Gestalt Theraphy

• Gestalt Therapy is an existential, phenomenological, and process-based approach created on the premise that individuals must be understood in the context of their ongoing relationship with the environment. Awareness, choice, and responsibility are cornerstones of practice
• Contemporary Gestalt therapy, a.k.a. relational Gestalt therapy, stresses dialogue and relationship between the client and the therapist.
• Fritz Perls practiced Gestalt therapy paternalistically. Clients have to grow up, stand on their own two feet, and “deal with their life problems themselves.” Perls’ style of doing therapy involved two agendas:

  1. moving from environmental support to self-support
  2. reintegrating the disowned parts of one’s personality
• Genuine knowledge is the product of what is immediately evident in the experience of the perceiver.
• Beisser suggested that authentic change occurs more from being who we are than from trying to be who we are not.

  Paradoxical Theory of Change
• Some principles of gestalt therapy theory:

  • Holism
  • Figure-Formation Process
  • Field Theory
  • Organismic Self-Regulation
• all of nature is seen as unified and coherent whole

  holism
• tracks how some aspect of the environmental field emerges from the background.

  figure-formation process
• asserts that the organism must be seen in its environment or as part of the constantly changing field

  field theory
• a process by which equilibrium is “disturbed” by the emergence of a need, a sensation, or an interest.

  organismic self-regulation
• One of the main contributions of the Gestalt approach is its emphasis on learning to appreciate and fully experienced the present moment. Focusing on the past and the future can be a way to avoid coming to terms with the present. Gestalt therapists recognize that the past will make regular appearances in the present moment, usually because of some lack of completion of that past experience.

  The Now
• Involves paying attention to what is occurring now

  Phenomenological Inquiry
• When figures emerge from the background but are not completed and resolved, individuals are left with unfinished business, which can be manifested in unexpressed feelings such as resentment, rage, hatred, pain, anxiety, grief, guilt, and abandonment
• or stuck point, is the time when external support is not available or the customary way of being does not work

  impasse
• In Gestalt therapy, contact is necessary if change and growth are to occur. It is made by seeing, hearing, smelling, touching, and moving.
• The tendency to uncritically accept others’ beliefs and standards without assimilating them to make them congruent with who we are

  Introjection
• The reverse of introjection; we disown certain aspects of ourselves by assigning them to the environment

  Projection
• Consists of turning back unto ourselves what we would like to do to someone else or doing to ourselves what we would like someone else to do to or for us.

  Retroflection
• It is the process of distraction or veering off, so that it is difficult to maintain a sustained sense of contact.

  Deflection
• Involves blurring the differentiation between the self and the environment

  Confluence
• In Gestalt therapy, special attention is given to where energy is located, how it is used, and how it can be blocked.
• Blocked energy is another form of defensive behavior. It can be manifested by tension in some part of the body, by posture, by keeping one’s body tight and closed, by not breathing deeply, by looking away from people when speaking to avoid contact, by choking off sensations, by numbing feelings, and by speaking with a restricted voice.
• The 6 Methodological Components Vital to the Gestalt Therapy

  • the continuum of experience
  • the here and now
  • the paradoxical theory of change
  • the experiment
  • the authentic encounter
  • process-oriented diagnosis
• Gestalt therapists use active methods and personal engagement with clients to increase their awareness, freedom, and self-direction rather than directing them toward present goals.
• An important function of a gestalt therapists is paying attention to clients’ body language.
• Miriam Polster described a three-stage integration sequence that characterizes client growth in therapy:

  1. discovery
  2. accommodation
  3. assimilation
• Exercises are ready-made techniques that are sometimes used to make something happen in a therapy session or to achieve a goal.
• Experiments, in contrast, grow out of the interaction between client and therapist, and they emerge within this dialogic process.
• Experimentation is an attitude inherent in all Gestalt therapy; it is a collaborative process with full participation of the client.
• Sensitivity and careful attention on the therapist’s part is essential so that clients are “neither blasted into experiences that are too threatening nor allowed to stay in safe but infertile territory”
• In fact, a number of Gestalt therapy writers propose that the term “resistance” is actually incompatible with the philosophical and theoretical tenets of Gestalt therapy
• Yontef refers to the Perlsian style as a “boom-boom-boom therapy” characterized by theatrics, abrasive confrontation, and intense catharsis.
• According to Yontef , the newer version of relational Gestalt therapy has evolved to include more support and increased kindness and compassion in therapy. This approach “combines sustained empathic inquiry with crisp, clear, and relevant awareness focusing”
• Confrontation can be done in such a way that clients cooperate, especially when they are invited to examine their behaviors, attitudes, and thoughts. Therapists can encourage clients to look at certain incongruities, especially gaps between their verbal and nonverbal expression.
• The top dog is righteous, authoritarian, moralistic, demanding, bossy, and manipulative. “SHOULD AND OUGHT”
• The underdog manipulates by playing the role of victim: by being defensive, apologetic, helpless, and weak and by feigning powerlessness. This is the passive side, the one without responsibility, and the one that finds excuses.
• The empty-chair technique is one way of getting the client to externalize the introject, a technique Perls used a great deal. Using two chairs, the therapist asks the client to sit in one chair and be fully the top dog and then shift to the other chair and become the underdog.
• Essentially, this is a role-playing technique in which all the parts are played by the client. In this way the introjects can surface, and the client can experience the conflict more fully. The conflict can be resolved by the client’s acceptance and integration of both sides. The goal of this exercise is to promote a higher level of integration between the polarities and conflicts that exist in everyone. The aim is not to rid oneself of certain traits but to learn to accept and live with the polarities.

  The Internal Dialogue Exercise
• Making the rounds is a Gestalt exercise that involves asking a person in a group to go up to others in the group and either speak to or do something with each person.
• Certain symptoms and behaviors often represent reversals of underlying or latent impulses. Thus, the therapist could ask a person who claims to suffer from severe inhibitions and excessive timidity to play the role of an exhibitionist.

  Reversal Exercise