Has Jim Holder written any articles within the last FIVE years?



Yes, Two Dynamic Adjustment For Hallucinations - This technique will greatly impact hallucinations in a matter of five to ten minutes once rapport has been established. (Topical Essay from Adlerian Society UK and Institute for Individual Psychology (ASIIP) 2016) The Addiction Process and Re-Orientation - Within this article Jim Holder talks about the use of early recollections and first use/prime memories and their metaphorical value in change work. (Topical Essay from ASIIP 2014)



What are guiding beliefs?



Guiding Beliefs are simple to understand. People develop their personalities by the age of 7, and their personalities are governed by the beliefs they chose as a child. These beliefs are guides we hold on to as choices and decisions about life are made. People often think to themselves, "why does this keep happening to me?" or "Why do I always act this way with men (women)?" A client once said, "I can't do anything right." His belief started at such a young age he chose to forget about it. Some professionals would say it moved into the subconscious. Rudolf Dreikers said, "If people used instead of the word " unconscious", the more accurate word "unadmitted" they would simplify a problem which they otherwise make very confusing."1


1 Dreikers, Rudolf, Fundamentals of Adlerian Psychology. Alfred Adler Institute, Chicago, Ill., 1953, pp 54-55



What is the difference between abstinence and sobriety?



In Perceptual Adjustment Therapy we look at the positive instead of the negative, something we are moving to instead of away from. To abstain you must do without something. For example, a person will say, "I want to abstain from alcohol", so their focus is still on alcohol.To focus on alcohol increases the likelihood of having cravings for alcohol and possibly even using it. Sobriety is a state of being in which we can enjoy life in a relaxed and joyful manner.



Are discounts available for the purchase of larger quantities of your materials?



Yes! It is our goal to make our professional training materials available to as many who need them as possible. Visit our Products Pages to view the available discounts.



Is Jim available to conduct trainings in the United States and Internationally?



Yes. In fact Jim is in discussions at this time with individuals in the United Kingdom, Slovakia, Ireland and Columbia, SC



Are discounts available for the purchase of larger quantities of your materials?



Yes! It is our goal to make our professional training materials available to as many who need them as possible. Visit our Products Pages to view the available discounts.



Is Parenting with Positive Intentions helpful for all parents?



Yes, this parenting program is for any parent who is interested in harmonious family living. If you are a parent who often feels annoyed, frustrated, mad, hurt, guilty, or hopeless, the "Parenting with Positive Intentions" will be helpful to you, your spouse, and other family members.


MORE ABOUT THIS

What causes children to misbehave?



When children become discouraged they tend to misbehave in order to fit into their family and society as a whole. We are social beings, and want to find a place where we feel we belong. When discouraged young children have four major goals of misbehavior, and these four goals are attention, power, revenge, and inadequacy. Even though they are misguided goals the child feels these goals work for them. Parents unknowingly begin to support the misbehavior of their child.



Are there books that go along with the teachings in Parenting with Positive Intentions?



There is a wonderful book writen years ago by Rudolf Dreikurs, Children The Challenge. It is perfect for parents with young children and covers all the fundamentals of parenting. In Parenting with Positive Intentions we will also cover the issues of today's world, with I-phones, texting and more. Another book you would find helpfull is "The Couragious Parent" by Cindy Walton-McCawley and Kathleen Walton. It is a question and answer book and a great resorce for parents and counselors.



How can physicians use the "FACE Screening"?



The FACE Screening was originally developed for doctors to use in their practice, either in an examing room or by letting a patient fill out the screening tool while in the wating room. It is a time saver for physicians, and was reserched by McLeod Regonal Medical Cener in Florence SC, and the University of SC Counseling Department. It is a one page questionnaire patients can easilly fill out in a couple of minutes while waiting for their doctor. It will asses and inform the patient and doctor of their risk of becoming addicted to sedatives or opiates. The federal government is encouraging doctors to learn more about the risk of addictions in order to halt or at least curb the alarming rate at which people are dying from overdoses of addictive medications, especially opiate pain killers.



How can the "FACE Screening" be helpful to individuals and families?



