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On 30 December 2017, the portal KrytykaPolityczna.pl published an interesting article "Cięzka depresja polskiej psychiatrii" concerning, among other things, the sad psychiatric statistics in Poland. The article is vividly written and contains many comparisons and conclusions. Let me cite some of them:- in 2017, more people died by suicide in Poland than in road accidents. At least some of them could have been prevented;-  WHO points out that most mental health disorders develop before the age of 14 , so they are at least partly preventable;- almost one million of our country's citizens have been diagnosed with some form of addiction (traditionally considered a mental disorder);- WHO: last year, 27 % of Europeans had an episode of a mental disorder;- 10.9 % of Poles abuse alcohol;- 6.2 % of Poles suffer from panic attacks;- 3.4 % of Poles suffer from phobias of various kinds;- 3.2 % of Poles suffer from major depression; - 10 % of Poles under the age of 18 (i.e. 10 % of 6915960 = 691 thousand ) struggle with mental problems requiring professional help. There are 25 mental health centres (CZP) in Poland, which comprehensively care for people with depression and other mental disorders. None of the CZPs in Poland help children and adolescents - this is pointed out by the authors of the Polish Map of Health Needs. Very sad in my opinion are the statistics, which also show that in our country a child who has any kind of mental disorder will see a psychiatrist after waiting a year for an appointment. Just what happens next? I recommend the entire article by psychiatrist Przemysław Waszak. You can find it at this address: http://krytykapolityczna.pl/kraj/polska-psychiatria/

Statistics made available by the Central Statistics Office on 31 December 2016 were used to estimate demand. The demand was calculated using the Play Therapy Demanding Model (Copyright Play Therapy UK 2015). There are currently about 715,000 children aged 0-15 years who need therapy in Poland ! Most in the Mazowieckie Voivodship, with over 100,000. Almost 12,000 qualified child therapists are currently needed in Poland for children aged 0-15. Given the planned birth rate, this number is set to rise further.

Poland's first Play Therapy training course covers the new herds in child therapy. The training is organised by Play Therapy Poland. In the UK, standards of training and therapeutic work created and overseen by Play Therapy International have led to every Play Therapy therapist gaining registration with the Professional Standards Authority These standards have been tested and implemented in more than a dozen countries around the world. The standards include, among other things, safe and effective therapy to meet the needs of the child. Therapy is carried out under the constant and regular supervision of a supervisor. The standards include the therapist: his/her training process, personal values, knowledge, behaviour, competence, regular supervision, continuing professional development through participation in professional training.

Today about why you should use Sandplay therapy. We know from previous posts that Sandplay is a therapy for children, but also for adults , especially those who have difficulty verbalising their emotions. There are a lot of such people. In my practice I meet mostly children, but there is also no shortage of adolescents and adults who treat their emotional life as an entity independent of anything - they seem to have no control over it. Sandbox therapy - why choose it? Because play is the language of the client at any age , as Haim Ginott said, miniatures are the equivalent of words in play . This language allows for self-expression in a creative, artistic and safe way. The therapy process conducted with Sandplay enables clients to be fully themselves and with themselves . Thus, Sandplay therapy becomes more than just a tokenisation of the psyche - it is a space for full self-expression and self-exploration. Sandplay therapy allows clients to be with the emotions they cannot or are afraid to express. These emotions become projected onto the figures, onto the placement of the figures, onto the sand in the safe space provided by the therapist, and onto the sandbox itself, into which the therapist should not put his or her hands without the client's permission. Stacking figures in the sandbox is free from judgement , which is feared not only by children but also by adults. The fear of being judged often imposes masks on us in accordance with the expectations of others. Over time, self-expression becomes the same as hiding behind a certain persona. In Sandplay it is different: here the Self is at work , being explored and expressed by the person in a safe way. There are no good or bad images in Sandplay - each is an illustration of the client's emotions. I remember a middle-aged woman who sat for an hour in front of an empty sandpit. She put nothing