The last things you want to be reflected in your body language with a client are rejection, excessive distance, or the quality of pushing something onto the client. Perhaps the greatest antidote to such tendencies is showing an inquisitive nature. When you’re curious about what the client is saying, on all levels, it draws the client out, especially when it is a calm, grounded curiosity. What follows are the ingredients for creating such an experience.
Components and Typical Evolution
Questions that do not have an unusual quality to themThey are, at least on the surface, common sense. Remember, this is early in your connection with the client.
Using body language to express your interest and curiosity, such as leaning forward slightly when the client says something with an emotional connection or deeper meaning.This shows that you are responsive, and it can feed the client’s self-disclosing behavior because attention is a strong reinforcer of behavior.
Inquiries regarding the underlying significanceThey can start with a half-baked assumption that morphs into a question. For example, “I can imagine that when she said that, you could really…” (making a small sweeping gesture toward your stomach-gestures should show restraint, so there is no sense of acting or being an erratic person)… Well, I mean, what other options could have gone through your mind at that point?" Ending the question with an open face shows a hint of appreciation for the client’s pain and feeling boxed in. The client’s answer gives the practitioner a sense of the client’s level of flexibility and insight. If the client has no sense of having options (as in “she made me feel that way or do that”), then the therapist has pulled this out in a context in which there is no sense of impending judgment or “psychoanalyzing” the person. Notice that the half-baked assumption is actually a way of establishing an expectation that the client must have feelings about it and connects the client with feelings to some degree, priming the client for a deeper answer than you would get with the “talking heads” effect that removes humanity from coaching. This is very important for eliciting in yourself a healing state. Any time that you begin to feel yourself pushing into the client, distancing too much, or becoming judgmental, this experience is one of the fastest and most useful ways to keep yourself from contaminating the process. It is easier to think creatively and flexibly when you are in an inquisitive state.