Name the game and you take its power away

Photo by Thibault Mokuenko on Unsplash

One of the healthiest devices known in the field of counselling is the concept of naming what is going on in the room. As I was reminded recently, one way of looking at this is to imagine each phenomenon as the game. There is incredible value in naming a game.

Naming without Shaming

For instance, sometimes it is abuse that needs to be named, and if we can name the game early, locate it and put it on the table, it can be discussed as an object; it can be discussed without apportioning direct blame; it can be discussed in a safe way; it can be discussed in a way that does not frighten off a person engaging in abuse who cannot yet contemplate what they are doing. What beckons isn’t immediately threatening. The person engaging in potential abuse, it is hoped, can meet the concepts without feeling accused.

It is the accusation itself
that amplifies the threat.

The power of naming the game
is we take its power away.

Before we move on from the concept of abuse, it must also be acknowledged that many people who engage in abuse will refuse to see it as abuse. But every person in therapy must be given the opportunity to face the therapist’s teaching and decide for themselves. Those given to being abusers ought, like everyone, to be given the opportunity to repent. God’s miraculous grace is not beyond the abuser. But repentance (a change of mind that leads to a change in behaviour) is required.

Counselling Friends

Another game that can be named is the pure fact that a process of therapy can and often does involve a complex process and a convoluted bunch of emotions.

Sometimes in churches we are required to counsel our friends, but our friends ought to be given the opportunity of knowing that the game can change friendships.

Indeed, for the pastor and counsellor it is wise to recognise that every relationship is vulnerable to disruption, even destruction, when it is exposed to the truth of the therapeutic process.

It’s remarkable how many relationships do change when licence is needed and given in the gentle though firm interrogation of relational dynamics to arrest toxic patterns and to breathe life into marriages and other family dynamics.

The power in naming the game
is we give licence for people
to opt in to or out of the process
having been forewarned.

Sometimes it is a pastor or counsellor’s job to put at risk the personal relationship they enjoy with the person to improve a family relationship that person has — “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends,” it says in John 15:13.

It is in the identification of issues
that gives people command over truth.

The power of naming the game is
we take its power away.

Citing cause for Encouragement

One of the great opportunities in working with a pastor or counsellor is the likelihood that they will identify something (and perhaps more than one thing) to encourage. Given that most people burn out because of a discouragement, not having been noticed or acknowledged or praised or valued, even having been rejected or left out, the role of encouragement cannot be understated.

And yet those who are in helping professions have the uncanny knack of identifying niches of brilliance in those they come to know.

This runs counter to the above two points, whereby the power in naming the game — the strength or performance of someone as yet unnoticed — is power not taken away, but a power for truth through the identification of the game.

***

Some people do take advantage, especially of caring kinds of persons. Once the game has been named, however, there is nowhere to hide. Once the game has been named, a genuine kind of freedom can be realised.

This article acknowledges the wisdom of my father-in-law, Ray Brown.