The "FACE Screening" can help individuals and families know who is at extreme risk for becoming addicted to alcohol, street drugs, and even addictive prescription medications like sedatives, nerve medication, or opiate pain killers. We all need this information especially if we come from a family where addiction of any kind has been an issue. It is also helpful in lessening the feelings of shame for a person in the midst of addiction or in recovery. The feeling of shame is of course a relapse trigger for many people.



Do people with a substance use disorder have more negative beliefs?



Through our studies and research on Perseptual Adjustment Therapy, and The FACE Screening people with substance use disorders do have more negative beliefs than the general population in the USA. The range we have found is between 84% and 91% of first menories or as Alderians would say "early recollections" contain either negative content or feelings. This does not mean that everyone with a negative first memory will become addicted, but it is a risk factor. See The FACE Screening for other risk factors. There are 4 in all.



What can a person do to help them sleep?



While I was in my Master Practitioner training for Neurolingistic Programming I learned a technique that not only helped me sleep but also helped me relax in stressful situations, like speaking to large groups of people. It was taught to me by John Grinder in Raleigh NC. during a year-long training program. I have found I could use it in all types of situations. The full exercise is on my " Deep Relaxation and Pain Mnagement" CD. I give the exercise five stars! It worked for me the first night that I used it.



How do you intergrate Adlerian and Gestalt Therapy and Neurolinguistic Programming?



Romanian Interview

Today I am semi-retired and have my own training and consulting business located in Evergreen, SC, USA. I retired from McLeod Regional Medical Center in September, 2013 after 37 years of working in the counseling field. I have always treated those with substance use disorders along with marital, relationship, and mental problems, both mild and severe. I still have a small private counseling practice one day a week. You asked how I integrate Adlerian, Gestalt Therapy and Neuro-Linguistic Programming. Adlerian Psychology and Gestalt Therapy are both holistic and move a client into their core issues.


Neuro-Linguistic Programming isn't a therapy in itself. Instead, it helps the professional, and the general population, learn useful interventions and, for example, the linguistic patterns for success. Neuro-Linguistic patterns for treating addictions were heavily influenced by Gestalt Therapy. I like the terminology and detailed strategies of NLP. In my early years of counseling I found some clients were profoundly impacted by sensory awareness brought on with the use of Gestalt Therapy, and others gained awareness and insight through more cognitive or analytical processes used in Adlerian Psychology.


In Gestalt Therapy the client is helped to first become aware of and then move through an impasse that has blocked them for years. An Adlerian would see client's guiding fiction as the point of being stuck. A Gestalt Therapist would see the client being stuck and out of touch with themselves. Fritz Perls (Gestalt) and Bandler and Grinder (NLP), in working with Addictions use the metaphor of integrating parts of a person. Adler, in his Individual Psychology, believes there are no parts, but that you have to look at the purpose of the behavior to help a person move to a healthier place in life. There is a danger in a person believing that he or she actually has parts. It is important to know this is simply a metaphorical way to approach his/her beliefs or stuckness, and give a new direction in to which to move. Adlerians teach to trust only movement; that life happens at the level of events, not words.


In Perceptual Adjustment Therapy, I find it most helpful to let the client direct me. Those who move through the world on a feeling or sensory level, I will meet them there. With those who are more analytical/cognitive thinkers, I use Early Recollections and a form of re-orientation. Remember, both Gestalt and Adlerian are holistic in nature.


In Perceptual Adjustment Therapy I side -step the power struggle or argument between the two schools of thought. I saw the similarities instead of the differences. In my experiential training as a Gestalt Therapist, an Adlerian Psychologist and Master Practitioner of NLP, I discovered personally important things about myself, so I saw the significance in each. It is important for the counselor/therapist to be aware of themselves. If professionals do not have insight into themselves, the use of metaphors and other therapeutic interventions can easily be less than optimal.



Who were your mentors?



My early mentors were Dr. Jack Mulgrew in Gestalt Therapy at Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina, USA. Also at Appalachian was Dr. Don Clark. They encouraged me to spend a month in training at Esalen Institute at Big Sur, California, studying Gestalt Therapy, Biofeedback, and other subjects with Julian Silverman, Richard Price, Gregory Bateson, and others. Consequently, that part of my undergraduate studies was more like a Masters Program. Sue Clark was also my therapist at the time at Appalachian, and we did some profound work together using Gestalt Therapy.


