before you leave the closet notice how it looks and feels to you now.
Take a deep breath and open your eyes
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Enough! Finding the Connection to Your Essential Worth by Kathryn L. Boone
In his book, Play; How It Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul, Stuart
Brown describes some properties of play:
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Apparently purposeless (done for its own sake) — doesn’t have to have survival value
Voluntary – not an obligation
Inherent attraction — it’s fun and makes you feel good
Freedom from time — we become so engaged we may lose a sense of time
Diminished consciousness of self — we stop worrying about how we look
Improvisational potential — we aren’t locked into rigid ways of doing things, we are open to
change and chance
Continuation desire — we want to keep doing it. We find ways to continue it
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