Reality therapy and WDEP

1. Introduction

Version followed: Robert Wubbolding's WDEP formulation of reality therapy ("the Cycle of Counseling", relationship/environment plus WDEP procedures), grounded in William Glasser's choice theory (Glasser 1998). Wubbolding describes it in the 2015 interview (Klingler & Gray), his Erickson Foundation course descriptions, and Counselling with Reality Therapy (Wubbolding & Brickell, 2nd ed. 2017). Glasser's original 1965 procedure and his later "new reality therapy" are noted wherever they differ.

Reality therapy is a brief, present-focused counselling method. William Glasser, a psychiatrist, developed it from the 1950s–60s in work with delinquent youths and severely disturbed adults. Robert Wubbolding (Center for Reality Therapy, Cincinnati; William Glasser International) systematised it as the WDEP system. Its theory is choice theory. People are internally motivated to meet five basic needs: survival, love/belonging, power (inner control, achievement), freedom and fun. They do this by pursuing specific "wants" stored in a personal "quality world". All behaviour is "total behaviour" (acting, thinking, feeling, physiology), and it is chosen as the best current attempt to close the gap between what a person wants and what they perceive they have. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015; Neukrug ODU page; Brainscape course cards]

How change happens: change starts when the client, within a warm but firm relationship, judges for themselves that their current behaviour is not getting them what they want, and comes to believe they can choose other behaviour. A specific plan they control then turns that judgement into action. Wubbolding treats self-evaluation as the core of the method, more important than the plan itself. The therapist works mainly through acting and thinking, the components the client controls most directly. Feelings and physiology are expected to follow. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015; Erickson Foundation BT12 description; Glasser 1992 as cited in Slideshare/Corey-based presentation]

2. Framework

Reality therapy is not organised into fixed-length phases. Wubbolding presents it as a cycle with two interlocking components:

1. The counselling environment (the relationship). This is built first and maintained throughout.
2. The procedures that lead to change: the WDEP system. These are used flexibly, in any order and repeatedly, within and across sessions.

[source: Erickson Foundation reality-therapy address description ("two main components"); Klingler & Gray 2015, which describes Appendix A, the Cycle chart]

Practical working sequence (W, D, E, P are not rigid steps; the therapist moves back and forth among them) [source: Klingler & Gray 2015; Kent State module; synthesis for the ordering]:

Format and dose

• Individual, group, couple/relationship, school and addictions applications are all described. Counselling with Reality Therapy has chapters on group counselling, schools, relationship counselling, addictions and paradoxical techniques. [source: Taylor & Francis book page]
• Brief and short-term. Glasser described his updated (choice-theory-based) reality therapy as helpful from the first session and often complete in ten sessions or fewer. [source: Erickson Foundation Glasser presentation description] No standard session count is published for Wubbolding's WDEP. Many practitioners use weekly 45–60-minute sessions. [uncertain: no primary dose specification found]
• Every session can contain a mini WDEP cycle: review last plan → wants → doing → evaluation → new or revised plan. [synthesis]

Criterion for the key transition (E to P): Wubbolding states that plans are made only after self-evaluation has established that current behaviour is not working and the client wants to change. Planning before that point is premature. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]

Version differences

• Glasser 1965 ("Reality Therapy: A New Approach to Psychiatry"): widely summarised (e.g. Glasser & Zunin) as eight steps: involvement; focus on present behaviour; client evaluates behaviour; plan; commitment; accept no excuses; no punishment (allow natural consequences); never give up. [uncertain: primary 1965 text; the eight-step list is from secondary summaries and memory of the literature]
• Glasser's later version (Choice Theory 1998; Counseling with Choice Theory 2000): emphasises the present unsatisfying relationship, teaches choice theory to clients, and deliberately avoids discussing the past and symptoms, which Glasser saw as hindrances. [source: Erickson Foundation Glasser presentation description]
• Wubbolding: adds a structured relationship component ("tonics" and "toxins"), many types of self-evaluation (22 are listed in his 2000 book), five levels of commitment, self-talk in the D component, SAMIC planning, paradoxical techniques, metaphors, and Ericksonian utilisation. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015; Erickson Foundation descriptions; Brainscape; Slideshare]

3. Guiding principles

From choice theory (Glasser's ten axioms, Choice Theory 1998, as summarised in course materials) [source: Brainscape course cards; Glasser 1998]:

• You can control only your own behaviour. In practice: work on what the client can do, not on changing absent others.
• All we can give or get from other people is information. In practice: the therapist offers information and questions; the therapist does not coerce.
• Long-lasting psychological problems are relationship problems, and the problem relationship is in the present. In practice: ask early who the client is disconnected from now.
• The past shapes us but need not determine us; present relationships matter more than past pain. In practice: acknowledge history briefly, then return to what the client can do now.
• Five genetic needs drive behaviour (survival, love/belonging, power, freedom, fun), with individual differences in need strength. In practice: map which needs are unmet and how strongly each one pulls.
• Needs are met only by satisfying pictures in the quality world. In practice: get specific about wants (people, activities, values, things). The therapist aims to enter the client's quality world.
• All behaviour is total behaviour (acting, thinking, feeling, physiology), best described with verbs. In practice: speak of "depressing" or "angering" rather than "being depressed". This is Glasser's own device, and it should be used cautiously (see section 5).
• All total behaviour is chosen, but we control acting and thinking most directly. In practice: pull the "front wheels" (car analogy: acting and thinking steer, feeling and physiology follow). [source: Brainscape]

From Wubbolding's practice [source: Klingler & Gray 2015; Erickson Foundation descriptions; Slideshare/Corey-based summary]:

• Self-evaluation is the heart of the method. In practice: never tell the client their behaviour is wrong; ask them to judge it.
• Internal rather than external control. In practice: help the client move from "they make me..." to "I choose...". Do this "artfully and compassionately" (Wubbolding, quoted in Klingler & Gray 2015), never as an accusation.
• Present and future focus. In practice: problems may be told in the past tense, but solutions are worked on in the present and future.
• Emphasise actions while acknowledging feelings. In practice: listen to feelings, then ask what the client was doing at the time.
• Avoid "why" questions. In practice: "why" invites excuses. Ask "what are you doing?" and "is it working?" instead.
• Gentle but firm challenge. In practice: hold the client to their own stated wants without hammering, blaming or criticising.
• No excuses, no punishment, don't give up. In practice: don't ask why a plan failed. Ask whether the client still wants the outcome and what they will do now. Let reasonable consequences stand, don't add sanctions, and persist. [source: Glasser's steps via secondary summaries; uncertain wording]
• Behaviour is language. In practice: ask what message the client's behaviour is sending to others. [source: Erickson BT06/IC07]
• Respect others' needs. In practice: meeting one's needs must not deprive others of meeting theirs. This is part of what the client evaluates. [source: Kent State module]
• Cultural adaptation. In practice: soften directness where the culture calls for it (Wubbolding cites Japanese practitioners), avoid overgeneralising about groups, and acknowledge that some clients have genuinely fewer choices while still locating the ones they have. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]
• Utilisation (Ericksonian). In practice: use the client's own language, metaphors and existing strengths as the vehicle for change. [source: Erickson Foundation BT10/BT12 descriptions]

4. Intervention inventory

Notes on sources: Wubbolding's full lists (the Cycle of Counseling chart; the 22 types of self-evaluation in Reality Therapy for the 21st Century, 2000; Reality Therapy and Self-Evaluation, 2017) are not drawn on here. Items below are confirmed in the sources named in each entry. Where a component is reconstructed from secondary teaching materials, or from the literature alone, it is marked [uncertain]. All example language is illustrative unless quoted with a citation.

A. Environment (relationship) interventions

4.1 Building the counselling environment ("tonics")

• Purpose: become a need-satisfying person in the client's quality world, so that later challenge and self-evaluation are tolerable. Used from the first minute and maintained throughout. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]
• Steps:
  1. Use attending behaviours, empathy, positive regard and genuineness. Wubbolding names involvement, empathy, positive regard and alliance as the core. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]
  2. Listen for themes (recurring wants, losses, efforts) and feed them back. [source: Slideshare/Corey-based summary]
  3. Listen for and use the client's metaphors ("I'm drowning"), and keep working inside the image. [source: same]
  4. Summarise and focus: briefly reflect, then steer toward wants, doing or evaluation. [source: same]
  5. Use appropriate humour and facilitative self-disclosure. [source: same]
  6. Do the unexpected, e.g. ask about times things went well instead of the expected problem talk, or respond with curiosity instead of the anticipated reproach. [source: same; examples are synthesis]
  7. Further tonics in Wubbolding's chart, such as suspending judgement, being courteous, determined, enthusiastic, firm and genuine, setting boundaries, allowing silence, and letting reasonable consequences stand. [uncertain: recalled from Wubbolding's chart; not confirmed]
• Example language (illustrative): "Before we go further, what would make our time together worth coming back for?" / "You said you feel like you're drowning. Who's in the water with you?"
• Watch for: the client starts volunteering wants and specifics, returns for sessions, and tolerates evaluative questions without defensiveness. Warmth without firmness drifts into chat. Firmness without warmth reads as judgement.