I went to West Virginia University with two friends, one applying for their Doctoral Program, and the other for the Masters Program. I was sitting in the hall as one friend walked out of the interview with two professors. As she came around the corner she obviously looked shocked. I asked what happened and she went on to tell me she was just talking to "this old man" and he asked about her 2 older brothers, and she had never said anything about her family. I was amazed and said I would like to learn from that man and how he knew she had 2 older brothers. Later that day, they (the school) found out I had been trained at Esalen and asked me if I wanted to interview and, of course, I did.


After being accepted to the Masters Program, and then arriving for the start of the semester, I learned that that "old man" was Manfred Sonstegard, one of the top Adlerians in the world, and he was no longer at the University. I was disappointed, to say the least, that he was gone, but the first party we had for our class was at Sonstegard's empty house. I did get to study with him, however, at a later date. Luckily for me, Dr. Michael Yura at WV had been mentored by Sonstegard and ran the Family Education Center started by Sonstegard. In turn, Dr. Yura mentored me and my wife, Rosie, in Adlerian Psychology.



Is there a purpose for someone becoming addicted?



Question # 4 No one starts out to be addicted to a substance or any thing else. In looking at the purpose of substance use, accepting that human behavior is purposeful and positively directed, there are two levels. The first level of being directed by a positive intent is the simplest to understand. Consider a young girl who fears men because her belief is that they hurt and abandon girls and women. She gains awareness about this by sharing her ER of being 4 years old when her father beat her mother and then walked out on her and her mother. Through her life she has found that cocaine and alcohol cause her fear of rejection and abandonment to vanish and enables her to socialize and even be intimate with a man. So her positive intent in her use is to feel more social and courageous with men.


The second level is metaphorical in that her substance use disorder becomes more severe over time to the point the man she has begun to love like she loved her father becomes infuriated with her drunkenness. He hits her just as her father hit her mother, and finally storms out of her life leaving her alone just like when she was 4 years old. She has created and satisfied her self-fulfilling prophecy that a man she loves will first hurt and then leave her.



How do you work with an addicted client using Perceptual Adjustment Therapy?



In Perceptual Adjustment Therapy, the client directs me to the core issue by looking at Early Recollections as their personal metaphors. This also helps gain awareness into their beliefs and how their beliefs have influenced their perceptions. Once the awareness/insight has been gained the client has a choice to adjust their beliefs and perceptions if they wish, or stay the same, being active in their addiction and fulfilling the purposefulness of that behavior. There are a number of ways to alter the client beliefs into a more positive and useful metaphor.


This opens the door to new perceptions of life and gives the client the courage to take the action they desire. Remember, we can trust only movement. Perceptual Adjustment is holistic and a client directed therapy and brings the client into the here and now. Without understanding the positive intents behind the substance use a client will be in what they perceive as an internal conflict. To accept the positive intent is to free the addicted person from the shame they so often feel, and gives them a goal for treatment. Simply stated, that is to begin to find healthy ways to accomplish their positive intents for substance use and enjoy their life of sobriety. Too often addictions treatment has been negative, confronting and less than encouraging.



How do you use encouragement in therapy?



As to encouragement, I use encouragement throughout the recovery process. To gain insight and awareness through the use of early recollections is encouraging in itself, and since the counselor and client do this together they get the opportunity to encourage each other as they work together. To look for the positive intents for early use of substances is a new and encouraging behavior for the client. The clients have usually had counselors and family point out the negative consequences in their substance use. Now, instead, they are encouraged to look at the other side of the coin, the positive reasons for early use of addictive substances.



How do you define addiction?



