Suppressed Anger Dealing with Very Strong Negative Emotions

This is a second session with a client who returned for further work. The first session was for insomnia and was not filmed. Whilst the client reports that the insomnia was not improved by this first session, he reports that other areas of his life have undergone a “massive change.” These changes are discussed at the beginning of this session. Following a humourous and provocative approach inspired by the work of FrankFarrelly and Nick Kemp, Andrew T. Austin playfully opens the change work by conversationally and subtly probing for the client representations and strategies. Advanced practitioners will notice the conversational use of state fractionation as well as the chaining of states in the first half of the session. “The interruptions and tangential questions are not random,” Austin cryptically offers by way
of explanation, “this approach works really well and in this case [client] was delightful to work with and noticeably very responsive to the work.”

Some archetypal themes pertaining to persistent anger are explored in this session, such as the use of violent fantasy, mechanisms of suppression and control and feeling as though one is potentially like an exploding volcano. At times confrontational but never once losing rapport, Austin demonstrates how the Metaphors of Movement process, strategy reframing, submodality changes, kinaesthetic dissociation and future pacing can all be achieved quite conversationally and without incurring any conscious resistance by the client.

Possibly this conversational style is too covert, as at the end of the session, contrasting to the level of intensity of the feeling of anger earlier in the session the client remarks, “How did you do that?! That is quite amazing really. I cannot even imagine myself getting into a state,
it’s bizarre!”