in it, no figure. In the last seconds, she gently touched a few grains of sand and said: "This is exactly my depression. Having so much, I can do nothing'. This woman went from being a silent participant in life to an observer of herself and her feelings. And that was a good start to her therapy. Sandplay also has another value: through sand and figures it has a unique kinesthetic quality , providing a safe sensory experience, which is particularly needed by clients in crisis regardless of age. This ties in with the needs for attachment, relationship and safe experience. Touching, moving one's hands over the sand reduces the client's anxiety and helps self-regulation , as tactile stimuli are interpreted by the limbic system as soothing. The final part of the answer to the question: why use Sandplay? - addresses the very fundamental issue of the therapeutic relationship . Sandplay creates a safe space for the client. The non-directive therapist, through his or her accepting presence, following the client, respecting the client's process, creates the space to build a trusting relationship, for the client to experience himself or herself safely, to develop the client's capacity for symbolisation, sublimation, projection and also abreaction. Here we already enter the area of trauma. But this will be discussed in the next posts in our series on Sandplay. In the next episode, we will talk about sandbox and sand for Sandplay. We will share our knowledge and experience on what sand is worth choosing, where to buy it and, most importantly, what to put it in to inspire the customer process.

We very much like to read about indications for some form of therapy, treatment. Probably because an indication is already a form of diagnosis, and the diagnosis becomes the basis for therapy. Therapy becomes a further diagnosis. On the other hand, reading indications gives hope to the therapist/parent that he/she will eventually find something suitable for the chosen client/child. The process of diagnosing children requires an enormous amount of clinical experience, solid knowledge and an almost perfect ability to observe behaviour, to give meaning to behaviour . Of course, an open heart towards the child is an indispensable basis for achieving the skills indicated above. The reason I am writing about all this is that when it comes to child therapy, the mind may tell us one thing and the emotions may tell us another. It is therefore useful to be aware of both. Sandplay makes it considerably easier for the therapist to see and feel the child's problems by observing the images created by the child in the sandpit and by observing the movements that accompany this process. For which clients is Sandplay recommended? Let's move on to the indications - the above introduction was intended to show the versatility of the Sandplay tool, a tool that makes it possible to talk even when it is not possible : after trauma (traumatic experiences are encoded in the brain and in the body, so therapy should also be sensory-based), in bereavement, in depression, with periodic disorders, e.g. emotional disorders lasting for years. I have included a more detailed list of indications below: Asperger's syndrome autism delayed development of communication skills delayed speech development delayed emotional development delayed social development reduced hearing ability, deafness reduced social functioning impaired communication skills (speech disorders, stammering) reduced mobility cerebral palsy reduced psycho-physical fitness due to somatic illnesses Relationship formation and communication disorders social anxiety disorder depression affective disorders separation anxiety disorder adjustment disorders anxiety disorders disorders of expression of emotions This list does not exhaust the possibilities of Sandplay. My youngest client who reached into the sandpit was less than three years old. He went into the sandpit, located on the floor, and sat in the sand. At first he started to play only with the sand, then he came out of the sandbox and started to carry various objects into it. His mother said it was the first time he had played so calmly. It seems that he needed to experience the sandbox , the boundaries and then only started to use the figures. Another example of sandbox therapy concerns a 5-year-old girl. Her trial ended in disclosure. You know yourselves what happens afterwards according to the law. Sandbox therapy - Therapy without words In word-based therapy we often ask: "How do you feel about this?". We expect clients to verbalise their pain and frustration in order to process the issues and begin to heal. Is this necessary? Clients of all ages may not be able to express their stories and accompanying pain through verbalisation alone . This applies to children, it applies to adolescents, it also applies to adults. Why use Sandplay therapy with such clients? I will talk about this in the next post in our series on Sandplay.

