From Knowing the Steps to Finding Your Footing

Deliberate Practice Builds Confidence

One of the most humbling realizations I've had in my own development as an EFT therapist is that understanding the model and being able to consistently apply it are two very different things.

What I appreciate most about EFT is that it gives us a remarkably clear map. We know the destination, we understand the sequence of the work, and we have a framework for making sense of even the most complex relational dynamics. In many ways, the model itself is beautifully elegant. Following that map in the therapy room, however, is another matter entirely.

When EFT is done well, it can look deceptively simple. Watching an experienced therapist, we may have the impression that they are effortlessly following the model. What we don't always see are the dozens of small clinical decisions happening moment to moment—decisions that have become so integrated they no longer require the same level of conscious effort. 

Translating the model into moment-to-moment clinical work requires many small therapeutic choices that become easier only through intentional practice. The map may be clear, but helping a partner stay with an emerging emotion instead of moving quickly back into content, or assembling an enactment in a way that feels emotionally alive and accessible—these are things that knowing the model alone doesn't prepare us for.

Most of us have experienced this firsthand. We can watch an EFT training video and recognize the negative cycle, identify attachment strategies, anticipate the next intervention, and probably even understand why Sue Johnson did what she did. Then we walk into our own session… One partner escalates unexpectedly. The other begins shutting down. The conversation moves quickly into the repressed laundry list of grievances from 10 years ago, and suddenly we're trying to regulate ourselves while tracking two nervous systems, deciding whether to interrupt the negative process, formulating evocative reflections, determining whether an enactment is possible, and somehow keeping one eye on the larger process all at the same time. During the most emotionally intense moments in session, we're not only tracking our clients—we may also be working hard to keep our own prefrontal cortex online while our amygdala is sounding the alarm.

It's no wonder the work can feel difficult.

Over time, I've come to appreciate that EFT is built upon hundreds of tiny clinical decisions. We often think about the larger interventions—tracking the cycle, assembling emotion, or facilitating corrective emotional experiences—but those interventions are made possible by dozens of smaller micro-skills happening moment by moment. Can I catch the attachment cue before the content takes over? Can I use an evocative question to help a partner stay with an emotion just a little longer? Can I slice the experience thinner before trying to deepen it? Can I recognize the precise moment an enactment becomes possible? These are not simply concepts to understand, they are skills to perform.

In Judo, there's an interesting parallel in how judoka train. Rather than developing proficiency purely through sparring or observation, a significant portion of their training consists of partnered drills called “uchikomi”, where judokas isolate a single technique, repeat it with a partner, receive feedback, make small refinements, and gradually integrate those movements into live practice, “randori”. Over time, the techniques become more natural and reflexive—accessible under pressure because they've been built up in smaller, more focused ways first.

This is one of the reasons Deliberate Practice has become such an important part of clinical training. Unlike traditional consultation, where we often discuss cases retrospectively, Deliberate Practice slows the work down. Therapists intentionally focus on one micro-skill at a time, practicing it repeatedly through role plays in a supportive, low-stakes environment until it begins to feel increasingly natural. One practice session might focus on using evocative inquiry to gather and assemble a partner's emotional experience. Another might emphasize slowing down enough to slice an experience thinner before deepening it. Later, the focus may shift to interrupting the negative process early in therapy, setting up an enactment, or tracking our own internal experience when the room becomes emotionally intense. The goal isn't perfection, it's repetition, feedback, and refinement.

The Deliberate Practice literature suggests that expertise develops not simply from accumulating experience, but from engaging in focused practice with feedback. This helps explain why two therapists can attend the same externship, read the same books, and work with similar clients, yet develop at very different rates. The difference often isn't motivation or intelligence—it's whether they've had opportunities to intentionally practice the individual building blocks of the model.

There's something almost counterintuitive about how this plays out in the room. For example, as evocative reflections become more natural, we spend less mental energy deciding what to say next and more energy staying emotionally present with our clients. As enactments become less intimidating and interrupting the negative cycle becomes more instinctive, we're better able to focus on the emotional process unfolding between partners rather than on our own performance. Slowing down our learning tends to make us more fluid over time, which is why so many EFT trainers remind us that “slow is fast”. Deliberate Practice isn't about becoming more scripted, it's about becoming more available.