4.2 Avoiding the "toxins"

• Purpose: remove the external-control behaviours that destroy the relationship. Use continuous self-monitoring. [source: Brainscape course cards; Slideshare summary; Klingler & Gray 2015]
• Steps: monitor yourself for these behaviours: arguing, attacking or accusing; bossing, blaming or belittling; criticising or coercing; demeaning or demanding; encouraging excuses (including asking "why"); instilling fear or finding fault; giving up easily; holding grudges. If you catch one, stop, acknowledge it briefly, and return to a what/how question.
• Example language (illustrative): instead of "Why on earth did you do that?", ask "What were you hoping would happen when you did that? Did it happen?"
• Watch for: "why" questions, lectures, sarcasm, and the urge to persuade. Wubbolding warns against hammering, blaming and criticising. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]

4.3 Clarifying wants about therapy and the therapist (opening the W)

• Purpose: set a shared agenda and assess motivation, especially with referred or mandated clients. Use in session 1 and whenever direction is lost.
• Steps: (1) Ask what the client wants from your time together. (2) Ask what they want from you. (3) Ask what others (court, school, family) want from them, and what they themselves want. (4) Look for overlap the client owns, for example "getting them off my back". [source: Klingler & Gray 2015 for the questions on wants from counselling, counsellor, family and self; step 4 synthesis]
• Example language: "What do you want out of our time together?" (quoted in Klingler & Gray 2015) / "If I could be useful to you, what would I be doing?" (illustrative)
• Watch for: an owned want, even a small or self-protective one, is enough to start. "Nothing" is information about commitment level (see 4.7).

B. W: Wants, needs, perceptions, commitment

4.4 Exploring wants and the quality world

• Purpose: make specific the pictures the client is trying to satisfy: from life, family, partner, job, self. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015; Brainscape]
• Steps:
  1. Ask broad then narrow: from life, then from each key relationship, then from themselves.
  2. Ask what life would look like if the want were met. [source: Slideshare/Corey-based]
  3. Distinguish wants (specific pictures) from needs (the general drives underneath). Note which want serves which need.
  4. Explore the quality world: the people, activities, values and things that matter most. "Quality" is not a moral judgement here. [source: Brainscape]
  5. If the client doesn't know what they want from themselves, rephrase (e.g. how hard they want to work). [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]
• Example language: "What do you want out of life?" (quoted, Klingler & Gray 2015) / "If your relationship with your son were the way you want it, what would I see on a normal evening?" (illustrative)
• Watch for: vague or other-controlled wants ("I want her to change"). Gently move toward what the client can pursue. Working signs: wants become concrete, observable and within reach.

4.5 Needs assessment (needs and need-strength)

• Purpose: identify which of the five needs are frustrated and how strongly each drives this person. Each person's need-strength profile shapes their wants. [source: Brainscape; Neukrug ODU page]
• Steps: (1) Briefly explain the five needs in plain words. (2) Ask the client to rate informally how satisfied each need is now and how strong it is for them. (3) Link the presenting problem to an unmet need, e.g. anger as a frustrated attempt at power or freedom. (4) Use the result to target wants and plans. [synthesis: informal ratings; published need-strength profiles exist in Glasser-tradition training but are not drawn on here, uncertain]
• Example language (illustrative): "On a scale from 1 to 10, how much belonging do you have in your life right now? And how much do you need?"
• Watch for: over-teaching theory. Keep it short and tied to the client's material.

4.6 Exploring perceptions and locus of control

• Purpose: surface how the client sees the situation and their own control. External-control perceptions ("they make me mad") block change. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]
• Steps: (1) Ask how they see the situation and themselves. (2) Ask directly where they locate control. (3) Note external-control language. (4) Without arguing, invite them to examine whether any part of the situation is in their hands (this leads into self-evaluation of the perception, see 4.12).
• Example language: "Do you see your control as inside of you or outside?" (quoted, Klingler & Gray 2015) / "He started it, and you get to decide what you do next. What have you been deciding?" (illustrative)
• Watch for: the client feeling blamed. Wubbolding stresses doing this "artfully and compassionately". With oppression, trauma or genuine constraint, validate the real limits first. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]

4.7 Assessing the level of commitment

• Purpose: gauge readiness and pitch the work accordingly. Wubbolding describes five levels, from not wanting to do anything to doing whatever it takes. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015 (endpoints); Kent State module (five levels exist); Erickson course pages ("5 Levels of Commitment")]
• Steps: (1) Listen for the client's commitment phrases. (2) Place them on a ladder: roughly, (1) "I don't want to be here / do anything"; (2) wanting the outcome but not the effort; (3) "I'll try" / "maybe"; (4) "I'll do my best"; (5) "I'll do whatever it takes". (3) Accept the level as a starting point and evaluate it with the client (see 4.13). [uncertain: wording of levels 2–4 reconstructed from the literature; only the endpoints were confirmed]
• Example language (illustrative): "Where would you put yourself: 'I'll try', 'I'll do my best', or 'whatever it takes'?"
• Watch for: an upward movement in commitment language across sessions is a sign of progress. Low commitment is not a failure; it sets the plan size.

