The concept of gestalt in psychology. Basic methods and techniques of Gestalt therapy. What is Gestalt therapy? Gestalt therapy is also based on the psychological concept of “unfinished actions.” Very often the patient is the person who simply leaves
The unfamiliar word “Gestalt” still hurts the ears of many, although, if you look at it, Gestalt therapy is not such a stranger. Many concepts and techniques developed by it over the 50 years of its existence have literally become “folk”, since in one way or another they are included in various areas of modern psychotherapy. This is the here and now principle, borrowed from Eastern philosophy; a holistic approach that considers man and the world as a holistic phenomenon. This is the principle of self-regulation and interchange with the environment and a paradoxical theory of change: they occur when a person becomes who he is, and does not try to be who he is not. This is, finally, the “empty chair” technique, when you express your complaints not to a real, but to an imaginary interlocutor - a boss, a friend, your own laziness.
Gestalt therapy is the most universal direction of psychotherapy, providing the basis for any work with the inner world - from combating childhood fears to coaching top officials. Gestalt therapy perceives a person as a holistic phenomenon, in which simultaneously and constantly there is conscious and unconscious, body and mind, love and hate, past and plans for the future. And all this is only here and now, since the past no longer exists and the future has not yet arrived. Man is designed in such a way that he cannot exist in isolation, as a “thing in itself.” The outside world is by no means hostile to us (as psychoanalysis claimed); on the contrary, it is the environment that nourishes us and in which our life is the only possible one. Only in contact with the outside world can we take what we lack and give what fills us. When this mutual exchange is disrupted, we freeze and life becomes like an abandoned circus arena, where the lights have long gone out, the spectators have left, and we habitually walk and walk in circles.
The goal of Gestalt therapy is not even to understand why we walk in this circle, but to restore freedom in our relationships with the world: we are free to leave and return, run in circles or sleep in the open air.
Granddaughter for grandmother
Gestalt therapy is called the granddaughter of psychoanalysis. Its founder, the Austrian psychiatrist Frederick Perls, at the beginning professional path was a Freudian, but, like any good student, he went further than his teacher, combining Western psychotherapeutic schools with the ideas of Eastern philosophy. To create a new direction (as well as for Perls’ personal life) important role played by his acquaintance with Laura, a doctor of Gestalt psychology, who later became his wife. The word gestalt (German) itself does not have an exact translation. Approximately, it denotes a complete image, a complete structure. At the beginning of the 20th century, a school of experimental psychology emerged, called “Gestalt psychology.” Its essence is that we perceive the world as a collection of integral images and phenomena (gestalts). Narmiper, bkuvy in solve can be followed in any place - we still understand the meaning. If we see something unfamiliar, the brain first quickly tries to find what it looks like and adapt it to it. new information. And only if this fails, the orienting reflex is activated: “What is it?”
The postulates of the new direction were strongly influenced by the “field” theory developed by Gestalt psychologist Kurt Lewin. Essentially, this discovery showed: the world has everything we need, but we see only what we want to see, what is important to us at this moment in our lives, and the rest becomes an unnoticeable background, rushing by, like the landscape outside a car window. When we are cold, we dream of warmth and comfort; when we are looking for boots, we look at everyone’s feet. When we are in love, all other men cease to exist for us.
Another theory - “unfinished actions” - has experimentally found that unfinished tasks are best remembered. Until the work is done, we are not free. She holds us like an invisible leash, not allowing us to leave. We all know very well how this happens, because at least once everyone has wandered around the table with an unfinished coursework, no longer able to write it, but also unable to do anything else.
In Perls's life there was a series of meetings that influenced the emergence of the theory of Gestalt therapy. For some time he worked as an assistant to the doctor Kurt Goldstein, who practiced a holistic approach to man, not considering it possible to divide him into organs, parts or functions. Thanks to Wilhelm Reich, who introduced the bodily dimension into psychotherapeutic work, Gestalt therapy became the first direction to consider bodily manifestations not as separately existing symptoms requiring treatment, but as one of the ways of experiencing internal, emotional conflicts. Perls' views were also influenced strong influence ideas of existentialism of the 20–30s.
And, finally, the essence and philosophy of Gestalt therapy, its view of the world as a process, and of man as a traveler, its love of paradoxes, the desire for truth hidden in the depths of everyone - all this surprisingly resonates with the ideas of Buddhism and Taoism.
Mission Possible
Perls based his theory on the idea of balance and self-regulation, that is, in essence, the wisdom of nature. If nothing interferes with a person, he will inevitably be happy and contented - like a tree growing in favorable conditions, capable of taking everything it needs for its own growth. We are children of this world, and it contains everything we need to be happy.
Perls created a beautiful theory about the contact cycle environment. What this is can be easily understood at simple example your lunch. How does it all begin? At first you feel hungry. From this feeling a desire is born - to satisfy hunger. Then you correlate your desire with the surrounding reality and begin to look for ways to realize it. And finally, the moment comes to meet the object of your need. If everything went as it should, you are satisfied with the process and the result, you are full and almost happy. The cycle is complete.
Included in this big contact cycle are many small ones: perhaps you had to finish or reschedule something to go to lunch, or you went to lunch with one of your colleagues. You had to get dressed to go out, and then choose from a variety of dishes what you wanted (and could afford) right now. Likewise, the lunch itself could be included in a larger gestalt called "Business Meeting" (or "Romantic Date" or "See You at Last"). And this gestalt is even greater (“Job Search”, “Career Advancement”, “Crazy Romance”, “Creating a Family”). So our whole life (and the life of all humanity) is like a nesting doll, made up of different gestalts: from crossing the street to the construction of the Great Wall of China, from a minute conversation with an acquaintance on the street to fifty years of family life.
