FOY Wellness and Recovery is a licensed PHP and IOP program in Agoura Hills, California. Our clinical program is developed and overseen by Clinical Program Director Dr. Shannon Dobbs, a licensed clinical psychologist. Strength-Based Therapy is a foundational lens across our clinical programming, emphasizing existing client resources alongside clinical treatment of symptoms.
What Is Strength-Based Therapy?
Strength-Based Therapy is an approach that intentionally identifies and builds on a client’s existing strengths, values, and resources, rather than focusing exclusively on symptoms and deficits. This approach is used across many evidence-based modalities as a complementary lens, grounded in research showing that a client’s sense of agency and existing capability meaningfully supports engagement and outcomes in treatment.
How Strength-Based Therapy Works
Rather than replacing evidence-based treatment for specific conditions, Strength-Based principles are woven into how that treatment is delivered, actively identifying what a client is already doing well, what has worked in the past, and what personal values and resources can be leveraged in service of recovery.
Strength-Based Therapy at FOY
Strength-Based principles inform individual and group therapy across FOY’s clinical team, particularly valuable for clients who arrive at treatment feeling discouraged or defined primarily by their diagnosis or struggles.
Who Benefits From a Strength-Based Approach
- Clients who feel discouraged or defined by past struggles
- Clients with a history of feeling pathologized in prior treatment
- Clients building motivation for sustained recovery
- Clients navigating co-occurring conditions who need a sense of agency alongside clinical treatment
What to Expect
Throughout treatment, your clinical team will actively identify and build on your existing strengths and resources alongside addressing symptoms directly, rather than focusing exclusively on what isn’t working.
FAQs
Does Strength-Based Therapy mean my symptoms won’t be addressed directly?
No, symptoms are still addressed directly through evidence-based modalities; Strength-Based principles are a complementary lens applied alongside that clinical work, not a replacement for it.
Is Strength-Based Therapy its own separate modality?
It is more accurately described as an approach or lens integrated across other clinical modalities, rather than a standalone, separate therapy.
Is Strength-Based Therapy evidence-based?
Research on client engagement and treatment outcomes supports the value of identifying and building on existing client strengths and resources as part of effective treatment.
Will my therapist ignore my struggles and only focus on the positive?
No, Strength-Based Therapy addresses struggles directly while also actively identifying strengths and resources, rather than avoiding difficult material.
Is this approach helpful for people who feel like a “failure” due to relapse?
Yes, Strength-Based principles are specifically useful for helping clients reframe setbacks within a broader context of existing capability and resilience, without minimizing the setback itself.
Who applies Strength-Based principles at FOY?
Strength-Based principles inform our clinical team’s overall approach across individual and group therapy.
How is this different from Motivational Interviewing?
There is significant overlap; Motivational Interviewing specifically focuses on exploring ambivalence about change, while Strength-Based Therapy more broadly emphasizes existing resources and capability across all aspects of treatment.
Will this approach set unrealistic positive expectations?
No, Strength-Based Therapy is meant to complement, not replace, honest clinical assessment of symptoms and challenges.
Is Strength-Based Therapy covered by insurance?
It is integrated across FOY’s PHP and IOP clinical programming, billed as a level of care rather than a separate service. Contact our admissions team about your specific plan.
Take the First Step
Call (805) 659-8429 or visit foywellnessandrecovery.com/contact for a free confidential assessment. We are in-network with Blue Shield, Cigna, and TRICARE through TriWest, and accept most other major PPO plans, including Anthem, Aetna, Multiplan, HMC HealthWorks, and Blue Cross Blue Shield, on an out-of-network basis.