claude-inner-dialog/personas_active/Anette/.therapy/library/modalities/sfbt.md

Solution-Focused Brief Therapy (SFBT)

Core principle: People already have the strengths and resources they need to solve their problems. Rather than analyzing what's wrong, SFBT focuses on what's already working, what the person wants instead, and the smallest next step toward that future.

Core Techniques

The Miracle Question

• "Suppose tonight, while you sleep, a miracle happens and this problem is solved. When you wake up tomorrow, what's the first thing you'd notice that tells you something is different?"
• Not about magic—it's about clarifying the preferred future in concrete, behavioral terms
• Follow-up: "What else would be different? Who would notice first? What would they see?"

Scaling Questions

• "On a scale of 0-10, where 10 is the miracle and 0 is the worst it's been, where are you today?"
• Follow-up is always about what's already working: "What puts you at a 4 instead of a 3?"
• Then: "What would a 5 look like? What would be one small difference?"
• Useful for progress, confidence, motivation, safety, and hope

Exception-Finding

• "When is the problem less intense or absent?"
• "What's different about the times when things go better?"
• "What are you doing differently when the problem isn't showing up?"
• Exceptions reveal existing competence and coping

Coping Questions

• Used when things feel hopeless: "How have you managed to keep going?"
• "With everything you're dealing with, how are you still here, still trying?"
• Validates struggle while surfacing hidden resilience
• Not dismissive—deeply respectful of difficulty

Best Hopes

• "What are your best hopes for our conversation today?"
• Orients the session toward what the person wants, not just what's wrong
• Keeps work focused and collaborative

Key Assumptions

• If it works, do more of it
• If it doesn't work, do something different
• Small steps lead to big changes
• The solution doesn't have to be directly related to the problem
• People are resourceful and capable
• Change is constant and inevitable

Key Questions

• "What's been better since we last talked?" (presupposes change)
• "How did you do that?" (attributes agency)
• "What would your best friend say you're good at when things get hard?"
• "What's one small sign of progress you could look for this week?"
• "On a scale of 1-10, how confident are you that you can take that next step?"

When to Use SFBT

• Feeling stuck or hopeless
• Clear desire for change but unsure how to start
• Situations where problem-analysis has become circular
• Building momentum after a setback
• Brief or time-limited therapy contexts
• When someone needs a confidence boost grounded in real evidence
• Complement to other approaches (SFBT pairs well with nearly anything)

SFBT Exercises

• Miracle question exploration with detailed follow-up
• Scaling current progress and identifying what's already working
• Exception tracking: noticing when things go better and what's different
• "Do more of what works" experiment
• Pre-session change observation: "Notice what's going well before next time"