Page 116 - The Power to Change Anything

Make the Undesirable Desirable 105

better than others?” and found that the method didn’t matter
much either.
After offending almost everyone in his field by undermin-
ing the apparently irrelevant distinctions upon which people
build careers, he stumbled onto an interesting finding. He
found a distinction that did matter. It had to do less with what
the counselor did than with what the counselor didn’t do.
A reigning but inaccurate assumption in counseling is that
confrontation motivates change. But despite all the hoopla
about family interventions and counselor-led confrontations,
Miller learned that forcing people to face their demons along
with their friends, colleagues, and therapists who hated those
demons also didn’t work. In fact, in one study, he found that
confrontation actually increased alcoholic binging. This led
Miller in a different direction. He began to explore the oppo-
site. What if the counselor merely helped patients figure out
what they wanted rather than what their fed-up friends wanted?
With the new question, Miller discovered that the best way
to help individuals reconnect their existing unhealthy behav-
iors to their long-term values was to stop trying to control their
thoughts and behaviors. You must replace judgment with
empathy, and lectures with questions. If you do so, you gain
influence. The instant you stop trying to impose your agenda
on others, you eliminate the fight for control. You sidestep irrel-
evant battles over whose view of the world is correct.
This discovery led Miller to develop an influence method
called motivational interviewing. Through a skillful use of open
and nondirective questions, the counselor helps others examine
what is most important to them and what changes in their life
might be required in order for them to live according to their val-
ues. When you listen and they talk, they discover on their own
what they must do. Then they make the necessary changes.
Dozens of studies have shown Miller’s approach to be
effective in helping people overcome alcoholism, smoking,
drug addiction, HIV risk behaviors, and diet failures, and to