I keep returning to a simple question: what does a theoretical model actually do in psychotherapy? We speak about models as though they describe the underlying reality of the mind, but their real value lies in how they function in the room. In practice, a model has two sides, and both are essential.

The first function is how a model helps the client organise their experience. An example from schema therapy makes this clear. When we speak about the critical self, coping modes, or the parts of a person that step in to protect or compensate, we are not proposing literal internal structures. We are offering a frame that helps the person make sense of their thinking, feeling, and behaviour. It gives them a way to see patterns that previously felt fused or confusing. 

This is not about truth. It is about giving the person a different way to understand their daily experience, and that shift in understanding is itself an intervention. It changes how they relate to themselves and opens new emotional and behavioural possibilities.

The second function is how a model structures the therapist. Clients see the visible, client-facing side of the model—the language, metaphors, and explanations—but the deeper function is clinical. It guides what the therapist pays attention to and what they do next. Schema therapy offers a simple example. A clinician might understand the central role of unmet childhood needs and the presence of vulnerable child states. This frame immediately shapes the work. Do we first address the harsh critical voice? Do we focus on contacting the child part? Do we work on soothing, or do we confront the avoidant protector? The model provides this map. It tells the therapist what is relevant, what is premature, and what the sequence of the work should look like. Without this structure, therapy risks becoming an unanchored conversation.

These two functions work together. A model has a client-facing side that helps the person make sense of their experience, and a clinical side that helps the therapist make sense of the person—how they are organised, how they respond, and what is happening in the room. One supports the other. The client’s meaning-making develops because the therapist is using a coherent framework to guide the direction and depth of the work. In that sense, a model is less a description of truth and more a tool for orientation. It organises experience for the client, and it organises action for the therapist. Both layers matter. Everything else is secondary.