Dynamic Emotion Focused Therapy: An interview with Susan Warren Warshow, LCSW, LMFT
Channel: Experiential Psychotherapy Training
Date: 2023-01-27

More interviews at: https://tinyurl.com/mrymdnn2

Susan Warren-Warshow is the  founder of the Dynamic Emotion Focused Therapy (DEFT)  Institute and author of "A Therapist’s Handbook to Dissolve Shame and Defense: Master the Moment" (Routledge, 2022).

DEFT is a shame-sensitive, compassion centered, attachment oriented, inter-subjective, relational psychodynamic, experiential, spiritually integrated, somatic and emotion-focused therapy.

The challenge facing every therapist is how to catalyze deeply felt connection within THREE relationships at once in order to optimally alleviate suffering: that between the therapist and client; that between the client and self; and that between the therapist and self.

Carl Jung has said, “The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely,” Yet such a love carries us through life in a way that nothing else can. Many clients describe accelerated therapeutic relief from a range of symptoms when such radical self-acceptance becomes possible. 

DEFT'S Emphasis on Shame:
In DEFT, shame is seen as a primary, inhibitory affect that is body-based and often accompanied by devaluing thoughts. Unfortunately, shame often skates under the radar in psychotherapy and is given insufficient attention. It frequently arises around attempts at emotional closeness and also shame-insensitive interactions, often triggering the transference of a critical parental figure as well as defensive projection of self-judgment and loathing onto the therapist. 

Shame is a state that can also affect the therapist, especially when inevitable errors and misalliances occur. It can also trigger countertransference, (e.g. being overly attached to a treatment cure leading to pressure on the client to “cooperate.” It can be very curative for the therapist to own these occurrences. Shame will be an obstacle to treatment success until it is given the caring attention it requires on both sides of the consulting room.

Signature Principles of DEFT:
Advances the theoretical concept of the “Therapeutic transfer of compassion for self.” This occurs through:

1.  The therapist's capacity to not only feel compassion and caring but to embody it. (Note to therapists: Do not be intimidated by this. This takes ongoing personal work and practice, which the DEFT Institute aims to support. It is normal for this state to fluctuate from one client to the next and to be impacted by numerous factors. Awareness and will are key factors in developing a more consistent experience of self/other compassion).

2.  The therapist's use of prosody, non-shaming language, and engaged, physiological attunement.

3.  Attentiveness to inhibitory and distancing defensive process and the cost it carries.

4.  A sustained focus on underlying feelings, such as sadness for a lack of compassion for self.

5.  Identifying when the client rejects the therapist's compassion. It is through such awareness that a choice to receive and direct compassion towards the self becomes possible. DEFT theory posits that such a transfer significantly impacts outcome. Becoming aware of this reality can be motivating to the client.

Encourages therapist authenticity, creativity and spontaneity with careful observation of responses to interventions. Retaining that which makes the therapist unique and real, e.g. self-disclosure in the interest of the client, is highly valued.

Supports a therapeutic relationship in which both client and therapist are learning from one another and are engaged in self-reflection, mutual vulnerability and personal growth.

Recognizes that many clients hold their spiritual beliefs to be central to their lives and healing. As a spiritually integrated therapy, the DEFT therapist is willing to explore feelings related to this aspect of a person's life experiences, thereby enhancing emotional closeness.  

Employs play and humor, which can help reduce defenses and build connection.

Emphasizes strengths and views defensive process as both resourceful and survival-oriented in nature. Therefore, DEFT draws emphatic attention to the courage to do therapeutic work.

Considers all new and difficult types of self-disclosure as "breakthroughs to intimacy,” e.g. revealing a shame-laden incident of childhood molestation for the first time or revealing to the therapist that cognitive disruption is occurring (“I keep losing my train of thought.”) When significant obstacles of toxic shame, anxiety or guilt are overcome, DEFT views these moments as entering new states which are worthy of recognition. Acknowledging such risk-taking contributes to the building of hope, the engine of treatment. And hope is a 2-way street between client and therapist!