The reasons for our dissatisfaction in life lie in the fact that some cycles of contact are interrupted somewhere, gestalts remain incomplete. And at the same time, on the one hand, we are busy (until the work is done, we are not free), and on the other hand, we are hungry, since satisfaction is possible only when the job is done (lunch is eaten, the wedding took place, life is good).
And here is one of the key points of Gestalt therapy. Perls focused his attention not on how the outside world interferes with us, but on how we prevent ourselves from being happy. Because (remember field theory) there is everything in this world, but for us there is only what we ourselves select from the background. And we can highlight either our powerlessness in the face of evil circumstances that did not allow us to dine, or the opportunity to somehow change them. Those who want, look for ways, and those who don’t want, look for reasons. And in fact, people differ from each other not so much in what circumstances they were given, but in how they react to them. Obviously, an employee who is inclined to feel powerless in front of a tyrant boss is much more likely to remain hungry, because he stops himself much more effectively than his boss.
The goal of therapy is to find a place and a way to interrupt contact, find out how and why a person stops himself, and restore the normal cycle of events in nature.
Stereo effect
Gestalt therapy is sometimes called contact therapy. This is its uniqueness. Until now, this is the only practice in which the therapist works “by himself,” in contrast to classical psychoanalysis, where the most neutral position is maintained (“ blank slate"). During a session, the Gestalt therapist has the right to his own feelings and desires and, aware of them, presents them to the client if the process requires it. People turn to a therapist when they want to change something - in themselves or in their lives. But he refuses the role of a person who “knows how to do it”, does not give directive instructions or interpretations, as in psychoanalysis, and becomes one who facilitates the client’s meeting with his essence. The therapist himself embodies that piece of the world with which the client is trying to build a familiar (and ineffective) relationship. The client, communicating with the therapist, seeks to transfer onto him his stereotypes about people, about how they “should” behave and how they “usually” react to him, and encounters a spontaneous reaction from the therapist who does not consider it necessary to adapt to a changing world the one with whom you are in contact. Very often this reaction does not fit into the client’s “script” and forces the latter to take a decisive step beyond the usual barrier of his expectations, ideas, fears or resentments. He begins to explore his reactions to an unusual situation - right here and now - and his new possibilities or limitations. And in the end it comes to the conclusion that, by building relationships, everyone can remain themselves and at the same time maintain intimate contact with the other. He gains or restores the lost freedom to get out of the script, out of the usual circle. He himself gains the experience of a new, different interaction. Then he can integrate this experience into his life.
The goal of such therapy is to return a person to himself, to restore freedom to deal with his life. The client is not a passive object of analysis, but an equal creator and participant in the therapeutic process. After all, only he himself knows where his magic door and the golden key to it are. Even if he forgot or doesn’t want to look in the right direction, he knows.
Responsible for everything
There are several “whales” on which the earth called “Gestalt therapy” rests.
Awareness– sensory experience, experiencing oneself in contact. This is one of those moments when I “gut” know who I am, what I am like and what is happening to me. This is experienced as insight, and at some point in life the awareness becomes continuous.
Awareness inevitably entails responsibility, but not as guilt, but as authorship: this is not happening to me, this is how I live. It’s not my head that hurts, but I feel pain and compression in my head, I’m not being manipulated, but I agree to be the object of manipulation. At first, accepting responsibility causes resistance because it deprives you of the enormous benefits of psychological games and shows the “wrong side” of human exploits and suffering. But if we find the courage to face our “shadow”, we will be rewarded - we begin to understand that we have power over our own lives and over our relationships with other people. After all, if I do it, then I can redo it! We develop our possessions and sooner or later reach their borders.
So, after experiencing the euphoria of power, we encounter the uncontrollable - with time and losses, with love and sadness, with our strength and weakness, with the decisions and actions of other people. We humble ourselves and accept not only this world, but also ourselves in it, after which the therapy ends and life continues.
The principle of reality. It is easy to explain, but difficult to accept. There is a certain reality (given to us in sensations), but there is also our opinion about it, our interpretation of what is happening. These reactions are much more varied than the facts, and they often turn out to be so stronger than sensations that we spend a long time and seriously solving the problem: is the king naked or am I stupid?
Gestalt therapy is sometimes called “therapy of the obvious.” The therapist does not rely on the client’s thoughts or his own generalizations, but on what he sees and hears. He avoids judgment and interpretation, but asks the questions “what?” and “how?” Practice has shown that it is enough to focus on the process (what is happening and how it is happening), and not on the content (what is being discussed), for a person to exclaim that same “aha!” A common reaction to meeting reality is resistance, because a person is deprived of illusions and rose-colored glasses. “Yes, it was true. But it’s kind of a treacherous truth,” admitted one of the group members. In addition, reality sometimes forces a person to admit that the king is really naked, and then it will no longer be possible to live as before. And the newness is scary.
Here and now. The future does not exist yet, the past has already happened, we live in the present. Only here and now am I writing this text, and you read it, or remember what happened, or make plans for the future. Only here and now is change possible.
This principle does not deny our past at all. The client’s experience, the field of his life, does not disappear anywhere and determines his behavior at every moment, including during the session. And yet, here and now he is talking to a therapist - and why about this? What is here and now that could be useful (at the moment)?