At Colorado Therapy Collective, along with supervision, we've found Deliberate Practice to be one of the most meaningful ways to support bridging that gap between theory and practice. Our monthly study sessions give therapists a dedicated space to slow down, rehearse specific EFT micro-skills, and receive focused feedback on the small clinical moments that ultimately shape the larger therapeutic process. Great EFT isn't built on one brilliant intervention. It's built on hundreds of small moments of attunement, practiced intentionally until they become part of who we are as therapists.

How Discernment Counseling Helps Couples Decide Before They Dive In

Not Every Couple Is Ready for Couples Therapy

When I look back at some of the hardest cases I’ve worked with as a couples therapist, I can see with the benefit of hindsight that many of those cases were so difficult because I shouldn’t have been treating them as couples therapy cases at all. They were actually much better suited to a protocol I would later learn: Discernment Counseling.

Discernment Counseling is designed specifically for what its creator, Dr. William Doherty, calls mixed-agenda couples—couples where one partner wants to save the relationship (leaning in), and the other is unsure or leaning out.

The truth is, even couples therapy models with strong evidence for their efficacy—like Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy—are based on studies that screen out mixed-agenda couples. They simply aren’t built for this presentation. When I learned there was a protocol designed for these couples, it felt like a missing piece clicked into place. It wasn’t that I was a bad couples therapist—I just didn’t have the right tools for this particular situation.

Many of us who are trained in couples therapy encounter these couples and immediately feel the challenge of the mixed agenda. And of course, we want to be of service. So we roll up our sleeves and do our best within the models we know, trying to honor both partners’ differing goals.

Sometimes this works. We’re able to build enough alliance and momentum that, after a few sessions, both partners become genuinely engaged in the work of couples therapy.

But more often, we’re left feeling stuck—struggling to gain traction, worried we may be making things worse, and sometimes even questioning our own competence.

Discernment Counseling helps address an important “order of operations” question. It makes clear that for couples therapy to have the best chance of success, we need two partners who are willing to commit to a course of that work. It reframes the initial task: not deciding whether to stay in the marriage forever, or knowing how to fix everything, but deciding whether to commit to time-limited couples therapy.

In this way, Discernment Counseling helps couples see that, as complex as their situation may feel, the paths forward generally fall into one of three categories: continue in the relationship without a specific plan for change, move toward separation or divorce, or make a clear, mutual commitment to engage in couples therapy and work toward a more satisfying relationship.

Unlike couples therapy, Discernment Counseling maintains a laser focus on helping couples make this decision.

One of the things I appreciate most about the framework is its structured blend of individual and conjoint time. It acknowledges that each partner is ultimately making an independent decision, while also recognizing that a guided, shared process leads to a more thoughtful and confident outcome than trying to navigate this alone or within a traditional couples therapy format.

I also appreciate that whatever path a couple ultimately chooses, Discernment Counseling helps them enter that path more intentionally. For couples who do choose therapy, it lays a strong foundation—each partner develops a “personal agenda for change,” and the couple agrees to a defined period and parameters for the work, which can increase both accountability and emotional safety.

What I’ve come to appreciate over time is that having the right framework doesn’t just help the couple—it helps us as clinicians. It gives us a clearer role, a clearer goal, and a way to stay grounded when things feel ambiguous or stuck.

Discernment Counseling doesn’t replace couples therapy—it protects it. It helps ensure that when we do begin couples work, we’re doing so with two partners who are willing to engage in that process, which ultimately gives the work a much stronger foundation.

If you’ve ever found yourself in a case that feels confusing, stuck, or quietly discouraging, it may not be a reflection of your skill as a therapist. It may simply be that the couple in front of you is asking a different question than the one couples therapy is designed to answer.

For clinicians who don’t have training in Discernment Counseling but are encountering these kinds of cases, having a trusted referral option can be an important part of providing good care. At Colorado Therapy Collective, we offer Discernment Counseling specifically for mixed-agenda couples and are always happy to collaborate with referring therapists to support clients in finding the right starting point for their work, and hopefully strengthening the future couples work they do with you, if that’s the path they choose.

Integrating the EFT Tango with the Steps and Stages

Whether you’re a new or seasoned EFT therapist, you know that enactments (or choreographed encounters) are at the heart of our model of change. Because EFT is an experiential model, helping clients have new experiences with each other in the therapy room is essential.

In recent years, the training emphasis in EFT seems to have shifted from the Steps and Stages framework toward the Tango. While both are essential, each alone is incomplete: the Steps and Stages provide a roadmap for the course of treatment—from disconnection and isolation toward secure connection—while the Tango is our series of in-session interventions that guide us in helping couples have the experiences that move them along that road.

