Reality therapists are opposed to making diagnoses. A diagnostic label frequently adds a burden to individuals who are already burdened by emotional, family, or adjustment problems. Glasser notes, for example, that being labeled a schizophrenic "can be worse than the disease as far as incapacitating one in the course of life's activities."[[4]]
[[4]] William Glasser and Leonard M. Zunin, "Reality Therapy," in Raymond J. Corsini, ed., Current Psychotherapies (Itasca, IL: F. E. Peacock Publishers, 1979), p. 329.
Reality therapists can resist diagnosing and labeling their clients because their approach claims that personal psychological difficulties, except those due to physical illness (see Chapter 8), result from a lack of personal discipline and responsibility. People are often caught in the habit of blaming their failures on their families, their lack of opportunity, their race, poverty, and other outside forces. It is a habit with a dead end: it ignores the potential success that can come from initiative motivated by responsibility and moral courage. As Ernest Hemingway said when asked if he ever anticipated failure, "If you anticipate failure, you'll have it."
THE EXPERIENCE OF REALITY THERAPY
It isn't hard to gain a feeling for what reality therapy is like. These are the basic principles of the approach:
The relationship between therapist and client must be personal. The therapist tries to make clear that he is a genuine person who has, in some areas of his life, been able to plan effectively and to develop a sense of personal success.
The focus of individual sessions is on what the client does, not on what he or she may feel. Behavior can be changed much more directly than feelings, and feelings soon fall into place once behavior is more satisfying. What is important is for the client to develop intelligent plans and then to work to carry them through. If certain goals are not realized, the therapist's concern is to encourage the client to take the next practical step, rather than to spend time and energy analyzing what went wrong.
The reality therapist accepts that the first steps are often halting ones. It is important not to be disconcerted by occasional stumbling and a few falls. What is essential is a commitment to self-discipline and progress, refusing to punish yourself when a plan may not succeed, but going beyond it with a positive attitude that eventually can become a habit.
Glasser gives this illustration of the persistent refocusing on practical issues that characterizes reality therapy: a teenage girl expresses to her therapist that she would like to look for a job. The therapist does not respond, "Good, let me know how it works out," but instead begins the following exchange.[[5]]
THERAPIST: What day next week?
GIRL: I don't know. I thought Monday or Tuesday.
THERAPIST: Which day? Monday or Tuesday?
GIRL: Well, I guess Tuesday.
THERAPIST: You guess, or will it be Tuesday?
GIRL: Tuesday.
THERAPIST: What time Tuesday?
GIRL: Well, sometime in the morning.
THERAPIST: What time in the morning?
GIRL: Oh, well, 9:30.
THERAPIST: Fine, that is a good time to begin looking for a job.
What do you plan to wear?