Dialogue in Gestalt therapy it is a meeting of two worlds: client and therapist, person and person. When the worlds come into contact, in this contact it is possible to explore the border that exists between “me” and “not-me”. The client (sometimes for the first time!) experiences the experiences that arise in the process of interacting with someone who is “not me” while simultaneously maintaining his own identity. These are those I–You relationships in which there is I with my feelings, You with my feelings and that living, unique thing that happens between them (happens for the first time, this very minute and will never happen again).
This is a unique experience because the therapist is a person outside the client's life who does not need anything from him, and can truly allow the client to be himself and experience what he is experiencing without trying to influence his feelings.
Gestalt therapy is beyond morality and politics. Its only task is to make the client’s inner world accessible to him, to return the person to himself. She has no educational goals. She doesn’t care at all whether a person grows cabbage or rules a kingdom - it is important that everyone lives their own life, minds their own business and loves with their own love.
Walking together
In classical psychoanalysis and in everyday consciousness, individuality and society are opposed to each other. In everyday life, we often have the idea (and feeling) that another person limits our freedom, since it ends where our neighbor’s nose begins. Then the most logical conclusion seems to be that the fewer people there are around and the further we are from them, the more free we are, the easier it is to be ourselves. That is, psychologically speaking, loneliness is necessary for deep individualization. In most philosophical practices, the process of individualization involves immersion in oneself and withdrawal from the world.
Perhaps at some stage this is really necessary. But Gestalt therapy says: in order to come to yourself, you need to come to others. Go to another person - and there you will find your essence. Go into the world - and there you will find yourself.
But why does contact with the world and another person allow individualization to occur? Alone with ourselves, we can think whatever we want about ourselves. But we will never know if this is true until we interact with the world. A person may think that he can easily lift a car until he tries - in fact, this ability does not exist, but only fantasies about it. This is the false self, the false uniqueness. True uniqueness involves real action in the real world.
What happens to our uniqueness when it meets the uniqueness of another? Only when we come into contact with the world (another person) does our uniqueness take on a practical character. Two realities collide, giving birth to a third. In this way, the socialization of individuality occurs: a person’s originality is the uniqueness of his functions, and this determines his value to others. Individuality brought to the boundary of contact turns into a function for others. For example: “I’m authoritarian” - Well, then lead.” “I am a poet” - “And make your soul sing.”
Thus, we go beyond the definition of society as restraining frameworks and regulations; they simply cease to play a determining role. What becomes significant is what in a person is of value to others. And what in others is of value to this person. These are our experiences, experiences and ideas, our unique characteristics or simply abilities that others do not have. This determines our need for each other and determines our relationships.
Diamond Eye
Remember the prayer attributed to the Optina elders: “Lord, give me the strength to change what I cannot bear! Lord, give me patience to endure what I cannot change! And, Lord, give me wisdom to distinguish the first from the second!” I have the impression that Gestalt therapy is gradually teaching me this wisdom. She has made my life interesting because it helps me to be very selective, to quickly abandon what does not suit me, to search and find what I need. And everything that happens in my life: people, business, hobbies, books - this is what I like, is interesting and needs.
Gestalt therapy also gave me peace. I can trust the river that is my life. She lets me know when and where I need to be alert, and when and where I can drop the oars and just surrender to the flow and the sun.
Gestalt therapy is one of the methods of psychotherapeutic counseling that arose in the mid-20th century. His fundamental principles, ideas and techniques developed by Paul Goodman, Frederick and Laura Perls. The central principles of Gestalt therapy are the desire to form and expand awareness, relevance, and taking responsibility for everything that happens to oneself. The main goal and means of Gestalt therapy is “conscious awareness.” This definition implies living a specific situation “here and now”, as well as conscious presence in such living. Work in Gestalt is always carried out only with those problems and experiences that are relevant for patients precisely “here and now”.
Gestalt therapy in modern psychotherapy is built on the basis of the experience of comprehending consciousness and the identification of essential features in it (philosophical phenomenology) and Gestalt psychology.
Gestalt therapy theory
The founders of Gestalt therapy saw this method of psychotherapy as deeply practical and not subject to theoretical research. However, over time, the volume of information and comprehension of the experience of Gestalt therapy required systematization of theory and analysis. P. Goodman was the first to engage in theoretical systematization and analysis. It was he who first constructed the cycle-contact curve. It is Goodman who modern psychotherapy owes for the introduction of most of the terms of Gestalt therapy.
Gestalt therapy and its main principles are based on the ability of the psyche to, in the process of unity of all functions of the body and psyche, on the body’s ability to creatively adapt to the environment.
The theory of Gestalt therapy is also based on the individual's responsibility for his own actions, goals and expectations. Main role The psychotherapist’s goal is to focus the patient’s attention on the awareness of what is happening “here and now.”
S. Ginger argued that everything that happens to the subject are events that occur at the contact boundary. In other words, boundary-contact simultaneously involves the isolation of the individual from the environment and the potential possibility of interaction with such an environment. In Gestalt therapy, the approach to resistance is radically different from the approach of research trends.