C. D: Direction and doing

4.8 Exploring overall direction

• Purpose: get the big picture of where the client's current choices are taking them, as a frame for self-evaluation. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015; Slideshare]
• Steps: (1) Ask where they are headed. (2) Ask where they will be in a year (or five) if nothing changes. (3) Reflect the direction back neutrally, without judging it.
• Example language: "Where are you headed in your life?" (quoted, Klingler & Gray 2015) / "If the next six months look like the last six, where does that leave you?" (illustrative)
• Watch for: a client who sees the direction clearly often starts self-evaluating spontaneously. Let them.

4.9 Exploring specific doing (total behaviour, actions first)

• Purpose: replace generalities with a concrete, present-tense account of what the client actually does. Actions are where control is greatest. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]
• Steps:
  1. Ask what they are doing and how they spend their time. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]
  2. Pick one specific recent episode and go through it like a video: what they did, what they were thinking, how they felt, what happened in their body. [source: total behaviour components in Klingler & Gray 2015; episode method synthesis]
  3. Ask what they did last week, what they wanted to do differently, and what stopped them. [source: Slideshare/Corey-based]
  4. Acknowledge feelings, then return to actions: "And what were you doing while you felt that?"
• Example language: "What are you doing?" / "How are you spending your time?" (quoted, Klingler & Gray 2015) / "Walk me through last Thursday evening from the moment you got home." (illustrative)
• Watch for: "nothing" or "the usual". Slow down and get observable detail. Avoid "why". It works when the client can name concrete actions they could do differently.

4.10 Exploring self-talk

• Purpose: identify habitual thinking that sustains ineffective choices. Wubbolding added self-talk as an extension of the original model. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]
• Steps: (1) Ask what they tell themselves before or during the problem behaviour. (2) Name it as a sentence, e.g. "I can't do anything". (3) Ask the client to evaluate whether that sentence helps them get what they want (4.12). (4) Invite an alternative sentence they believe and can use, and build it into the plan. [steps 3–4 synthesis; Wubbolding's published lists of ineffective self-talk are not drawn on here, uncertain]
• Example language (illustrative): "When you stood outside the gym, what were you saying to yourself? Does that sentence get you where you want to go?"
• Watch for: drifting into cognitive disputation. In reality therapy the client judges usefulness; the therapist doesn't argue truth.

4.11 Behaviour as language

• Purpose: reframe actions (including symptoms) as messages to the world. This moves clients from feeling externally controlled to sensing inner control, and gives a new angle for evaluation. [source: Erickson Foundation BT06 and IC07 descriptions]
• Steps: (1) Ask what message the behaviour sends to the people around the client. (2) Ask whether that is the message they want to send. (3) Ask what they could do to send the message they intend. (4) Evaluate efforts to communicate (the course objectives refer to ways of helping clients evaluate these). [source: Erickson BT06/IC07; the specific questions are synthesis]
• Example language (illustrative): "When you slam the door and leave, what is your partner hearing? Is that what you want her to hear?"
• Watch for: the reframe working shows as the client taking authorship ("I guess I'm telling them to back off"). With self-injury or suicidal behaviour, never treat the message as manipulation. Assess risk first (see section 5).

4.12 Verb ("-ing") language for total behaviour

• Purpose: Glasser's device of describing feelings as active behaviours ("depressing", "angering", "anxietying") to convey that the whole behaviour is chosen and can be changed through its acting and thinking components. [source: Brainscape cards on Glasser's axiom that total behaviour is designated by verbs; Glasser 1998]
• Steps: (1) Teach the car analogy (acting and thinking steer, feeling and physiology follow). (2) Optionally restate the problem as a verb. (3) Ask what part of it the client can steer today.
• Example language (illustrative): "Some people find it helps to think of this as something you're doing, like 'depressing', rather than something done to you. Does that fit at all, or not?"
• Watch for: shame or feeling blamed for illness. Offer it as optional; drop it if it lands as blame (see section 5). [synthesis]

