Anyone a bit like I used to be, well actually still am!! Fearful of making mistakes? Sometimes so much so that I would not necessarily bring all the right details of the cases I am struggling with to supervision. I would fear the consequences, fear being judged, fear that this was the exact moment when my colleagues would realise that I should never have been in this role. That tap on the shoulder that I have been waiting for for years to say, I’m sorry but when we said yes to you to come and train as a Clinical Psychologist, well that was an accident, it was someone else we were supposed to say yes to!!
These fears go back deeper for me, and many of us I would guess. I grew up in an authoritarian household where a rule was a rule and there was a right way of doing things. Unfortunately for me, I didn’t like the right way so was frequently getting in trouble for making mistakes.
Recognising this fear of mistakes has helped me push myself a little further. I have learnt to acknowledge and recognise the emotion I am feeling but do it anyway! Even now, 15 years after my journey in EMDR began I am still learning from the mistakes I make, some little ones (oh I was at the end of a channel then, I missed my opportunity to go back to the memory) and some bigger ones. (I realised at my Consultancy training that for years I had been taking clients back to their image of the trauma rather than the vaguer memory in general). I gave myself such a hard time about not getting this right!
Recently I have trained to become an EMDR Facilitator, I had to attend the 7 day training 3 times. 21 days of reexperiencing my initial training, how amazing for me! I sat listening to the trainers teach all over again and boy did I learn from it!! Even now, I facilitate once a month and always come away learning something knew from the teaching or from the supervisees and I love this aspect of the role!
I’ve started to think differently about the mistakes I make. I acknowledge the shame, fear and self berating thoughts I have and then notice what I can learn from these mistakes. This has been a game changer for me! I try and learn from my mistakes and change my practice, I believe that this has made my practice far more effective and efficient.
One of the many things I love about EMDR is the mistakes we make are so easy to change, sometimes it can literally be changing a word which just takes a second! This little change can have a massive impact on the efficiency of the treatment.
If you want to find out more about mistakes in EMDR therapy that can easily be changed click on this link here http://eepurl.com/gFQN0P to download my PDF ‘5 easy to rectify mistakes EMDR therapists often make’.
0 Comments