Gestalt therapy represents resistance as methods of interaction between the individual’s body and the environment that previously had high efficiency for the purpose of interaction, however, in the actual present, the methods of interaction are either completely inappropriate or the only ones available to the patient. So, for example, for a drug-addicted client, a characteristic method of interaction will be the merging of the body with the environment, which is considered completely organic in the interaction between the baby and the mother. It follows that the patient’s resistance, naturally shown by him in the process of interaction with the psychotherapist, is used as the basis for an effective search for needs that are unconscious by the patient.
Gestalt therapy practice also focuses on making the client aware of their own true needs. Gestalt theory, first of all, considers the boundaries of contact between the individual’s body and its environment. The most important has practical experience in this theory. In fact, Gestalt sees any situation through the prism of experience, while striving to abstract from any opinions that precede the experience.
In Gestalt therapy, in contrast to psychiatric practice, the main place belongs to experimental analysis and action, which should lead to creative adaptation, perception of the new, awakening and growth.
From an anthropological point of view, Gestalt therapy considers the organism as a whole; for it, the individual is a whole. And different methods of interaction with the environment, such as emotions, thinking, are functions of the whole. This theory is based on the concept animal nature the individual, according to which he cannot separate from the environment and is forced to constantly adapt to it for the sake of his own survival.
From the position of Gestalt therapy, a person at each stage of his development lives in a certain field that combines his past experience, self-image, beliefs, values, attitudes, hopes for the future, significant relationships, career, environment, material possessions and culture.
Gestalt therapy is considered a field concept because it argues that in order to understand an individual's behavior, the entire configuration of relationships in his life must be considered. This configuration covers the past experience of the individual, her views and values, desires and expectations, current needs, the modern structure of life, determined by her place of residence, work, family ties, the immediate circumstances in which she now finds herself. The term Gestalt refers to a configuration of parts that are connected together.
The state of each part of the field is to some extent determined by its mutually directed action with the other part. The field also includes the biological state of the individual at the moment, his current desires and needs, and immediate circumstances. Actions and experiences will be determined at any given moment by the interaction of all these parts. Since in some part of this field certain transformations will always occur, i.e. the individual can never remain the same as he was before.
Gestalt therapy brings to the fore the awareness of what is happening in the present moment. various levels, inextricably united with each other - at the bodily level, at the emotional and intellectual levels. Everything that happens “here and now” is a fully flowing experience that affects the body as a whole, and also consists of memories that precede the experience, fantasies, unfinished situations, anticipations and intentions.
The goal of Gestalt therapy is not to help the patient resolve a specific problem that worries him and with which he came to the psychotherapist. In accordance with Gestalt, an existing complaint serves as a certain signal or is a symptom of a habitual lifestyle, which is the real problem. Gestalt therapy focuses on increasing the individual's ability to maintain meaningful contact and increasing awareness of what is happening, resulting in the individual gaining the ability to make effective choices. However, it should be understood that Gestalt does not mean by “increasing awareness” the achievement of insight. The essence of Gestalt therapy is to increase the client's ability to remain centered in the actual present moment and to learn to be aware of it.
Perls Gestalt Therapy
Gestalt literally translated from German means image, form. Gestalt theory states that the individual functions based on the principle of self-regulation. The personality maintains its homeostasis (dynamic balance) through constant comprehension of the needs that are formed in it and generated by the environment, and the satisfaction of these needs gradually as they appear, along with this, all remaining objects or events that have no connection with this process, recede into the background.
Gestalt therapy and its main provisions are based on five core theoretical definitions: the relationship between background and figure, awareness and concentration on the actual present, opposites, responsibility and maturity, and defense functions.
One of the central definitions in the theory of Gestalt therapy is the relationship between ground and figure. Self-regulatory processes of the body lead to the formation of a figure - a gestalt. The concept of "gestalt" should be understood as a pattern or form - special organization parts that make up a certain whole, which cannot be transformed without destroying it. Gestalt formations arise only with a specific background or against a specific background. For the background, the individual chooses what is important or significant for him, and this important or interesting thing for him becomes a gestalt.
Once the need is satisfied, the gestalt is completed. In other words, Gestalt loses its relevance and importance. At the same time, it fades into the background, making room for the formation of a new gestalt. This rhythm of production and completion of gestalts is a normal rhythm of the human body.
If the need cannot be satisfied, then the gestalt remains incomplete.
In order to have the ability and ability to develop and complete gestalts, an individual must be fully aware of himself at a given moment in time. Awareness and concentration on the actual present are central concepts of Gestalt therapy. To satisfy their own needs, people need to be constantly in contact with areas of their inner self and external environment. The internal area of awareness covers the processes and phenomena occurring in the human body. People respond to their own internal needs when, for example, they put on a sweater when they feel cold. The external region combines the totality of external phenomena that enter the human consciousness as perceiving signals. Data coming from internal and external areas is practically not evaluated or interpreted.
In addition to the inner and outer areas, there is also a middle area. Perls called this area the fantasy zone, which contains thoughts, fantasies, beliefs, connections and other intellectual, mental processes. He believed that neuroses arise as a result of a tendency to concentrate on the middle region due to the exclusion from consciousness of the phenomena of the internal and external regions. This tendency conflicts with the natural rhythm of the body's processes. In general, much of the private and cultural experience of people arises from the process improvement of the middle domain. People learn to reason about their own thoughts, justify beliefs, defend relationships, and evaluate others.
Perls argued that the causes of abnormal states lie in human desires to fantasize and comprehend when interpreting what they are aware of. When an individual is in the middle region, he mainly works with his past or future: remembering, planning, despairing and hoping. People do not live in the actual present and invariably do not pay attention to the need to understand the processes occurring in external and internal areas. Self-regulation of the body depends on awareness of the current and on the ability to live according to the “here and now” principle to the fullest.