Anyone who works with children knows that experiencing has much more value for them than explaining . When working with children, both individually and in the family system, we need to realise that they do not communicate in the same way as adults. Children do not have the cognitive or verbal maturity to communicate in therapy the way adults talk. Children communicate through play . What are the benefits of Sandplay? Sandbox therapy makes ideal conditions for creating, observing and correcting experiences in an emotional way . Building, reconstructing, dismantling and re-creating one's world in the sandbox provides the opportunity to look at one's feelings and reactions to the image. The child creates the structure himself, experiences it, changes the images freely, being the master of his world, the person who decides and thus becomes responsible for his decisions. All this happens in a  safe relationship with the therapist , who creates a space for the child to express himself or herself by being present, creating a sense of permission, accepting the child and his or her emotions as they are, following the child, reflective comments that build insight in the child. This sounds familiar to many of you. Yes, you are right! These are the principles of Virginia Axline's non-directive therapy , which in sandbox therapy are the basis of contact with the child. Applying these principles to sandbox therapy creates the conditions for children to express themselves non-verbally, breaking down the limitations of language, speech in therapy. The therapist, observing the sandbox being created, experiences the client's emotions and begins to empathise with them, accompanying the client through their process... without words . Language is only an adjunct in child therapy. Why do I emphasise so strongly the importance of non-verbal contact in child therapy? Because too often we give therapeutic value to word-based therapy, underestimating the child's process without words. "One picture is worth more than a thousand words". Here we come to the answer to the question: why is Sandplay suitable for children? Having conducted therapy with deaf children, mute children, children with mutism, children with delayed speech development, children with mental retardation, children with autism, children with anxiety disorders, traumatised children, etc., I have observed positive changes in their behaviour, in their processes, which started in the sandplay. We can use sandbox therapy to treat any child , regardless of their difficulties, their level of development. At what age can a child start Sandbox Therapy? For children of what age is Sandplay suitable? At any age . The difference lies in the individual benefits for the child, which are determined by their level of development. A three-year-old, for example, will benefit from the tactile aspect of sandplay through embodiment, thus creating the framework for role-play; a six-year-old, using his already developed abstract thinking skills, will create metaphorical images of his problem, but also of his solution, which he can create himself and see. The teenager, discovering the metaphorical nature of sandbox work, may open the door to deeper or more direct processes. We have already written a little bit about which clients Sandplay is recommended for. In the next post I will expand on this topic so that it is clear what benefits clients with specific difficulties achieve , I will share my experiences. I think I will surprise you with what I have discovered with my clients.

I generally prefer to write about what unites rather than what divides. I think it's useful to be aware of justray roo what the similarities and differences are between Sandplay and Sandtray , because sometimes the two terms function interchangeably, despite their divergence. What do Sandplay and Sandtray have in common? What certainly links the two terms is the fact that sandboxing is used in the therapy of children, adolescents, adults, couples as well as families. They are also linked by the fact that in both forms the basis of the process is the creation of a dynamic interpersonal relationship , which we will write about in the next sections of our series. Dora Kalff, already known to us for introducing the term 'Sandplay', emphasised the importance of the therapist creating a 'free and protected space'. This safety, which is in fact a priority for every therapist, creates a way for the client regardless of their age to change, and creates an opportunity for full self-expression and self-discovery. Both Sandplay and Sandtray have no age barriers for their clients, no differentiation of more or less appropriate gender, occupation or even language. This is because both methods offer the possibility of non-verbal expression that becomes visible to the therapist and felt by therapist and client. So much for the similarities. What makes Sandplay and Sandtray different? And the differences? Sandplay refers to the Jungian approach, derived from the work of Dora Kalff and her take on sandplay therapy. As you will remember, Jung believed that: "symbols are the natural language of our unconscious, which consciousness does not yet comprehend". This is why Sandplay pays so much attention to symbols , their archetypal meaning as well as their personal meaning for the client. In practice, a  Sandplay room usually contains around 1,000 objects (there will be a separate entry about these), whereas a  Sandtray room will contain far, far fewer objects , as the therapy mainly involves verbal interactions between therapist and client. Apart from this difference, visible to the naked eye, the term Sandtray refers to any therapeutic use of sand and sandbox materials . The meaning of the symbols remains in the background here, as the sandtray as an image becomes, among other things: material for analysis, dialogue; material that can show the client's problem, but also the solution, especially in the first sandtray. In my opinion, the boundary between the level of use of symbols in Sandplay and Sandtray is very fluid and it is impossible to work without symbols, as they are often the ones that immediately create a metaphor, which is a tool for psychotherapy. Sandbox therapy - summary Sandbox therapy, in both approaches, can serve as an alternative method of communication (primarily non-verbal) and can be a conduit for reflection and verbal dialogue between client and therapist, especially once a strong therapeutic relationship has been established. We have written about symbols, metaphor. Someone might say that this closes the possibility of using Sandplay in therapy for children, especially those on the autism spectrum. However, I assure you that every child can benefit from sandplay therapy and that is what our next post in this series will be about. I invite you to read!