D. E: Self-evaluation

4.13 Self-evaluation questioning (all types)

• Purpose: the core intervention. The client judges the effectiveness, realism and fit of their own behaviour, wants, perceptions and commitment. Change begins only when the client concludes something isn't working. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015; Erickson BT12]
• Types and steps. Use whichever fits; repeat in varied forms. Wubbolding's 2000 book lists 22 types; the following are confirmed [source: Klingler & Gray 2015; Slideshare]:
  1. Actions: is this specific action helping or hurting you? Is it bringing you closer to or further from the people you want to be close to?
  2. Direction: is the overall direction where you want to go?
  3. Wants: is what you want realistic, attainable, good for you?
  4. Perceptions: is it really true you have no control?
  5. Thinking/self-talk: does this way of thinking help?
  6. Feelings: is feeling this way helping you get what you want?
  7. Commitment: will "I'll try" get the job done?
  8. Values fit: is the behaviour congruent with your own beliefs? Does it respect others' needs? [source: Slideshare; Kent State]
  9. Plans: is this plan workable (see 4.15)?
• Procedure: (1) Get a concrete D account first; evaluation of vague material is empty. (2) Ask the evaluative question in a neutral, curious tone. (3) Wait; accept any answer, including "it works". (4) If "it works", evaluate further: works for what, for how long, at what cost, according to whom? (5) When the client concludes "no", ask whether they want to do something different. Only then plan.
• Example language: "Is what you want realistic? Is it attainable?" and "Is it really true that you have no control over the situation?" (quoted, Klingler & Gray 2015) / "Is what you're doing working for you?" (Wubbolding's preferred alternative to 'why', quoted in Klingler & Gray 2015)
• Watch for: rhetorical questions with a built-in verdict (that's criticism). Ask genuinely. A working sign is the client using evaluative language unprompted ("that's not getting me anywhere").

4.14 Metaphorical self-evaluation

• Purpose: help clients judge whether wants are realistically attainable and behaviours work, through a metaphor rather than direct questioning. Wubbolding's examples use TV detectives Adrian Monk and Lieutenant Columbo as metaphorical guides. [source: Erickson Foundation BT08 and topic-page descriptions]
• Steps: (1) Pick a metaphor the client knows or one from the client's own language. (2) Frame the evaluation through it, e.g. the client as a detective examining the evidence about whether their strategy works. (3) Bring the conclusion back to concrete behaviour. [steps 1–3 synthesis; the content of Wubbolding's Monk/Columbo method is not drawn on here, uncertain]
• Example language (illustrative): "If Columbo looked at the last month, what's the one small detail he'd point at and say, 'Just one more thing...'?"
• Watch for: metaphors the client doesn't relate to; switch to theirs.

E. P: Planning and commitment

4.15 SAMIC planning

• Purpose: convert the self-evaluation into a specific, client-controlled action. [source: Kent State module; Slideshare citing Wubbolding]
• Steps:
  1. Ask where they go from here (Wubbolding: "Where do you go from here?", quoted in Klingler & Gray 2015).
  2. Let the client generate the plan. Brainscape lists three planning levels (client alone, jointly, counsellor-suggested) and treats client-initiated plans as most effective.
  3. Check it against SAMIC3: Simple, Attainable, Measurable, Immediate, Controlled by the planner, Committed to, Consistently (continuously) done. Some versions add P for the planner and/or "involving" the helper (Brainscape gives an AMI2C3 variant). Name which you are using.
  4. Phrase it as something to do, not to stop. Make it independent of others' cooperation, repetitive (ideally daily), and started as soon as possible. [source: Slideshare/Corey-based summary]
  5. Write it down; agree when it will be reviewed. [source: same]
  6. Ask the client to evaluate the plan before committing (4.13, type 9).
• Example language (illustrative): "So what's one thing you'll do before we meet next week, something that depends only on you?" / "When exactly? How will we both know it happened?"
• Watch for: plans that are too big, depend on others ("she'll stop nagging"), or are "stop" plans. Small and sure beats big and hopeful. [synthesis]

4.16 Securing and evaluating commitment to the plan

• Purpose: strengthen follow-through. Glasser listed commitment as a step. Wubbolding uses the commitment levels and asks the client to evaluate tentative commitment. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015; Slideshare; Glasser's steps per secondary summaries, uncertain]
• Steps: (1) Ask how committed they are. (2) If "I'll try", ask them to evaluate whether trying will get it done. (3) Options include a verbal commitment, a written plan, a handshake, or a phone/text check-in [uncertain: forms of commitment from Glasser-tradition practice, not confirmed]. (4) Express interest in the outcome, not pressure.
• Example language: "If you say, 'I'll try,' will that get the job done?" (quoted, Klingler & Gray 2015) / "On the scale we talked about, where are you with this plan?" (illustrative)
• Watch for: compliance to please you, which shows as high verbal commitment without specifics. Re-check S and C.