Perls called the opposite a single assessment or a set of such assessments. So, for example, the assessments “bad” or “good” are two opposites of such a totality. According to Gestalt therapy, people form their own perception of the world through such opposites. Perls believed that personality is formed according to the same principles. Subjects experience opposing emotions throughout their lives. Every day a person is dominated alternately by hatred, then love, then happiness, then frustration. So, for example, throughout life an individual loves and hates his own parents, wives or husbands, children. It is important to understand that such opposites do not represent irreconcilable contradictions, but are differences that can form and complete a gestalt.
The concept of opposites can also be applied to personality functioning. Personality is interpreted as a kind of holistic formation that combines two components: “I” and “It”. In cases where an individual acts according to impulses from the sphere of his “I”, he is able to distinguish himself from others. Such a boundary of the “I” appears with the aim of feeling one’s own uniqueness, dissimilarity from the rest of the world. In cases where individuals act according to impulses from the sphere of “It”, then they find themselves closely interconnected with their own environment, the barrier of “I” is transformed into a vague and flexible edge. Sometimes there is even a feeling of identity with the outside world. These aspects of personality functioning, complementary to each other, are responsible for the development and completion of gestalts. Aspirations from the sphere of “I” help to highlight a clear image from the background. In other words, they form an image, and aspirations from the sphere of “It” complete the gestalt with the subsequent return of the image to the background environment.
The individual’s psyche responds to threats or stressful factors by avoiding problems, developing immunity to pain, and sometimes with hallucinations or delusions. Such reactions are called protection functions. They are capable of distorting or interrupting an individual’s contact with a threatening situation. However, when the danger affects the subject over a long period of time or the individual is exposed to many dangers at the same time, as a result of which the brain will protect him even from ordinary sneezing without the use of protection. The result of this will be that the individual learns that contact with the environment is unsafe, as a result of which he will resort to protective reactions in all situations, even when danger does not threaten.
In Gestalt theory, optimal health is considered maturity. To achieve maturity, the subject must cope with his desire to receive help from outside. Instead, he needs to learn to find new sources of help within himself. If an individual is not mature, then he will be more likely to manipulate the environment in order to satisfy desires and needs, rather than take responsibility for his own disappointments and failures. Maturity comes only when an individual mobilizes own resources in order to overcome the condition and fear that appear due to the lack of outside help and the inadequacy of self-help. Circumstances in which an individual cannot take advantage of outside help and rely on himself are a dead end. Maturity is the ability to take risks in order to get out of a dead end. In cases where an individual does not take risks, his behavioral role stereotypes are updated, which allow him to manipulate other people.
Perls believed that the adult personality must diligently, step by step, work through all its own neurotic levels in order to accept responsibility for itself and achieve maturity. The first level is called the “cliché” level. At this level, people act in stereotypical ways. The next level is the “artificial” level, in which roles and games of various directions dominate. Here they manipulate others while trying to get the help they think they need. After the “artificial” level comes the “dead end” level, characterized by the lack of outside help and the inadequacy of self-help. Individuals avoid this level in the same way as they avoid any pain, since in situations of “dead end” they feel frustrated, lost and deceived. Then comes the level of “internal explosion”. Having reached this level, people touch their real “I”, their own personality, which was previously, as it were, “buried” under protections of various kinds.
Most often, Gestalt therapy practice is focused on experiences at the “dead end” level. The therapeutic intervention creates a non-threatening crisis situation, and the group provides a safe environment that encourages risky decision-making.
Gestalt therapy techniques
For adequate interaction of the individual with the environment, other individuals and himself, the so-called “contact boundary” must always be observed. Its blurring and disruption leads to neuroses and other problems of a psychological, personal and emotional nature. This may occur after contact is terminated without proper completion. Failure to complete contacts can subsequently become entrenched in the individual’s actions and lead to neuroticism.
With the help of Gestalt therapy techniques, an individual can restore the contact boundary, unite his own feelings, thoughts and reactions, thereby freeing himself from psychological problems.
The techniques used in Gestalt practices are united around two key areas of work: principles and games. The principles are used on initial stage therapy. The main principles in Gestalt therapy are the principles: “here and now”, “I - you”, subjectivization of statements and the continuum of consciousness.
The “here and now” principle is a functional concept of what is happening at the moment. So, for example, momentary memories from childhood will relate to the “here and now” principle, but what happened a couple of minutes ago will not.
The I-Thou principle demonstrates the desire for open and natural contact between human individuals.
The principle of subjectivization of statements is the transformation of subjective statements into objective ones. For example, the phrase “something is pressing in the chest area” should be replaced with “I am suppressing myself.”
An integral component of all Gestalt practices and one of the central concepts is the continuum of consciousness. It can also be used as a separate technique. The continuum of consciousness is focusing on the spontaneous flow of the essence of experiences, a way of leading the individual to natural excitement and renunciation of verbalizations and interpretations.
The technical techniques are called Gestalt games, which consist of various actions performed by clients on the instructions of the psychotherapist. They promote a more natural confrontation with significant content and experiences. Games provide the opportunity to experiment with yourself or other group members.
Greetings, dear visitors to the site of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy online, I wish you mental health.
Such an introjected (essentially programmed) person, if he says “I”, means “THEY”. Those. does not live his own life, and often this is the life of a loser.
