312 | CCPT Mindset: The Final Mindset Shift…From Doing CCPT to Being CCPT

In this final episode of the CCPT Mindset series, I wrap up with one of the most foundational shifts we must make as child-centered play therapists: moving from doing to being. I explore how the pressure to “do it right” in session—say the right thing, follow the right steps, get the right outcome—keeps us stuck in a performance mindset that actually undermines the very heart of the model.

Instead, I walk through what a being posture looks and feels like in the playroom: calm, grounded, attuned, and fully present. I talk about how our presence—more than our techniques—is the true intervention in CCPT. This episode is an invitation to reflect on how we show up with children and how we care for ourselves so that who we are supports healing, growth, and authentic relationship.

PlayTherapyNow.com is my HUB for everything I do! playtherapynow.com. Sign up for my email newsletter, stay ahead with the latest CCPT CEU courses, personalized coaching opportunities and other opportunities you need to thrive in your CCPT practice. If you click one link in these show notes, this is the one to click!

If you would like to ask me questions directly, check out www.ccptcollective.com, where I host two weekly Zoom calls filled with advanced CCPT case studies and session reviews, as well as member Q&A. You can take advantage of the two-week free trial to see if the CCPT Collective is right for you.

Ask Me Questions: Call ‪[phone]‬, or email: [e-mail]
Brenna's CCPT Hub: https://www.playtherapynow.com
CCPT Collective (online community exclusively for CCPTs): https://www.ccptcollective.com
Podcast HQ: https://www.playtherapypodcast.com
APT Approved Play Therapy CE courses: https://childcenteredtraining.com
Twitter: @thekidcounselor https://twitter.com/thekidcounselor
Facebook: https://facebook.com/playtherapypodcast

Common References:
Cochran, N., Nordling, W., & Cochran, J. (2010). Child-Centered Play Therapy (1st ed.). Wiley.
VanFleet, R., Sywulak, A. E., & Sniscak, C. C. (2010). Child-centered play therapy. Guilford Press.
Landreth, G.L. (2023). Play Therapy: The Art of the Relationship (4th ed.). Routledge.
Bratton, S. C., Landreth, G. L., Kellam, T., & Blackard, S. R. (2006). Child parent relationship therapy (CPRT) treatment manual: A 10-session filial therapy model for training parents. Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group.
Benedict, Helen. Themes in Play Therapy. Used with permission to Heartland Play Therapy Institute.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
You're listening to the Play Therapy Podcast with Dr. Brenna Hicks,
your source for centered and focused play therapy coaching.
Hi,
I'm Dr. Brenna Hicks,
The Kid Counselor.
This is the Play Therapy Podcast where you get
a master class in child-centered play therapy
and practical support and application for your
work with children and their families.
In today's episode,

(00:20):
we are closing out the CCPT Mindset series,
and this week we are talking about
being versus doing.
And we've hit on this before,
but I think this will really wrap up the series in a helpful way,
and it will tie into the other three topics that we've addressed in this series.

(00:42):
Before we get into that though,
I have a couple of housekeeping announcements.
If you are new to the podcast,
first of all,
welcome.
Very glad you found us,
very glad you're here.
This is an incredible group
of CCPTs from all over the world.
And you have joined
the listener tribe and really glad that you're here.

(01:02):
I know I have mentioned several times about the CPRT course that we are releasing.
I spoke with Joseph with Corwell today.
It is ready.
We are ready to launch probably within the next few days,
so I wanted to make you aware of that.
Podcast listeners and my community,
you are going to have a week
where you can get $100 off the price of the course.

(01:25):
And this is a thank you to you all.
It's an acknowledgement that you're my people.
And so
I negotiated with them that we're going to offer the first week
with a promo code so that you can get $100 off the course if you're interested.
Let me really quickly tease what goes into this course
so that you are aware of what you're getting.

(01:45):
It's 16 hours of CEUs.
And what makes this different and why I structured this course the way that I did
is you don't just get the facilitation content
out of the book and the manual,
you actually get video examples of me facilitating
each week to parents.
So you get the instructional video about the content and then you

(02:09):
get a demonstration video of me actually teaching the content to parents.
So this is the most comprehensive CPRT training course
that is out there as far as I'm aware.
And it will give you 16 CEUs to boot.
So not only does it help you to facilitate CPRT with confidence and competence,
but it will also give you CEUs,

(02:31):
and most of you all need about 30 or so
for your license renewal,
for example,
so that's more than half of your requirements for your 2 year license renewal.
It will all.
So count toward your RPT hours if you're working toward those,
and it will be CCPT in theory.
So
I'm super excited about this
and stay tuned.

