Blog 1. A paradigm for Unmotivated Clients

Motivational Work - The Universe of The New Paradigm -
Motivational Work – The Universe of The New Paradigm

A paradigm for Unmotivated Clients 

There is a need for Motivational Work – a paradigm for unmotivated clients. The necessity for a new theory is the current idea of using the psychotherapeutic model and applying it to unmotivated clients. In a way, it is understandable why it is done. It is a well-known approach and fits well with how you traditionally meet others. Two examples are the methods of Prochaska and DiClemente and Motivational Interviewing. As a result, both approaches exclude many unmotivated clients, which is sad.

The Psychotherapeutic Paradigm

The two methods use the same paradigm as psychotherapy. You talk to the client in a civilized manner, you make emotional contact with him, he reflects on his situation, comes to the appointments made, and so on. This is a description of a reasonably well-functioning person. He is in contact with himself emotionally; he dares to listen to the motivational worker and can openly cooperate in the situation (he comes to the meeting, sits there, and returns to a new session). The motivational worker gets manifestly positive affirmations with this method.

Most Clients Do Not Fit In

Most clients in psychiatric clinics, welfare agencies, or prisons do not fit in with this approach. They don’t come to meetings, or they leave abruptly; they are aggressive, insulting, threatening, violent, under the influence of psychopharmacological drugs, illegal drugs, or alcohol; they are compliant (that is, they adapt superficially to the motivational worker’s expectations), but they have shut themselves off emotionally.

If you use the Prochaska and DiClemente model or Motivational Interviewing, you confirm the motivational paradox; those in most need of support get the least. Consequently, there is a demand for Motivational Work – a paradigm for unmotivated clients.

A New Paradigm

To be able to help, you must alter the approach and use a different model. You have to change theory and perspective because unmotivated clients function differently than motivated clients. The paradigm that psychotherapy uses is similar to Newton’s physics. Its principles and laws work here on Earth. You cannot apply them to all the phenomena in the whole universe.

The psychotherapeutic situation is a particular case of a much larger theme: how human beings form relationships with each other. You have to create a theory that can explain the total cosmos and simultaneously include Newton’s physics; that is precisely what Einstein accomplished. The same thing applies to motivation. If you extend your theory to that level, you will have the working tools required for your motivational work.

Change of Perspective

If you change to the Einsteinian perspective via Motivational Work, you will find that unmotivated clients relate to other people similarly to people in love. Resistance has different and more critical functions than defense. Destructiveness helps the unmotivated client to connect to the motivational worker and has essential survival qualities.

Mankind has, on the whole, two primary forms of relationships: equal and unequal. The unmotivated client seeks unequal connections and is much more social than the motivated client. The motivational worker needs to have a more intense relationship than usual in psychotherapy. You also use a different set of methods and techniques.

Reaching All Clients

If you use this Einsteinian new paradigm (Motivational Work), you will notice that you can reach all clients. No matter how unmotivated and destructive they are, you will be able to motivate them and protect yourself from being burnt out. Now you can reach all those clients that need help and support the most. The motivational paradox has disappeared. This can give the motivational worker a deeper meaning in his work and allow him to choose which clients he wants to help without considering how motivated they are.

Who Am I

Who am I to formulate such grandiose ideas? I am a Swedish clinical psychologist trained in Rogers’ client-centered therapy, psychodrama, and individual psychodynamic therapy, and I have worked for more than 40 years with unmotivated clients and patients.

Through the experience, I learned that you could only help those who were at least partly motivated, so I developed my own theory and method for encouraging those with the least motivation. Since Motivational Interviewing is based on Rogers’ client-centered therapy, you could say that Motivational Work picks up where MI leaves off.

My Writing Process

After completing a textbook on motivational work in Swedish in 1986 (so far printed in four editions, also translated into Danish, with three editions), I then decided to write an English manuscript (with the help of two English translators) so that I could convey my ideas to the whole world (Motivational Work part 1-4). At the same time, I wished to develop my theory and methods so that everybody could fully understand what I meant.

Writing for 21 years

This writing process has taken 21 years to complete. I have always worked full-time during this period, so I have used my evenings and spare time, including holidays, to write. I had no idea how huge the task would be at the start. It was a surprice to me how much theory that was needed to describe the paradigm for unmotivated clients.

A General Theory

When I wrote about the theory of Motivational Work, I found out that it applied to all human beings, i.e., not only the unmotivated. The new paradigm can be used to understand how a love relationship is formed, how parent and child connect, how family functions, how a group acts, and how an organization operates.

22 Comments

  2. […] The objective of motivational work is to nourish the positive energy in the positive core. Such an approach also reduces the risk of burnout, as no external affirmation is needed in the client’s behaviour to fulfil this objective. Instead, motivational work aims towards intrinsic change, which may only achieve expression in outward behaviour after a long time. The more motivational work is tied to observable, distinct (and often immediate) changes in the client, the more likely it is that the worker will feel disappointed and redundant in his contact with the client. […]

  13. […] Motivational Work turns upside-down the traditional notions of how to motivate. In my last blog (no. 80), I focused on the influence of the psychotherapeutic paradigm in interaction with the hierarchy of society. In this blog, I will concentrate on other affections, which follow from the psychotherapeutic model. Moreover, Motivational Work has an opposite view on how to approach the client. To conclude, Motivational Work reverses the paradigm. […]

  17. […] aspect of the difference between Motivational Work and psychotherapy. It concerns the view on what kind of help an unmotivated client needs. Correspondingly, the issue is connected to my blogs 79 – 84. They are dealing with the aspects […]

  21. […] you know about the significance of supervision. You can read my books and blogs, but to fully use Motivational Work, you must integrate values, theory, motivational relationship, and methods into a personalized way […]

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