Unfinished Gestalt and “Projection”
With projection, a person shifts responsibility for what is happening to the environment. Often, he attributes all his hidden, unconscious negative qualities to other people. Including life problems and misfortunes.
When such a person says “THEY”, one must understand - “I”.
With the help of the Gestalt approach, he can understand and solve his problems.
Incomplete Gestalt and “Merger”
When merging, a person’s contact boundaries are so blurred that he is unable to distinguish his thoughts, feelings and actions from the thoughts, feelings and actions of other people.
When such a person says “WE”, it can be “THEY” and “I”.
Unfinished Gestalt and “Retroflection”
With retroflexion (turning back), a person transfers to himself emotions and actions intended for others.
He draws a contact line in the middle of himself, as if dividing into two personalities.
Such a person uses pronouns: “himself”, “to himself”, as if we are talking about two different people.
Gestalt therapy: methods, techniques and exercises
Using the methods, techniques and exercises of Gestalt therapy, transference and countertransference, in incomplete situations, an emotional outburst and completion of the Gestalt (situation) is possible, i.e. restoration of the contact boundary and getting rid of neurotic mechanisms.Gestalt therapy method “Peeling the onion”
By using the “peeling the onion” method, a person is gradually freed from neurosis, psychological and emotional problems. With the help of the therapist’s questions and the client’s answers, the problem, one after another, appearing in the form of “Figures”, is gradually removed into the “Background”.
The ultimate goal of therapy is for the client to gain the ability to cope independently with their psychological problems, and did not depend on the Gestalt therapist.
Gestalt therapy technique “Here and Now”
Psychotherapy “here and now” helps to free yourself from today's difficulties, regardless of when they arose.
The current solution to problems frees the future from these problems.
Gestalt therapy approach “Shuttle movement”
“Shuttle movement” consists of a stage-by-stage experience by the client of an event with a return (if necessary) from the next stage to the previous one.
The experience takes place in the style of “psychodrama”, i.e. the client visualizes the traumatic situation and experiences it, thereby completing the “unfinished situation.”
Gestalt therapy exercises for independent use
Gestalt prayer by Fritz Perls:
I am me.
And you are you.
I am not in this world to live up to your expectations.
And you are not there to live in accordance with mine.
I am me.
And you are you,
Amen.
Title: Practice of Gestalt therapy.
Fritz S. Perls is the founder of Gestalt therapy, one of the leading areas of modern humanistic psychology. He was born in Berlin in 1893. Having received medical education, in 1926 he became an assistant to the famous Gestalt psychologist Kurt Goldstein. At the same time, Perls joins the psychoanalytic movement; his teacher and analyst was Wilhelm Reich, and Karen Horney, Otto Fenichel and others also worked with him. In the mid-30s, Perls emigrated to South Africa(where he founded a psychoanalytic institute), then to the United States. In the early 40s, Perls broke with the psychoanalytic movement. His first book, “Ego, Hunger and Aggression,” was subtitled “Revisiting Freud’s Theory and Method” in the first edition, and “Introduction to Gestalt Therapy” in the second edition. The book “Gestalt Therapy: Excitement and Growth in the Human Personality” is dedicated to the first formulation of the foundations of a new psychotherapeutic approach, which has melted into itself the tasks of psychoanalysis, the insight of Gestalt psychology, the revelation of the philosophy of existentialism and phenomenology, the first part of which we offer to the reader.
It was originally a manuscript by Frederick S. Perls. Ralph Hefferlin developed the practical part, Paul Goodman developed and expanded the theoretical part.
So in its present form it is the result of the joint efforts of three authors, and each bears equal responsibility for it.
We had one common goal - to create a theory and method that would expand the possibilities and applicability of psychotherapy. We did not consider it necessary to politely conceal our many differences of opinion from each other, and open discussion of them more than once led us to results that neither of us could have foreseen in advance. Many of the ideas in the original manuscript have been retained in this book, but much has been added through collaborative efforts and, more importantly, much has taken on new meaning in the context of the resulting whole.
Table of contents
From the translator
Introduction
ORIENTATION
INITIAL SITUATION
CONTACT WITH YOUR ENVIRONMENT
Experiment 1: Feeling of present reality
Experiment 2: Sensing Opposite Forces
Experiment 3: Attention and Concentration
Experiment 4: Differentiation and integration
METHODOLOGY OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Experiment 5: Recall
Experiment 6: Heightening body awareness
Experiment 7: Experiencing Emotional Continuity
Experiment 8: Verbalization
Experiment 9: Integrating Awareness
DIRECTED AWARENESS
Experiment 10: Turning Merge into Contact
Experiment 11: Turning Anxiety into Excitement
SELF MANIPULATION
CHANGED SITUATION
RETROFLEXION
Experiment 12: Study of Misdirected Behavior
Experiment 13: Muscle Mobilization
Experiment 14: Performing a reverse action
INTROJECTION
Experiment 15: Introjection and Eating
Experiment 16: Getting rid of introjects and digesting them
PROJECTIONS
Experiment 17: Revealing Projections
Experiment 18: Projection Assignment
GESTALT APPROACH AND WITNESS THERAPY
Preface
Introduction
GESTALT APPROACH
BASES
Gestalt psychology
Homeostasis
Holistic doctrine
Contact boundary
NEUROTIC MECHANISMS
The birth of neurosis
Introjections
Projection
Merger
Retroflexion
NEUROTIC AND THERAPIST
HERE AND NOW
CLEANING THE ONION
SHUTTLE MOVEMENT, PSYCHODRAMA AND CONFUSION
WHO'S LISTENING?