(02:51):
We will do an email newsletter about it.
We'll announce it in the Collective,
we'll announce it on the podcast,
and I'll give you that $100 code so that you can save money to boot,
so.
Very excited.
That has taken us a ton of time,
a ton of work.
Corwell has just put in so much energy and effort into this,
and I can't say this enough.
Corwell has become such a champion for CCPT

(03:13):
in the CEU world,
and I'm really grateful for Joseph and Katie and their team.
They have been fantastic,
and they really believe.
In what we're doing and they believe in the model and they've been so supportive,
so that's a huge benefit to us
to have someone that is coming alongside CCPT and
wanting you to have access to all of your requirements

(03:36):
in your model,
and that is a huge gift.
So I'm really grateful to Corwell as well.
All righty,
so let's dive into the being versus doing.
We,
I think often,
as we should
focus on mastering the skills of the model,
and we need to know them,
we need to execute them,
we need to be adherent.

(03:57):
So those are important
points of focus.
But the heart of the model
is never
about what we do.
So the skills matter,
yes.
But Landreth even discusses
that if you just robotically recite the skills
and the phrases and the concepts.

(04:20):
It's not effective because it's about the relationship.
It's how we show up.
It is about us being in the room
and it's about being CCPT
that's the heart of the model.
And so
I want to be real clear as we wrap up this CCPT mindset.
I don't want us to get lost in

(04:41):
the doing
we're we're not doing CCPT we're not doing skills we're not doing therapy.
This isn't a checklist.
This is a way of being
and I really want that to kind of be the way that we wrap up this set.
So
if these are questions that you ask yourselves.

(05:01):
You probably are in a doing
mentality.
So if you've ever said.
Did I do that right?
Did I say that right?
Did I execute that right?
Am I doing this right?
That's a doing mentality.
What should I say here?
What should I do here?

(05:23):
Doing mentality.
What should I use in this moment?
to help,
what should I use in this moment to
Help the child move further along,
what should I do in this moment,
doing mentality?
And
here are some signs.
Those are questions you might ask yourselves.

(05:43):
Here are some signs.
You feel pressure to respond quote correctly.
Or
you measure your effectiveness by what you said or did.
So in other words,
you get to the end of a session,
you're like,
man,
I was like,
really on it today,
like that was an awesome session cause I said and did the right things.

(06:05):
Or you evaluate the session based on the outcomes.
Oh man,
that kid
had a huge symbolic shift.
That kid had a new theme developed.
That kid all of a sudden was able to articulate emotions.
That's exactly what we were waiting for.
That's all doing mentality.

(06:26):
So then in contrast,
the being posture.
I
calm.
And grounded
And non anxious,
those are the adjectives,
but
the important piece.
Is presence
You're calm and grounded and non-anxious and you're present.

(06:51):
You have a deep trust in the model
and in the child,
those have to coexist.
You are willing to reflectively respond.
Instead of rescue or fix.
And you are able to embrace and boy,
these are,
these are tough ones,

(07:11):
but this is the being posture.
You're able to embrace silence.
You're able to embrace stillness.
And or you're able to embrace repetition.
And those,
as you can see,
obviously the doing mentality versus the being very different

(07:32):
in tone,
in approach,
in aura.
And here's
I think kind of
thought provoking concepts here.
Kids don't respond to techniques.
They're not cognitive,
they're not rational.
They don't have abstract reasoning.
They don't want to be told what to do,

(07:52):
they don't want to be given an agenda,
they don't want an activity,
they don't want a worksheet,
they don't respond to techniques,
they respond to you.
Landrithth emphasizes again and again.
How you
are an integral piece of
the CCPT process.

(08:14):
Your presence,
your being,
your
engagement,
the relationship with you.
You are a factor
in the process.
They respond to you.
And the model works through congruence.
When you are congruent,

(08:35):
when the child is congruent,
when there's congruence to the model,
when there's congruence in the relationship.
That's when the model works.
It's not about outcome or performance.
It works when there's congruence.
Let's go back to Roger's core conditions.
That's one of them.