In defining "addiction" I have to start by saying there are no positive addictions. The media and others like to tell us of positives addictions. But an addiction is only an addiction if it causes some life problems. The problem may be physical, social, work, love, spiritual and so on. The core root of the problem starts before the substance is ever used. It starts with an individual developing a negative belief that influences them to feel inferior and have strong negative feelings of being deprived. This inferiority feeling influences them until the first time they use a substance, and the negative feeling vanishes and they feel confident socially, for example. This goal or intent to use starts the substance use process and may continue until there is a substance use disorder. Addictions are simple. A negative belief and lifestyle often sets the stage for substance use disorder if appropriate counseling in not sought out. When people who see life in a more positive light become addicted a trauma usually takes place.



How do you work with families using Perceptual Adjustment Therapy (PAT)?



When I have a family session I start with education and cover two main topics. I first start by discussing how families involved in addiction interact with each other and society. They often hide their feelings, keep family secrets, blame others and their thoughts are focused on the substance use whether the addicted individual is using that day or not. There are those in the family that pamper/enable the substance user.


This pampering behavior is often an addictive behavior in itself and in the spouse's case often started prior to the marriage or as early as the beginning of the relationship. Secondly, I also look at the early recollections of the spouse to understand how being married to a substance user fits into their lifestyle and family constellation. We rebuild our families of origin to fit in and feel comfortable in our place. It is amazing how often the spouse found their place by taking care of someone in their own childhood.



What is your thought about confrontation in working with addicted clients?



People have been confronting addicted individuals for some time and often for years. So we have a choice of confronting an addicted individual who has developed defenses for years, or side-step the power struggle about someone being addicted, as I do. When a professional uses ER's to understand the person's belief you work together and begin to develop a positive and encouraging relationship. When you look for the positive intents in early substance use the defenses can begin to melt away. The client hasn't ever looked closely at the positive nature of their use. This is a way to reframe a negative into a positive counseling strategy. The client can decide if they want to make a change in their life.


Adlerians have encouraged parents and counselors to side-step power struggles. In couple's counseling it's important for both individuals to see how their metaphor for life may, in fact, often reinforce a negative situation and/ or style of life. So, for example, exploring ER's and family constellations puts a couple on a more level playing field. No one has to be the bad person. The couple gains awareness and insight about themselves and their partner together. This strengthens the marriage. Looking at the strengths of each person and encouraging the spouse to step in and also look at the partner's strengths in their ERs and family life is powerful. Substance use and pampering/enabling behavior both have positive intents behind them. Adler taught that all behaviors are goal directed. I simply add that all behaviors have a positive goal or intention.



Is it important to see what progress has been made during
the theraputic process?



It is important to see what progress has been made in the counseling process. In each session it is important to look at the progress being made to encourage the client. I will ask a client for their first memory at the end of treatment, just as I did in the beginning of treatment. This will give me a metaphorical picture of the progress made during our counseling sessions.



Is therapy that important to recovery?



A person who has addicted himself/herself may stop using substances after educating themselves. However, their lifestyle and core issues will not change. Therefore, the person may be pleased with sobriety, but be miserable in some portion of life. The example that comes to mind is of a young carpenter who was working for me and found out I was an addiction counselor. He felt comfortable in telling me he had been addicted and stopped on his own with no help.


This young man had many obvious positives. For instance, his eyes were bright, he had a love for life, his job and his family and he was healthy. It was apparent to me that this young man had accomplished much more than just stopping his active use of substances. I told him I did not believe he had stopped on his own. He said that he did do it without help. I said I did not believe that, and he must have done something different in his life. He said that he started to go to church. I then asked if his church members knew he was addicted and did they support him. He smiled and said that they did. He courageously had told his story of addiction in church and the people were all very supportive of him. So he said, "I guess that I had some help, didn't I?" We just smiled and went on about our work building my training center. We are social creatures and it is important to find a healthy place in society where people support and encourage us. The support and encouragement from others can give us the courage to accept ourselves and walk a new path in life.



What did Adler mean by "no chance memories"?



When we ask a client for a first memory, the recollection we get does not just "happen to be recalled. It is the exact memory, culled from all the rest, that the clients own mind interprets as somehow reflecting his present situation. It is like asking a child to draw a picture of his family and then inferring from it some clues about their relationships, better, about the child's perception of their relationships.



POSITIVE INTENTIONS



James Holder, MA, Licensed Professionsal Counselor, Master Addiction Counselor


CELL 843.621.0791