WITNESS TO THERAPY
From the editor
GESTALT IN ACTION
What is Gestalt
Awareness
Marriage
Gestalt prayer
Couples No. 1
Couples No. 2
Philosophy of the obvious
Dream Maidline
Everything is a process of awareness
World of fools
Fritz and Freud
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Gestalt - what is it? Many people ask this question modern people, however, not everyone manages to find the correct answer to it. The word “Gestalt” itself is of German origin. Translated into Russian it means “structure”, “image”, “form”.
This concept was introduced into psychiatry by psychoanalyst Frederick Perls. He is the founder of Gestalt therapy.
Frederick Perls was a practicing psychiatrist, so all the methods he developed were primarily used to cure mental disorders, including psychoses, neuroses, etc. However, the Gestalt therapy method became very widespread. Psychologists and psychiatrists working in the field soon became interested in what it is. different areas. Such a wide popularity of Gestalt therapy is due to the presence of a reasonable and understandable theory, a wide choice of methods or patients, as well as high level efficiency.
Main advantage
The main and greatest advantage is a holistic approach to a person, which takes into account his mental, physical, spiritual and social aspects. Gestalt therapy, instead of focusing on the question “Why is this happening to a person?” replaces it with the following: “What does a person feel now and how can this be changed?” Therapists working in this direction try to focus people's attention on awareness of the processes that happen to them “here and now.” Thus, the client learns to take responsibility for his life and for everything that happens in it, and, consequently, for making the desired changes.
Perls himself viewed Gestalt as a whole, the destruction of which leads to the production of fragments. The form strives to be unified, and if this does not happen, the person finds himself in an unfinished situation that puts pressure on him. There are often many unfinished gestalts hidden in people, which are not so difficult to get rid of, it’s enough to see them. The huge advantage is that to discover them there is no need to delve into the depths of the unconscious, but you just need to learn to notice the obvious.
The Gestalt approach is based on such principles and concepts as integrity, responsibility, the emergence and destruction of structures, unfinished forms, contact, awareness, “here and now.”
The most important principle
A person is a holistic being, and he cannot be divided into any components, for example, into body and psyche or soul and body, since such artificial techniques cannot positively affect his understanding of his own inner world.
A holistic gestalt consists of a personality and the space surrounding it, influencing each other. To better understand this principle, you can turn to psychology interpersonal relationships. It makes it possible to clearly monitor how great influence society has on the individual. However, by changing himself, he influences other people, who, in turn, also become different.
The Moscow Gestalt Institute, like many others, includes the concept of “contact” as a key concept. A person is constantly in contact with something or someone - with plants, the environment, other people, informational, bioenergetic and psychological fields.
The place where an individual comes into contact with the environment is usually called the contact boundary. How better person feels and the more flexibly he can regulate the contact difference, the more successful he is in meeting his own needs and achieving his goals. However, this process is characterized characteristic features, which lead to disruption of the individual’s productive activity in various areas of interaction. Perls Gestalt therapy is aimed at overcoming such disorders.
The principle of the emergence and destruction of gestalt structures
Using the principle of the emergence and destruction of gestalt structures, one can easily explain the behavior of a person. Each person arranges his life depending on his own needs, to which he gives priority. His actions are aimed at meeting needs and achieving existing goals.
For a better understanding, you can consider several examples. So, a person who wants to buy a house saves money to buy it, finds a suitable option and becomes the owner of his own home. And those who want to have a child direct all their efforts to achieve this goal. After the desired is achieved (the need is satisfied), the gestalt is completed and destroyed.
The concept of an unfinished gestalt
However, not every gestalt reaches its completion (and then destruction). What happens to some people and why do they constantly form the same type of unfinished situations? This is the question for many years interested specialists in the field of psychology and psychiatry. This phenomenon is called unfinished gestalt.
Specialists whose place of work is one or another Gestalt institute have managed to recognize that the lives of many people are often filled with constantly recurring typical negative situations. For example, a person, despite the fact that he does not like to be exploited, constantly finds himself in precisely such situations, and someone who does not have a good personal life comes into contact with people he does not need over and over again. Such “deviations” are associated precisely with incomplete “images”, and the human psyche will not be able to find peace until they reach their logical end.
That is, a person who has an incomplete “structure”, on a subconscious level, constantly strives to create a negative unfinished situation only in order to resolve it and finally close this issue. A Gestalt therapist artificially creates a similar situation for his client and helps him find a way out of it.
Awareness
Another basic concept of Gestalt therapy is awareness. It is worth noting that a person’s intellectual knowledge about his external and internal world has nothing to do with him. Gestalt psychology associates awareness with being in the so-called “here and now” state. It is characterized by the fact that a person performs all actions, guided by consciousness and being vigilant, and does not live a mechanical life, relying solely on the stimulus-reactive mechanism, as is typical of animals.
Most problems (if not all) appear in a person’s life for the reason that he is guided by the mind and not by consciousness. But, unfortunately, the mind is a rather limited function, and people who live only by it do not even suspect that they are actually something more. This leads to the replacement of the true state of reality with an intellectual and false one, and also to the fact that the life of each person takes place in a separate illusory world.
