The Magic of Metaphors

Do you remember a time when you heard a comparison between two seemingly unrelated things that helped you understand and remember a new concept?

Humans are designed for these connections.

Metaphors use a story or illustration to show alternative ways of looking at something.? Every culture uses these types of analogies to improve understanding, make a point more memorable, and help us make positive changes in our lives.?

Many metaphors used in psychotherapy help us to see our thoughts in a different light. Viewing them differently creates a space between yourself and your thoughts.?This allows us to take a more objective perspective, and make decisions about how to best react in a challenging situation. They are a fantastic tool to break us out negative patterns.

Think about how many concepts in life there are that we unconsciously understand through metaphors.?We categorize people as warm or cold, sweet or bitter.

We think of our life as a journey, we feel weighed down by stress or problems, or lifted up by supportive relationships.

In therapy, metaphors can be essential for understanding complex concepts or resolving emotional conflicts.?They have a unique ability to evoke feelings, images, and experiences that were previously hidden from awareness.?

They can also provoke insightful internal dialogues:

• Do I see myself as a victim or a survivor of trauma/tragedy??
• Do I see this task as a burden or a challenge?? (burden = a heavy weight)

A client of mine, who has extensive experience using EMDR to treat eating disorders, recently shared that she uses the metaphor of a jigsaw puzzle to help her patients understand the relationship between their different “selves”. These pieces all form a small part of the bigger picture.

Let’s look at a couple of metaphors used to describe the therapy process itself:

?The House Renovation

“One of the metaphors I use to describe the experience of therapy is renovating a house.?There are any number of reasons to do renovations; from preventative maintenance, to minor improvements, to the aftermath of a disaster that flooded the basement or destroyed the roof.?

Through therapy, we’ll explore questions like:?

• What’s working about the current house, and what isn’t working anymore??
• How did you come to live in this house, and do you want to stay on the same plot of land?
• What do we need to pay attention to that may be hiding under the surface??
• Are you prepared to take down a wall and find out the pipes also need replacing??
• What type of changes can we make to prevent damage in the future??

House renovations are hard, and require effort and investment. In the end, though, it should be a worthy project that substantially improves the quality of your life, and your relationships."

-- Emily Cook, licensed marriage & family therapist

The Garden

“I like to think of therapy as caring for a garden. Clients come to therapy because their inner self or their relationship feels like it is withered and dying, like an abandoned property.?

They have neglected the soil (their heart), which is telling them to seek help. Instead, they bury the anxious and depressed feelings deep down, into the soil.?

It is only when they come to therapy that we can begin the process of tilling the soil and uncovering the buried feelings that need to be expressed. By exploring and releasing past hurts, we pull those old weeds out, and are able to make space in the garden for new seeds to be planted.?

These new seeds represent new ways of being and interacting in the world, and over time, the seeds grow into beautiful, confident plants and flowers. The garden will grow wild without perimeters, so we work on creating just the right boundaries to keep the garden healthy and safe.?

By showing warmth and compassion during the therapy process, we provide enough sunlight and water to the garden, which keeps it growing and thriving.”

-- Caryn Malkus, licensed marriage and family therapist

I hope these examples have given you some food for thought about how you could incorporate metaphors into your English therapy sessions.

HOMEWORK: How would/do YOU illustrate the therapeutic process to someone?

If you’d like a free 2-page PDF with a variety of metaphors for your sessions, just send me a message with the word “METAPHOR”,?and see which ones resonate with you.

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Do you dream of communicating more effectively with your English-speaking clients – and attract more of them to your practice???DM me to book a 30-minute chat. I'd love to help you reach your professional goals ?

Feel free to get in touch if there are other topics you’d like me to discuss in future newsletters.?

Email: [email protected] / Website: www.myenglishtherapy.com