Have you ever heard of the Sandplay method and would like to explore the topic further? Or is it a new term that intrigues and interests you? On our blog, we are starting a series on Sandplay , in which we will try to introduce this concept both theoretically and practically. From the content of this post, you will learn what Sandplay Therapy actually is and where this technique has its roots . What does the term Sandplay mean? Sandplay is a highly expressive, flexible, adaptive and projective therapy that integrates multiple theoretical approaches. Its expressivity is based on the possibility of non-verbal expression of thoughts, feelings, emotions and experiences, which are difficult to express in words, but easy to express in images. The client's expression becomes a picture in a sandbox, and we know that 'a picture is worth a thousand words'. The image also acts on the therapist and thus enables him or her to empathise with the client's emotions. Sandplay's flexibility is based on its ability to be used with children, adolescents, adults, individual clients, couples, families or therapy groups. The flexibility of Sandplay also refers to the integration of many psychotherapeutic techniques and theoretical approaches within the method. Sandplay's adaptability is linked to its ability to adapt quickly to changing customer needs. Sandplay is a  projective therapy that allows the client to express intra-psychic content. We feel that all the above aspects of Sandplay are beautifully encapsulated in the definition of Dora Kalff , considered to be the creator of this therapy: "Sandplay is a Jungian-oriented, non-verbal form of therapy that facilitates the psyche's natural ability to heal. In a free and therapist-protected space, the child or adult creates a concrete manifestation of his or her inner imaginary world using sand, water and miniature objects. In this way, Sandplay illuminates the client's inner symbolic world and provides a space for his or her expression in the safety of the sandbox." History of Sandplay - the roots and development of the Sandplay Therapy method It all started with playing on the floor. In 1911, Herbert George Wells wrote the book 'Floor Games' based on playing on the floor with his sons. The book inspired many people working therapeutically with children to use play in therapy. Among them was Margaret Lowenfeld - a British doctor, paediatrician and pioneer of child psychology and play therapy. And this is where our Polish theme begins: during the Polish-Russian War in Eastern Europe in the 1920s, Lowenfeld provided medical services to those affected by the typhoid epidemic and to those in prisoner of war camps in Poland. In parallel to this work, she was involved in helping thousands of Polish children suffering from the aftermath of the war. On her return to London, Lowenfeld observed children whose 'facial expressions, posture and gestures resembled those she had seen in the camps and in the areas affected by starvation as a result of the war'. These intense experiences led her to create a  method to promote children's mental health, to discover a way to enable children to share their inner experiences and worlds . Thus was born a working method called 'The Word Technique' with a collection of small figures and trays filled with sand. The year is 1928: 3 months of using 'The Word Technique' with children at the Clinic for Neurotic and Difficult Children in London was enough to observe positive changes in their behaviour. The Lowenfeld Technique quickly crossed the borders of the UK and, in fact, European psychotherapists and analysts began to appreciate the effectiveness of the Lowenfeld approach in child therapy. In a letter to the British Medical Journal in 1938, Lowenfeld explained that there were "two clearly formulated methods of play therapy, each with its own history and technique", referring to her own work and that of Melanie Klein. In this letter, Lowenfeld clearly defined her work as play therapy and those she trained as play therapists . The work with children in the sandbox was extended and popularised by the achievements of Dora Kalff , who was a Swiss Jungian analyst. When Dora Kalff learned about Lowenfeld's work, she began studying with her in London in 1956. Already during her studies, she adapted Lowenfeld's method, calling it Sandplay to clearly distinguish the term from 'The Word Technique'. The concept of Sandplay is still identified with the Jungian approach, although it is widely used outside Jungian circles. Despite this, Dora Kalff is considered to be the founder of Sandplay, and few people know or remember the work of Margaret Lowenfeld. It was the Swiss Jungian analyst