Gestalt therapists around the world, including the Moscow Gestalt Institute, are confident that to solve most problems, misunderstandings, misunderstandings and difficulties, a person only needs to achieve awareness of his internal and external reality. The state of awareness does not allow people to act badly by giving in to impulses of random emotions, since they are always able to see the world around them as it really is.
Responsibility
From a person’s awareness, another useful quality is born - responsibility. The level of responsibility for one’s life directly depends on the level of clarity of a person’s awareness of the surrounding reality. It is human nature to always shift responsibility for one’s failures and mistakes onto others or even higher powers, but everyone who manages to take responsibility for themselves makes a big leap on the path of individual development.
Most people are not at all familiar with the concept of gestalt. They will find out what it is at an appointment with a psychologist or psychotherapist. The specialist identifies the problem and develops ways to eliminate it. It is for this purpose that Gestalt therapy has a wide variety of techniques, among which there are both its own and those borrowed from such as transactional analysis, art therapy, psychodrama, etc. According to Gestaltists, within the framework of their approach, you can use any methods that serve as natural continuation of the “therapist-client” dialogue and strengthen the processes of awareness.
The principle of “here and now”
According to him, everything that really matters happens in the moment. The mind takes a person to the past (memories, analysis of past situations) or to the future (dreams, fantasies, planning), but does not give the opportunity to live in the present, which leads to life passing by. Gestalt therapists encourage each of their clients to live “here and now”, without looking into the illusory world. All the work of this approach is connected with awareness of the present moment.
Types of Gestalt techniques and contracting
All Gestalt therapy techniques are conventionally divided into “projective” and “dialogue”. The former are used to work with dreams, images, imaginary dialogues, etc.
The latter represent painstaking work that is carried out by the therapist at the border of contact with the client. The specialist, having tracked the interruption mechanisms of the person with whom he is working, turns his emotions and experiences into part of his environment, and then brings them to the boundary of contact. It is worth noting that Gestalt techniques of both types are intertwined in work, and a clear distinction between them is possible only in theory.
The Gestalt therapy procedure, as a rule, begins with such a technique as concluding a contract. This direction characterized by the fact that the specialist and the client are equal partners, and the latter bears no less responsibility for the results of the work performed than the former. This aspect is precisely discussed at the stage of concluding the contract. At the same moment, the client forms his goals. It is very difficult for a person who constantly avoids responsibility to agree to such conditions, and already at this stage he needs work. At the stage of concluding a contract, a person begins to learn to be responsible for himself and for what happens to him.
"Hot chair" and "empty chair"
The “hot chair” technique is one of the most famous among therapists whose place of work is the Moscow Gestalt Institute and many other structures. This method is used for group work. A “hot chair” is a place where a person sits who intends to tell those present about his difficulties. During the work, only the client and the therapist interact with each other, the rest of the group members listen silently, and only at the end of the session talk about how they felt.
The basic Gestalt techniques also include the “empty chair”. It is used to place a person significant to the client with whom he can conduct a dialogue, and it does not matter so much whether he is currently alive or has already died. Another purpose of the “empty chair” is dialogue between various parts personality. This is necessary when the client has opposite attitudes that generate
Concentration and experimental enhancement
The Gestalt Institute calls its original technique concentration (focused awareness). There are three levels of awareness - the inner worlds (emotions, bodily sensations), outer worlds(what I see, hear), as well as thoughts. Keeping in mind one of the main principles of Gestalt therapy “here and now,” the client tells the specialist about his awareness at the moment. For example: “Now I’m lying on the couch and looking at the ceiling. I just can't relax. My heart is beating very fast. I know there is a therapist next to me.” This technique enhances the feeling of the present, helps to understand the ways in which a person is removed from reality, and is also valuable information for further work with him.
One more effective technology is experimental enhancement. It consists in maximizing some verbal and non-verbal manifestations. For example, in a case where a client, without realizing it, often begins his conversation with the words “yes, but...”, the therapist can suggest that he begin each phrase this way, and then the person becomes aware of his competition with others and the desire to always have the last word. .
Working with Polarities
This is another method that Gestalt therapy often uses. Techniques in this field are often aimed at identifying opposites in a person. Among them, working with polarities occupies a special place.
For example, for a person who constantly complains that he doubts himself, a specialist suggests that those who are confident try to communicate with the people around him from this position. It is equally useful to have a dialogue between your uncertainty and confidence.
For a client who does not know how to ask for help, the Gestalt therapist suggests turning to group members, sometimes even with very ridiculous requests. This technique makes it possible to expand the individual’s zone of awareness by including previously inaccessible personal potential.
Working with dreams
This technique is used by psychotherapists of various directions, but the original Gestalt method has features that are characteristic only of it. Here, the specialist considers all elements of sleep as parts of the human personality, with each of which the client must identify. This is done to appropriate one’s own projections or get rid of retroflections. In addition, in this technique no one has canceled the use of the “here and now” principle.
Thus, the client should tell the therapist about his dream as if it were something happening in the present tense. For example: “I am running along a forest path. I have great mood and I enjoy every moment spent in this forest, etc.” It is necessary for the client to describe his dream “here and now” not only from own name, but also on behalf of other people and objects present in the vision. For example, “I am a winding forest path. A person is running towards me now, etc.”
Thanks to its own and borrowed techniques, Gestalt therapy helps people get rid of all kinds of masks and establish trusting contact with others. The Gestalt approach takes into account heredity, experience acquired in the first years of life, the influence of society, but at the same time calls on each person to take responsibility for own life and for everything that happens in it.