That's the whole point of reframing, anyway: creating freedom to maneuver. If a person has behavior X, it's a very specific behavior. It has actual sensory components: seeing, feeling, and hearing. If you try to change that piece of behavior directly, it will be very difficult. However, if that piece of behavior, with all its specificity, is suddenly seen or felt or heard to be in a larger context, a larger frame, you can discover that what you are really committed to is not the specific piece of behavior, but to the outcome that behavior is supposed to lead to in your world–model. Then suddenly you have a lot of room to maneuver. You hold the outcome—the goal that you are trying to achieve—constant, and recognize that this particular pattern of behavior is only one way to achieve it. There are many other ways to achieve «heaven on earth.»

Let me remind you that we almost never take a response away, except temporarily. There may be a context in which even murder, suicide, etc. is a good choice. I'm not willing to play God to the extent of removing any choices from a person; I simply want to add additional alternatives which are somehow more congruent with the person's conscious understanding of what he wants to achieve. I don't want to take away the ability to engage in the «inappropriate behavior» because it may become appropriate at some other time in some other context.

However, with a suicidal client it's quite appropriate to temporarily take away the choice of suicide. I recommend that you be very explicit at the beginning of your work with her. «I agree that it is better for you to die than continue living the way you are. I believe that I can assist you in changing your life in ways that make life worth living. I will accept you as a client only if you give up the possibility of suicide for three months. At the end of that time, if you still believe that suicide is appropriate, I'll even help you do it. Do you agree to that?»