As a supervisor, I’ve observed that therapists trained more recently in the model often feel confident orchestrating the moves of the Tango, yet sometimes lack clarity about what to be exploring and deepening to facilitate progress in the broader couple dynamic. Put differently, it’s easy to execute the Tango beautifully but miss what will have the most impact in moving couples toward secure connection.

Overlap Between Tango and Steps and Stages

First, let’s briefly review the Tango and the Steps and Stages. I’ve described the Tango in my own words, and preserved the traditional language describing the Steps and Stages:

The Five Moves of the EFT Tango

1. You zero in on a moment in session or a recurring interactional pattern.

2. You do a deeper dive into one partner’s experience, assembling it and mining for the more primary and tender elements.

3. You help them share a newer, more vulnerable, or less familiar part of that experience with their partner.

4. You get curious about what it was like to share in this different way, and how the partner experienced it.

5. You reflect back how this interaction was an exception to their usual cycle and/or highlight the strengths you observed.

The Steps and Stages of EFCT

Stage 1

1. Alliance and Assessment

2. Identify and delineate negative cycle

3. Access primary emotion driving cycle

4. Attachment reframe, cycle as problem

Stage 2 (Withdrawer Re-engagement & Pursuer Softening)

5.  Access, expand and share attachment fears and longings

6. Promote acceptance of new experience and create new interaction

7. Facilitate expression of needs and wants

Stage 3

8.  New solutions to old problems

9.  Consolidate / Integrate new cycle

A few notes about the Steps and Stages: While Stages are linear (Stage 1 must precede Stage 2, and Stage 2 precedes Stage 3), the Steps within Stage 1 are fluid. In practice, Steps 1–4 often occur throughout each Stage 1 session. 

Overlap Between the Tango and Steps and Stages

There is substantial overlap between Steps 1–4 and the moves of the Tango:

• Tango Move 2 mirrors Step 3.

• Tango Move 5 typically incorporates Steps 2 and 4, as you summarize the negative cycle, identify it as the problem, and highlight what is different in the current interaction.

• Throughout the Tango, the attachment frame is woven in, helping couples make sense of distress and interact differently.

Intentionally Choosing a “Move 1” to Move the Couple Forward

A critical decision point is where to enter with a “Move 1.” Even the most skillfully executed Tango may fail—or even escalate a cycle—if the entry point is misaligned with the couple’s current stage or needs.

Example:
In early affair recovery (Stage 1), you might see an opening to focus on the injuring partner’s loneliness, and move into assembling the physical sensations of pain, the narrative of partner as unavailable, and action tendency to reach out to the affair partner. You guide them to share this with their partner in a textbook-perfect Move 3, and yet the partner responds with anger, disengagement, or disbelief. This happens not because the Tango was executed poorly, but because the entry point was misaligned with the stage’s priorities.

In Stage 1, especially when an attachment injury is alive, it is more impactful to focus on helping the betrayed partner share their experience and supporting the injuring partner in witnessing and empathizing. Choosing an entry point out of alignment can make even a perfect Tango counterproductive.

Common Choice Points Where Steps and Stages Help Guide the Tango

• Stage 1: 

• Avoid focusing too much on deep attachment fears, longings, and needs in Stage 1 Tangos: this is the territory of Stage 2. Sometimes clients (especially pursuers) may bring these up, but the focus should remain on linking experiences to primary emotions and action tendencies.

• Similarly, In EFIT, I often see therapists going for deep, restructuring emotional enactments between parts of self, but without having really organized for a client the interpersonal or intrapersonal cycles they get caught in. While this may feel emotionally cathartic for therapist and client, without the scaffolding of understanding the maintaining patterns, this is likely to be a fleeting experience, not a truly restructuring one. A key reminder of the Steps and Stages is that clients need to have both a cognitive understanding of the negative cycle, as well as tasting felt experiences of what it is like to interact outside of it. 

• Negative cycle awareness: A core Stage 1 task is helping clients recognize and own their steps in the negative cycle. This informs Tango focus.

Example: Perhaps you are working with a couple with a harsh pursuer who is starting to accept the idea of a co-created negative cycle, but is not fully grasping the impact of their critical action tendency. This might point us toward using a tango to explore and assemble the impact of a critical jab on their partner - making the impact vulnerable and visible, and supporting them in witnessing their partner’s pain in a Move 3 / Move 4. In a Move 5, we might highlight how in the negative cycle, they don’t always recognize the direct line between their criticism and their partner’s retreat. 

