Genuine Hope and False Hope: Implications for Psychotherapy

As therapists we are keen to encourage hope and the life-giving energy it provides our clients. Much of our hope-focused encouragements are offered intuitively through a range of therapeutic strategies such as psychological holding, collaborative exploration of desires and goals, and by working through psychological blocks. Most clients given time to explore their presenting story find the hope they are looking for. However, not infrequently we work with clients who struggle more deeply to find hope. For these clients the obstacles to their discovery of hope seem insurmountable. One of the reasons hope can be difficult to find is because the hope sought for is not genuine hope at all but a false hope. False hope distorts our perception of reality leaving us with an illusion, and an illusion, by definition, is unattainable.

In this seminar we will explore the dynamic differences between working with genuine hope and false hope. Genuine hope leads to a future in which the True Self can be celebrated. False hope holds people in the grip of past illusions obscuring both the True Self and genuine hope.   

Learning Outcomes
By the end of this online workshop, participants will be able to:

• Identify the nature of genuine and false hope  
• Examine ways of working with and encouraging genuine hope   
• Clarify the illusion of false hope and its relational dynamics 
• Outline key therapeutic principles for extinguishing false hope 

Format

• The workshop will be presented online via Zoom
• Notes of the workshop will be available