Growing Creative Therapists

After years of practicing psychotherapy, and teaching it to others, we have come to realize that our work involves a blending of well-crafted skills that are theoretically grounded, with the clinical judgment to apply those methods in ways that are consistently helpful to others. It is the latter part of this mix that requires therapists (and their clients) tap into their own creative resources in order to produce successful outcomes. Interestingly, however, in our training to become practitioners, creativity is rarely included in the curriculum. Even supervision after graduation is often focused more on making sure we comply with standards of care rather than expanding the range of our therapeutic options (Remley & Herlihy, 2001). Practitioners are essentially left on their own to access their creative spirit, as if this process would occur automatically as a result of experience, or perhaps divine guidance. In truth, creativity is not just an in-born trait but a skill that can be learned, developed, and fostered over time. In fact, moment-by-moment functioning requires some use of creativity as no situation is exactly the same as any previous situation we encounter (Bohart, 1999). Indeed, people are creative every day–they find new ways to deal with old problems, they will find an alternate route to work when road construction is occurring, they find ways to save money when times are hard, or they find an alternative to silverware when no utensils are available (Ward, Fink & Smith, 1985). It is this everyday creativity that therapists can tap into in their clinical practice in order to enhance therapy, though most therapists are not trained to tap this resource.