Takeaways

If you take anything away from this article, remember this:

1. The Tango and the Steps and Stages work together to guide couples toward secure connection.

2. Clarity about the couple’s current stage, blind spots, and rigidity in the negative cycle informs where a Tango will be most impactful.

This doesn’t mean abandoning responsiveness to the present moment, but it does provide direction: knowing which openings to take and which to leave (for now) gives your work more precision and efficacy.

Successful Enactments: Avoiding Common Pitfalls

How to guide enactments with more intention, containment, and follow-through

Whether you’re a new or seasoned EFT therapist, you know that enactments (or choreographed encounters) are at the heart of our model of change. Because EFT is an experiential model, helping clients have new experiences with each other in the therapy room is essential.

The basic recipe for an EFT enactment is laid out in what Sue Johnson called the EFT Tango:

1. You zero in on a moment in session or a recurring interactional pattern.

2. You do a deeper dive into one partner’s experience, mining for the more primary and tender elements.

3. You help them share a newer, more vulnerable, or less familiar part of that experience with their partner.

4. You get curious about what it was like to share in this different way, and how the partner experienced it.

5. You reflect back how this interaction was an exception to their usual cycle and/or highlight the strengths you observed.

Easy, right?

Ha. First, let’s ground ourselves in reality. As EFT couples therapists, we are lifelong learners. There will always be a skill to refine and a growth edge to lean into. I’ve been working on enactments for over a decade, learning from some of the best along the way, and I still sometimes absolutely flop.

Setting up enactments that consistently move the needle for couples is a complex skill. We’re holding the EFT roadmap in mind, tracking where a couple is headed next toward de-escalation or bonding, and translating our case conceptualization into live experience in session. At the same time, we’re trying to minimize reactivity and maximize receptivity and openness.

It’s a lot.

Below are two common pitfalls I see, and how to avoid them.

Pitfall 1: The Enactment Is Too Open-Ended

I often see therapists do beautiful emotional assembly with one partner, only to move into the enactment by saying, “Can you tell your partner about that?” What often follows is either an unfocused repetition of what was just explored, or a quick slide back into the client’s usual action tendency. In both cases, the tender heart of the experience gets lost.

Instead, be very specific about what you want them to share.

For example:
“Can you tell your partner just this part you shared with me, that you feel so anxious when you think you might let them down?”

Be ready to block if they veer off course or start adding more.
“Hold on. What you just said is really important, and I don’t want us to lose it.”

Pitfall 2: Not Closing the Loop

The power of enactments lies in taking one small slice of a complex interactional dance and making it understandable, and even empathizable (not a word, I know). When we allow too much information, too many tangents, or overly expansive responses, we dilute that power.

Instead, keep the share bite-sized, then get curious about how it lands with the receiving partner. Contain their response as well. There’s often a strong pull to explore everything that comes up for them, and while that material may be rich and important, it’s usually best bookmarked for later.

The focus, for now, is tight: the vulnerable share, the partner’s response, and how this interaction differs from the couple’s typical cycle.

If a block shows up for the receiving partner, that’s excellent material to return to in a separate tango or enactment. But first, close the loop.

In Practice

Do you recognize yourself occasionally (or frequently) falling into one of these pitfalls? If so, that’s actually good news. It means you’re setting up enactments at all. You’re doing experiential couples therapy, which already puts you ahead of the curve.

For your next week of sessions, consider focusing on just one of these pitfalls. Just as trying to do too much in a single enactment can cause us to lose the plot with couples, trying to work on everything at once as therapists often leaves us feeling scattered and discouraged.

Turn Intention Into Action

Confidence doesn’t always arrive with a bold entrance. Sometimes, it builds quietly, step by step, as we show up for ourselves day after day. It grows when we choose to try, even when we’re unsure of the outcome. Every time you take action despite self-doubt, you reinforce the belief that you’re capable. Confidence isn’t about having all the answers — it’s about trusting that you can figure it out along the way.

The key to making things happen isn’t waiting for the perfect moment; it’s starting with what you have, where you are. Big goals can feel overwhelming when viewed all at once, but momentum builds through small, consistent action. Whether you’re working toward a personal milestone or a professional dream, progress comes from showing up — not perfectly, but persistently. Action creates clarity, and over time, those steps forward add up to something real.

You don’t need to be fearless to reach your goals, you just need to be willing. Willing to try, willing to learn, and willing to believe that you’re capable of more than you know. The road may not always be smooth, but growth rarely is. What matters most is that you keep going, keep learning, and keep believing in the version of yourself you’re becoming.