(08:57):
So it was unconditional positive regard.
These are things that are brought in.
That is why it works.
The core conditions have to be met for self-actualization to take place.
And doing
can be
imitated,
right?
So you can,
OK,
I gotta tell you a quick story.

(09:18):
I was on a coaching call this week
and
They were talking about what they were doing in sessions.
And I forget who someone said.
And I just,
I heard,
I heard your voice in my head.
And then someone else said,
Oh yeah,
I always think,
what would Brenna say or do in this moment?
Another one says,
you know,
Brenna,
you're always like,

(09:39):
you know,
the,
the person on our shoulder in the session.
Like,
you're always on our shoulder coaching us.
And I was like,
Yeah,
but am I the angel or the devil at that point?
Like,
I don't know how I feel about this.
So,
uh,
you can imitate me.
All right.
You,
you can listen to these podcasts,
you can join the Collective and learn in there.
You can coach with me,

(09:59):
you can read on all the seminal works,
whatever.
You can imitate.
What you should be doing.
But being
I
developed.
Being
is a process.
Being as cultivated.
So if we focus on the doing

(10:22):
and the imitation.
Of
the more adherent version of ourselves,
for example,
or the more confident version of ourselves or the
more equipped or trained or skilled or whatever.
If we focus on the doing,
all of a sudden we've missed out on the process of becoming.
Being is cultivated,
it's a process.

(10:42):
And your presence
is
the intervention.
If you ignore everything I've said in this whole episode,
please listen to that.
Your presence is the intervention.
It's not the doing,
it's not the skill,
it's not the technique,
it's not the clinical,
it's your very presence

(11:04):
in the playroom.
That is the catalyst for change.
So,
to wrap this series up.
Many times
the questions that are raised are
what should I say?
What should I do?
We need to move away from that
to who do I need to be.

(11:27):
Who do I need to be
with my kids?
Who do I need to be in the playroom?
I need to be patient.
I need to be unconditionally accepting.
I need to be gracious.
I need to be calm.
I need to be grounded.
I need to be consistent.
I need to be adherent.

(11:49):
Who do I need to be?
That is the question that we need to ask ourselves.
And how do we do that?
How do we become who we want to be?
Well,
self-care.
Intentional practice of self-regulation
before sessions,

(12:09):
after sessions,
during sessions.
There
are
Mechanisms that we need to have in place that help us go,
OK,
I need to give myself a minute.
That session was,
was a little bit much.
I'm gonna go close my eyes and sit in my office for 2 minutes.

(12:29):
I'm gonna lay on the playroom floor and deep
breathe for a couple of minutes after that session.
I'm going to go into a room and turn the lights off and just give myself
lack of stimuli for a minute.
Before,
during,
and after sessions.
We need to be self-regulating.
That's the only way that we can be the things that we want to be in the playroom.

(12:53):
And notice if your internal state
feels
anything other than if you start feeling anxious,
if you start doubting,
if you start feeling
performative in your thoughts,
if you start saying,
what should I do right now?
Notice that catch those things.
That's the checks and balances for yourself.

(13:15):
The goal is that
you work on
your being,
not just your skills.
Skills are important.
Don't mishear me.
You can't just say,
well,
I'm just gonna be in the playroom and things are gonna work out.
You can be doing nothing if you're,
if you have no idea of the model,
OK?
So

(13:36):
I can't just be one or the other,
but it's not
just about skills.
It's also about your way of being that should be
what you focus on
because the magic of CCPT
and that word gets thrown around a lot and my staff makes fun of
me if I throw it out because I typically say that that doesn't,

(13:56):
it's not helpful
because what does the magic of anything mean?
But what it,
what makes CCPT special?
There are magical things that happen in play,
or there's no denying that.
What makes it special is not the methods as much as it is you.
It all comes back to relationship.
As always,

(14:16):
ad nausium,
here we are relationship again.
We're not striving to master the model.
I hope we're striving to let CCPT master us.
And when you are CCPT.
You are able to bring

(14:36):
the same you
to every child,
every time,
every session,
no matter what.
That's the heart of what we're doing.
That is
the CCPT mindset.
It's being CCPT
so that every kid,
every time,
every session,

(14:57):
no matter what.
Gets who we are.
And we are CCPT.
I love y'all.
We'll talk again soon.
Bye.
Thank you for listening to the Play Therapy Podcast with Dr.
Brenna Hicks.
For more episodes and resources,
please go to www.playtherapypodcast.com.