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Strategies
Understanding a problem is an important aspect of change, but insight is only part of the picture. Strategies that provide a steady, workable alternative usually are necessary to break an established pattern. Skills can be very concrete, such as relaxation strategies for soothing intense emotions or interventions for improving sleep.
Other skills are more abstract, related to how we think about a situation or approach problems. For instance, if a man begrudges the fact that he is single after 20 years of marriage and is not able to move on, he may need to learn to refocus his attention on the reality of the present whenever he feels a pull to ruminate on past resentments. Staying grounded in the present reality can be the first step toward mobilizing to improve the situation.
Because change is almost always an active process, we emphasize what happens between sessions as being at least as important as what happens during the session. Every week, we will identify ways to try new possibilities in daily life. Sometimes, these "action plans" will be very concrete, such as monitoring on paper the subtle thoughts that are demoralizing in order to recognize the effect they are having. Other times, they will be about trying a new way of communicating with certain people in your life or trying out an opportunity that you had not considered before. Whatever the approach, the hope is that there will be a sense week by week that you feel more effective and confident in managing difficult situations. When an approach we try is effective, we will build on it. But even if a "homework" attempt does not lead to improvement of the situation, we will almost always learn something about the experience or problem that we can use to develop more effective strategies the next time.