4.17 Plan review: no excuses, no punishment, don't give up

• Purpose: handle the next session's review so the cycle continues. This derives from Glasser's original principles. [uncertain: Glasser 1965/1972; widely reported in secondary sources]
• Steps: (1) Start the session by asking what happened with the plan. (2) If done, ask the client to evaluate its effect and build on it. (3) If not done, don't ask why and don't criticise. Ask whether they still want the outcome, then re-plan smaller or different. (4) Let natural, reasonable consequences stand, and don't add punishment. (5) Persist: return to W or E as needed.
• Example language (illustrative): "It didn't happen. Okay. Do you still want what you wanted last week? What would be a plan you'd actually do?"
• Watch for: excuses gathering. Gently redirect to the present and to what the client controls.

F. Supporting and specialised interventions

4.18 Teaching choice theory to the client

• Purpose: give the client a usable model (needs, quality world, total behaviour, internal vs external control) so they can run WDEP on themselves. The counsellor introduces choice theory "at an appropriate time". [source: Kent State module; Glasser's later version, per Erickson Glasser description]
• Steps: (1) Teach one concept at a time, tied to the client's material: the five needs, then the quality world, then the car diagram of total behaviour. (2) Use a quick drawing. (3) Ask the client to apply it to this week's events. (4) Optionally assign reading (Glasser's Choice Theory, 1998) [synthesis].
• Example language (illustrative): "Think of your behaviour as a car. The front wheels are what you do and think; you steer with those. The back wheels, feelings and body, follow."
• Watch for: lecturing. Teaching must stay need-satisfying (fun, power) for the client.

4.19 Relationship work: caring habits vs deadly habits

• Purpose: in couple, family, parent and workplace work, replace external-control behaviours with connecting ones. Glasser lists seven caring habits: supporting, encouraging, listening, accepting, trusting, respecting, negotiating differences. The seven deadly habits are external-control behaviours: criticising, blaming, complaining, nagging, threatening, punishing, and bribing/rewarding to control. [source: Brainscape lists the caring habits and names blame/criticise/bribe/complain/punish as external control; the full deadly-habit list is from Glasser 1998, uncertain]
• Steps: (1) Ask each person to identify, without accusing the other, which deadly habits they themselves use. (2) Each evaluates whether the habit gets them the relationship they want. (3) Each picks one caring habit to practise this week, as a SAMIC plan. (4) Review. A related Glasser device, the "solving circle", has each partner ask what they can do in the coming week to help the relationship, for the sake of the relationship. [uncertain: solving circle recalled from Glasser 1998/2000] Counselling with Reality Therapy has a relationship-counselling chapter (title only). [source: Taylor & Francis page]
• Example language (illustrative): "Not what your partner does: which of these do you fall into when you're hurt? Is it getting you closer?"
• Watch for: partners using the list as ammunition against each other. Keep the focus on each person's own behaviour. Screen for intimate partner violence before conjoint work [synthesis].

4.20 Paradoxical techniques

• Purpose: for clients who resist linear plans. Wubbolding devotes a chapter to paradoxical techniques and describes plans as linear or paradoxical. [source: Taylor & Francis TOC; Brainscape]
• Steps (general forms reported in Wubbolding-tradition materials; specific protocol [uncertain]): (1) Reframe/relabel: give the behaviour a different, more workable meaning (e.g. "stubbornness" as determination). (2) Prescribe the symptom: invite the client to choose the problem behaviour deliberately at a set time, which puts it under control. (3) Restrain: suggest going slowly or doubting that change should happen yet.
• Example language (illustrative): "This week, rather than fighting the worry, set aside 15 minutes at 7 pm to worry on purpose, and note what you notice."
• Watch for: never prescribe dangerous behaviour (self-harm, substance use, violence, unsafe driving), and don't use paradox in crises, with suicidal clients, or where it could be heard as mockery. Use only within a strong alliance, with transparent intent. [synthesis]

4.21 "Positive symptoms"

• Purpose: Wubbolding is credited with the concept of "positive symptoms". [source: Erickson BT06/IC07 presenter bios] Its content is not described here. In the literature it refers to identifying and expanding the effective behaviours, the signs of health, the client will show when needs are being met. [uncertain: definition not confirmed]
• Steps (synthesis): (1) Ask what the client will be doing when they're better. (2) Ask when they already do some of it. (3) Make one of those behaviours the plan.
• Example language (illustrative): "When this is behind you, what will people see you doing on a Saturday morning?"
• Watch for: if the client can't describe any, go back to wants (4.4).