herself who recognised the importance of Lowenfeld's contribution and wrote of her: "She completely understood the world of the child and created with brilliant intuition a way of enabling the child to build a world - his world in Sandplay". Sandplay today Nowadays, Sandplay can be a  stand-alone therapeutic tool or, as in Play Therapy, one of the components of the Play Tool Kit . Sandplay can also be used in their work by therapists from other strands - from psychodynamic and behavioural, to humanistic and cognitive, to constructivist or systemic. It is well known that Sandplay has great power. To harness this power for the client, training, clinical practice and supervision are essential. After all, theory without technique is only philosophy, and techniques without theory can be dangerous. To ensure that our series is not just about philosophy, we will continue to present both theory and practice. For the sake of order, we will also describe the differences between Sandplay and Sandtray. Then we will also give reasons why Sandplay is suitable for children, among others.. Look forward to reading the next episode in our series on Sandplay next week!

I hesitated for a long time when choosing a title for this post. It sounded risky, because I feared a negative interpretation of it, such as: does this mean that we should not help the child during therapy? After all, the child needs help, support. This is correct. I think that the proper consideration of this topic should be more about the answer: when ? at what point? It is very difficult during a therapy session not to help the child. Non-directive therapy is perhaps difficult precisely because you have to stop the first impulsive reaction of wanting to help and wait. During a Play Therapy session, a child may not be able to cope with many things. Sometimes putting two Lego bricks together is a challenge, sometimes opening a new plastic cup of pastry is a challenge for the child. The heart and hands of the 'good adult' reach out on their own to help the child: to join the blocks together, to open the cup with the pastry cream. Just who gains from this situation and what information about themselves? The therapist, yes, will gain a sense of having helped the child. The child, on the contrary, will gain the feeling that he or she is so weak and clumsy that he or she will not be able to put two blocks together or open the cup of jelly beans. Are we sure that by helping the child, we want to give him the feeling that he is weak, clumsy and needs help? Maybe the vanity of the therapist and his need to be needed by the child is behind it? Maybe the therapist is unable to bear the child's frustration and the child's negative feelings accompanying failure and prevents them from happening by solving the problem for the child? Only does this mean that he accepts the child as he is ? The therapist's sense of being needed by the child implies the child's dependence on the therapist, not the independence of the child and the therapist. Under conditions of dependence, it is difficult for two autonomous persons to develop. So to help or not to help? If you are still in doubt then I will answer this question: not to help until the child asks for help. And it's not about getting the child to say the word "please", because learning magic words is not the goal here. It's about accepting that a child may not be able to, that a child may get upset, that a child may throw a cup of doughball on the floor shouting: "stupid box, I hate you". The idea is that the child can experience the real him/herself in the presence of an accepting therapist who will tell the child about his/her attempts, even when they end in failure, and will be ready to help when the child asks for help . But the most important thing is that the child will seek help himself to solve the problem, to finally open that box of pastry cream or put the blocks together. The next time, the child will find the solution to the problem himself or someone to help him. And this is what will contribute to the child's independence. This is because not being able to do something is not a cause for shame or sadness. Rather, the fact that we do not know how to do something and do not seek help to solve our difficulty is already a cause for serious concern. The child's ability to organise help for themselves seems to be the answer to why the therapist should not do it for the child. And if the child eventually manages to open that box of pastry cream himself, then he will experience a sense of his own agency. However, if we were to open it ourselves, then he would not have that opportunity. And this is why 'not helping' works therapeutically.

