From Jeffrey K. Zeig: Milton Erickson was my mentor intermittently for more than six years; he was also an inspiration in creating the Master Class. At his essence, Erickson was experiential. He was the most radically experiential therapist to ever practice. Creating transformative experiences is a component in many schools of therapy, including rational emotive behavior therapy and cognitive behavior therapy, but for Erickson being experiential was not merely a component; it was the foundation of his therapeutic work. Erickson's experiential approach is derived from hypnosis, which is essentially an experiential technique, not a means of providing information. The subtext of hypnosis is: "By living this experience, you can be different." This book is an opportunity to study single-session therapies that are based in experiential methods. The learning from these methods is primarily stimulated by the client "living" the change, not by intellectual understanding of how to change. The participants declare what they are going to do differently, and the sessions are designed to create experiences that foster the accomplishment of stated goals. Participants have solved complex problems and have made significant life changes. They have overcome writer's block and then completed a book; they are happier in their jobs and relationships; they rebalance work and life; and they surmount childhood trauma. The transcripts contained here offer opportunities to sit in on live interactions between therapist and client. An extraordinary adjunct to the transcripts are the participants'-all stellar professionals themselves-notes on the sessions. They articulate their understandings and impressions in such powerful ways that upon reading their perspectives I also took away something new.
About the Author: Jeffrey K. Zeig, PhD, is the Founder and Director of The Milton H. Erickson Foundation. Dr. Zeig is the architect of The Evolution of Psychotherapy Conference, the Brief Therapy Conference, the Couples Conference, and the International Congresses on Ericksonian Approaches to Hypnosis and Psychotherapy. He is on the Editorial Board of numerous journals; Fellow of the American Psychological Association (Division 29, Psychotherapy); and Fellow of the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis. He is a Distinguished Practitioner in the National Academy of Practice in Psychology of the National Academies of Practice and an Approved Supervisor of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy. A clinical psychologist, Dr. Zeig has a private practice, and conducts workshops internationally (more than 40 countries). He has been an invited speaker at major universities and teaching hospitals, and has edited, co-edited, authored or coauthored more than 20 books on psychotherapy that appear in 14 foreign languages.