4.22 Linking past and present: "normal responses to abnormal situations" and utilisation

• Purpose: an unconventional use described by Wubbolding with trauma and depression. Help clients see current behaviours as normal responses to the abnormal situations they lived through, then choose alternatives, particularly to meet the need for power or inner control. This draws on Ericksonian ideas such as utilisation, and the idea that "the solution often appears unrelated to the problem". [source: Erickson Congress 2019 and IC19 descriptions; topic page]
• Steps (synthesis built from the description): (1) Acknowledge the past event briefly and respectfully. (2) Reframe the present behaviour as the client's best survival choice then. (3) Ask whether that choice still serves them now (self-evaluation). (4) Identify a current choice that gives a sense of inner control. (5) Plan small.
• Example language (illustrative): "Keeping everyone at a distance made complete sense back then. Is it still doing for you what it did then?"
• Watch for: this is not trauma processing. With PTSD, refer or combine with a trauma-focused treatment. Don't push past content; Glasser's later version avoids it altogether (see 2).

4.23 Group reality therapy

• Purpose: run WDEP in groups (counselling, addictions, school, correctional). Members evaluate whether their behaviour gets what they want, carry out assignments between sessions, and receive structure for planning and evaluating change. [source: Slideshare/Corey-based; Taylor & Francis TOC]
• Steps (synthesis): (1) Open each session with a round of last week's plan, self-evaluated. (2) The leader models WDEP questions with one member while others observe, then members ask WDEP questions of each other. (3) Each member leaves with a SAMIC plan. (4) Enforce a no-blaming, no-criticism group norm (the toxins list).
• Example language (illustrative): "Before anyone gives feedback, let's hear Sam's own verdict: did the plan help?"
• Watch for: members criticising each other or advice-giving. Redirect to self-evaluation questions.

4.24 School and organisational application (lead management, quality schools)

• Purpose: Glasser and Wubbolding applied choice theory to schools (Glasser's Quality Schools) and to management ("lead management" rather than "boss management"), emphasising quality, increasing choices and noncoercive leadership. [source: Brainscape; Kent State module (Quality Schools page listed); Taylor & Francis chapter "Application to Schools"]
• Steps for a clinician consulting to a school or team (synthesis): (1) Teach staff the toxins/tonics lists. (2) Replace punishment-based discipline conversations with WDEP conversations ("What are you doing? Is it helping? What's your plan?"). (3) Use a brief plan sheet that the student or worker writes. (4) Follow up without punishment and without giving up.
• Example language (illustrative): "I'm not going to lecture you. What were you after when you did that? Did it get you that?"
• Watch for: staff using WDEP as a disguised reprimand. That turns it back into external control.

5. Handling problems

The sources say little about troubleshooting beyond the toxins list, the no-excuses stance, commitment levels, and paradox. Most guidance below is marked [synthesis].