Shush, shush, it's time for silence. The one you hear in your heart ...  (Budka Suflera) When I started working as a Play Therapy therapist I tried to reflect back to the child verbally everything they were doing, everything I could see in the child's behaviour, everything the child said. I even remember one child saying to me: ?do you have to talk so much? After putting my first impression after that comment aside, I started to think about it: - why did it bother the child? - Should everything be mirrored, as the American School of Play Therapy teaches? - When to reflect and when not to do so during a session? - if and when can mirroring be intrusive for the child? - are there children who do not accept mirroring verbally? - why should a child be quiet during a session? - who and when does the silence during the session annoy? Silence is commonly understood as the absence of sound. In the therapy room, however, silence is not a manifestation of inaction. It is a powerful therapeutic tool. In everyday life you have probably encountered the message: go and see what is going on in the children's room because it is too quiet. Sometimes after a session with a child, his/her parents waiting in the waiting room say that ?today the session was somehow quiet? Silence is a tool, for example, for communication (paradoxical in children with mutism), but also a tool for communicating extremely important things (let's celebrate with a minute of silence). In music, silence is as important as sound. In the therapy room, silence is first and foremost a time and place for the process. It is like a nest in which eggs can mature to hatch chicks. A Play Therapy therapist deciding to break a child's silence during a session should have something really important to say. It can only be something that brings additional insight into the child's feelings, self-understanding, self-awareness. Silence initiated by the child can express trust in the therapist, whose task is, among other things, to keep the child as long as possible in this state of focus on himself, his inner world. Once again, let me remind you of the golden rule of the 3W in child therapy: watch, wait and wonder. If the therapist is disturbed by the silence during the session or disturbed by the fact that the child does not speak to him/her, this is definitely a topic for supervision, as for some reason he/she may be preoccupied with his/her own difficulties and not focusing on the child's needs. Reflecting emotions verbally is one of many forms of mirroring. Sometimes a child does not accept only the verbal form. Then we are left with other forms of mirroring and other therapeutic tools through which the child can achieve insight. Shush, shush, it's time for silence. The one you hear in your heart. Come up and plunge into it, the crystal and purity of its depths....

"He plays all day long to kill someone," a parent of a child presenting for therapy once said. At first, such a response may cause trepidation and anxiety, especially for those starting out as a child therapist. Such a therapist may begin to think: I wonder who he is killing? For what? The answer to this question from a practical point of view is unnecessary. It is more important to answer the question: what needs is the child meeting in this play? What does this play mean to the child? The phenomenon of the phenomenon of play, the multifaceted nature of its functions, is shown by the number of definitions of play, which I will not quote here. After several years of conducting Play Therapy, I conclude that play is an activity in which the child can see his or her psyche, can find and try out new solutions to psychological conflicts, can create a new ending or narrative to events that he or she cannot yet describe in words. This way of understanding play emphasises its therapeutic functions for the child, who in play becomes an active creator of what is best for him. Play for children is a form of dialogue with themselves. It is a form through which they can make insights into themselves and their emotions. Taking into account the child's cognitive development, their difficulties with language and the development of cause-and-effect thinking- play bypasses these difficulties and gives children a language to express themselves. Some adults have the ability to mentalise. But every, average child regardless of culture has the ability to play. If a child is unable to play, then his or her therapy should first and foremost consist of restoring the ability to play so that he or she can regain contact with himself or herself. Where is Play Therapy in this? A non-directive form of therapy creates the conditions for the child to form a safe relationship with a therapist who accepts all the child's emotions. The therapist creates the conditions in which the aforementioned child can kill and be killed in play, can see what this means for him and what the consequences might be. If the relationship is safe, the child can see if indeed this person who ?was killed? was important to him and what his loss from the world of the living means. ? "You are already alive?" cried the child, bringing the therapist back to life. After a few sessions, the game of killing turned into a game of ?healing, then the child's self-healing. And this is what it was all about, for the child to find his own way of mental health, a way that is socially acceptable and at the same time gives him the possibility to express all his feelings. Play that does not change in 5-10 sessions may be post-traumatic, or it may be indicative of Asperger's syndrome, for example. In such a situation, it is advisable to be patient and trust the process. ?TRUST THE PROCESS?- as experienced therapists say. The child in play will create a new narrative and ending for the traumatic event, and the child with ZA will discover what is usually hidden from him- or herself.

