Mike Jackson has been an MFT in the Pasadena area for over thirty years. In 2000 he began using a personality type questionnaire based on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator ® with all individual, couple and family clients. Based on Carl Jung’s Theory of Psychological Types, this information proved to be much more accurate and helpful than the information he had been trained to use.
Mike has since written two books and published a number of articles on natural differences as the foundation for both the healing process as well as for human understanding in general. Mike does workshops and provides training on the use of the natural differences model and writes articles as a Conflict Resolution Topic Expert for GoodTherapy.Org.
Books
- No Fault Couples Counseling (2011)
- Natural Differences and the Healing Process (2013)
Both books are available as e-books here
Articles:
- http://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/parenting-understanding-your-childs-nature-052814
- http://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/understanding-yourself-is-key-to-understanding-others-0710144
- http://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/conflict-resolution-four-myers-briggs-temperaments-040814
- http://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/happy-in-solitude-the-joy-of-being-an-introvert-0924144#
- http://www.camft.org/StaticContent/TherapistMag/July_Aug08/
Implications from Mike’s work include;
- Natural Differences in personality types exist
- Contrary to current beliefs, the actual impact of parent’s on their child’s personality does not come from a shaping role in personality development, but rather in how the child grows up feeling about the one they already have.
- Understanding these differences is necessary for clinicians to establish a therapeutic bond with clients that naturally differ from them and to assure that clinician feedback and interpretations mirror the client’s nature rather than that of the clinician.
- The initial assessment for treatment has two parts.
1. Identification of the client’s normal temperament and personality type
2. Determining the client’s level of coping effectiveness with an assessment tool such as the Functional Inventory Test (FIT)
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