• Client says "nothing works" / stuck: Return to W. The want may be unrealistic or controlled by others, so evaluate the want itself. Shrink the plan to something certain to succeed. Ask about exceptions. Check whether the therapist has become a demanding, external-control figure. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015 on evaluating realism of wants; rest synthesis]
• Mandated or "I don't want to be here" (commitment level 1): Accept it without arguing. Ask what they want from the people who sent them (often "to be left alone"). Evaluate whether their current behaviour gets them that. Plan toward that owned want. [source: commitment levels per Klingler & Gray 2015; procedure synthesis]
• Excuses and blaming others: Don't argue or ask why. Acknowledge the other person's role, then ask what the client controls in the situation and whether their current response helps. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015 (avoid 'why'; internal vs external control); Brainscape (encouraging excuses is a toxin)]
• Plan not done (non-adherence): No criticism, no punishment, no giving up. Ask if the client still wants the outcome, re-evaluate the plan against SAMIC (usually too big, not immediate, or dependent on others), and re-plan. Persisting across repeated failures is part of the method. [source: Glasser's principles via secondary summaries, uncertain; SAMIC per Kent/Slideshare]
• Resistance to self-evaluation ("it works fine"): Accept the answer. Ask more precise evaluative questions: for what, for whom, short versus long term, at what cost to the relationships they want. Use metaphor (4.14) or behaviour-as-language (4.11) to approach from the side. Consider a paradoxical plan (4.20) where safe. [synthesis]
• Client feels blamed by "choice" language (common with depression, chronic illness, trauma, oppression, poverty): Validate real constraints first. Wubbolding accepts that some people have fewer choices but holds that everyone has some. Use "what part of this can you steer?" rather than "you are choosing this". Drop verb-language ("depressing") if it shames. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015 on fewer choices; rest synthesis]
• Overwhelm or flooding: Slow down, narrow to the next 24 hours, and make a tiny immediate plan (e.g. one phone call). Use grounding or other stabilising skills from other models if needed. Reality therapy sources don't describe affect-regulation techniques. [synthesis; marked as outside the modality]
• Rupture (client angry at the therapist, feels pushed): Check yourself against the toxins list (were you coercing, criticising, hammering?). Acknowledge it plainly, ask what the client wants from you now, and renegotiate. Wubbolding notes that compassion, empathy and positive regard can offset mistakes. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015; rest synthesis]
• Premature planning (therapist eager, client agrees but doesn't follow through): Go back to E. Wubbolding states plans come only after the client concludes current behaviour isn't working. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]
• Cultural mismatch with directness: Soften confrontation, use indirect or metaphorical evaluation, involve family wants where collectivist values apply, and avoid stereotyping. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015]
• Past-focused clients: Acknowledge briefly and connect to the present using the normal-responses-to-abnormal-situations reframe (4.22). Glasser's later version simply avoids discussing the past, but validating is wiser when a client feels unheard. [source: Erickson descriptions; balance is synthesis]
• Suicidal ideation or self-harm: Do a standard structured risk assessment and collaborative safety plan before any WDEP work. This includes lethal-means counselling (safe storage or removal of means, no method detail), crisis contacts, and the involvement of supports. Never use paradox, "behaviour as language" framing that implies manipulation, or "you are choosing this" language with a suicidal client. WDEP can then structure the safety plan (wants: reasons for living; plan: SAMIC coping steps). Wubbolding's 2017 book covers self-injury, but it is not drawn on here. [synthesis; uncertain about Wubbolding's specific guidance]
• Addictions: Use WDEP on the want the substance serves and evaluate its long-term cost. Coordinate with medical and withdrawal care. Wubbolding demonstrates reality therapy for cocaine addiction with depression on video (not viewed). [source: psychotherapy.net page; rest synthesis]
• Severe mental illness, psychosis, mania, active trauma symptoms: Reality therapy can supplement but not replace indicated treatments. Keep plans concrete and supported, coordinate care, and refer for trauma-focused therapy when PTSD is primary. [synthesis]
• Domestic violence or coercive relationships: Don't use conjoint caring-habits work, or frame the victim's situation as their choice, while there is risk. Do safety planning and referral first. [synthesis]
• Therapist slipping into lecturing or teaching choice theory too much: Return to questions. The client's own evaluation is the active ingredient. [source: Klingler & Gray 2015; synthesis]

Sources

Sources:

• Reality Therapy/Choice Theory Today: An Interview with Dr. Robert E. Wubbolding (Klingler & Gray, 2015), Canadian Journal of Counselling and Psychotherapy, full text PDF, the main primary source (Wubbolding's own account)
• Same article, abstract page
• Erickson Foundation catalogue: reality therapy topic area
• Erickson Foundation catalogue: WDEP tag
• Wubbolding, Behavior, Language and Reframing: A Reality Therapy Approach (BT06 course description)
• Wubbolding, Dealing with Symptoms as Language (IC07 course description)
• Counselling with Reality Therapy, 2nd ed., Taylor & Francis book page (TOC)
• Reality Therapy and Self-Evaluation: The Key to Client Change, ACA book page
• Reality Therapy for Addictions (Wubbolding video), Psychotherapy.net
• Choice Theory Instructional Module: Reality Therapy, Kent State (secondary)
• Neukrug, Reality therapy page, Old Dominion University (secondary)
• Reality therapy PowerPoint presentation (Flores), SlideShare, Corey-based summary citing Wubbolding (secondary)
• Week 7: Reality Therapy flashcards, Brainscape (secondary, course notes)

Further reading (not drawn on): APA video page Reality Therapy (Wubbolding).

Further reading (not drawn on; content marked [uncertain] where relied on):

• Glasser, W. (1965). Reality Therapy: A New Approach to Psychiatry. Harper & Row.
• Glasser, W. (1998). Choice Theory: A New Psychology of Personal Freedom. HarperCollins.
• Glasser, W. (2000). Counseling with Choice Theory: The New Reality Therapy. HarperCollins.
• Wubbolding, R. E. (1988). Using Reality Therapy. Harper & Row.
• Wubbolding, R. E. (2000). Reality Therapy for the 21st Century. Brunner-Routledge.
• Wubbolding, R. E. (2011; 2nd ed. 2017). Reality Therapy (Theories of Psychotherapy series). APA.
• Wubbolding, R. E. (2017). Reality Therapy and Self-Evaluation: The Key to Client Change. American Counseling Association.
• Wubbolding, R. E., & Brickell, J. (2017). Counselling with Reality Therapy (2nd ed.). Routledge.
• Corey, G. Theory and Practice of Counseling and Psychotherapy (reality therapy chapter), as the source of the SlideShare summary.