'My son hugged someone for the first time,' said the mother of a child with reactive bonding disorder, looking at her child's farewell to the therapist after the last session. The relationship between a child and a Play Therapy therapist is unique. It is a relationship in which the child can create a true picture of themselves in every way. Why? In my opinion, because it is firmly based on the principles of Virginia Axline's non-directive therapy. This is because the therapist, by accepting the child as he or she is, focuses on making the child see himself or herself as important, valuable, independent, creative and, above all, as he or she is. After many years of treating children, it was surprising to me during my Play Therapy training that a Play Therapy therapist, among other things, does not praise a child for anything. There is no praise here. Praise is a behavioural approach to the child. Instead, there are facts and appropriate reactions of the therapist to what the child is doing, saying and asking. I write 'appropriate' because it is the way the therapist reacts that builds up the child's self-image. Donald W. Winnicott wrote: "The child sees himself in his mother's eyes".  I would only modestly add that the child builds up a self-image in the eyes of the therapist. This statement shows the responsibility of the therapist for how the child will perceive himself. As adults, we answer the child's questions because we adults know. The Play Therapy therapist does not answer questions. Why and what is the purpose? How old are you? -  A child's question - seemingly trivial and at first glance the answer I am ... years old seems to be adequate. However, such an answer does not add anything to the child's self-knowledge in therapy. Instead, the answer: You are curious about how old I am - gives the child information about the fact that he or she is interested. Children are looking for knowledge about themselves and such an answer meets their need to gather knowledge about themselves.When asked by a child: Did I draw nicely? -  the therapist can answer : You are curious about my opinion. Here your opinion is the most important. The most important thing is whether you like it.  Another example : What are the other children doing here? The therapist can answer: You are interested in what the other children are doing here.  Child: Yes, I want to know what other people are playing with. Therapist: It seems that you would like to know what others are playing with.  Child: Then will you answer me or not? Therapist: I can see that you are very interested in knowing what other children play with. But here the most important thing is what you play with. This is your Special Hour. In about 90 % of children, two or three series of questions that end with an answer from the therapist: Here is the most important thing you do. This is your Special Hour", the child is usually quick to add the following question Yes, yes I know, my opinion is the most important thing -  and that is exactly the point. A sense of empowerment and taking responsibility for oneself develops naturally, because the child, when making decisions based on his or her choices, knows that he or she is responsible for those choices. Another example: Child: And what colour do you like? -  The therapist will answer: You are curious about my favourite colour. But here the most important thing is what colour you like. I once heard from a parent that such 'non-answers' to a child's questions is ignoring the child. Here one can rather infer impatience on the part of the parent. I think it is easier and faster for the parent to answer than to think about what the child's answer to the question is for, what need does the child's question arise from? In my experience, when a child hears that the most important thing is what colour he likes, he reacts with pride rather than disappointment at the lack of an answer. More often than not, he also communicates which colour is his favourite. Reflecting by "not- answering"-is an art. It takes a lot of self-discipline on the part of the therapist not to answer automatically, but to think about the benefits for the child of mirroring his question and behaviour.  However, children's reactions to this way of mirroring are almost always positive, if we subtract their impatience, which the therapist can also reflect by describing the physical signs of impatience observed in the child.  ... And this is how the child can be discovered, ...endlessly.