GESTALT

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GESTALT
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Gestalt

• Gestalt principles were developed prior to the
  development of Gestalt therapy.
• Gestalt form, figure, pattern, or whole
• Gestalt psychology was concerned with how we
  organize our experiences, I. E. perception or
  awareness.

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It is phenomenological in that it stresses the
subjective experiences. Life is best understood
by knowing the subjective , internal rather than
the objective, external.
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Humans perceive things as wholes and the whole is
more than the sum of its parts (holism, I.E.
non-reductionistic)
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Introduction - PG. 195

• Fritz and Laura Perls - Founders
• Existential Phenomenological - it is grounded
  in the clients here and now
• Initial goal is for clients to gain awareness of
  what they are experiencing and doing NOW.
• Promotes direct experiencing rather than the
  abstractness of talking about situations
• Rather than talk about a childhood trauma the
  client is encourages to become the hurt child

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Freud Perls

• Past
• Reductionistic
• Deterministic
• Unconscious
• Energy system seeking homeostasis or completion
• (repetition compulsion)

• Present
• Holistic
• Phenomenological
• Disowned parts
• Energy system seeking homeostasis or completion
• (Closure)

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KEY CONCEPTS
View of Human Nature - PG. 195 F. Perls view of
human nature is that clients are manipulative and
avoid self-reliance, I. E. not willing to accept
their own perceptions as valid. They are looking
to others for the answers. A
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C
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F. Perls therapy involved (PG. 196)

• Moving client from environment support to self
  support
• Reintegrating disowned parts of self
• Very abrasive confrontive style, with modern
  gestaltness.
• How is Gestalt inherently confrontive?

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Other Key Concepts

• 1) existential - genuine knowledge is the
  product of what is immediately evident in the
  experience of the perceiver. Awareness is
  ever-changing and each moment is one of choice
  based on evolving awareness. We are the creators
  of our own destiny, I. E. non-deterministic.
• 2) self-regulatory - awareness leads to closure

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• 3) change happens in the now If you want to
  go to S. Dakota, where do you start?

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The Now (PG. 197)
Our power is in the present Nothing exists
except in the now The past is gone and the
future has not yet arrived. For many people the
power of the present is lost. They may focus on
their past mistakes or engage in endless
resolutions and plans for the future.
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The influence of psychoanalysis is merged with
Gestalt psychology in the concept of now.
Events may have happened in the past however,
they are always interpreted and felt with the
present. Energetic homeostasis and repetition
compulsion (psychoanalysis) and closure and
unfinished business (gestalt) are similar. They
both say that issues unfinished in the past will
be energetically present in the now. Both say
that homeostasis or closure is sought. They just
approach it differently. Both work on the past in
the present. Psychoanalysis through
transferenceGestalt through experiments in the
present.
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What? and How? NOT Why? (PG. 198)

• WHY?

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What and how - NOW - in the
body/experiential Why -
Past - in the head/ analytical E. Polster
Story - the unfinished past is urgently in
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Unfinished Business PG. 198

• Feelings about the past are unexpressed
• These feelings are associated with distinct
  memories and fantasies.
• Feelings not fully experienced linger in the
  background and interfere with effective contact.
• Result
• Preoccupation, compulsive behavior, wariness
  oppressive energy and self-defeating behavior.

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Unfinished Business (PG. 199)
The effects of unfinished business often show
up in some blockage within the body. Gestalt
therapy emphasizes paying attention to the bodily
experience , as expressed feeling must be
suppressed by the body musculature. (REMEMBER
eMOTION) Our story is in the body. Polsters
fleshing out the flesh!
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The Impasse, or stuck point (PG. 199), is a
situation in which individuals believe they are
unable to support themselves. They feel stuck,
avoiding experiencing threatening feeling,
imagining something terrible will happen.
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Layers of Neurosis (PG. 199-200)

• Perls likens the unfolding of adult personality
  to the peeling of an onion
• Phony layer - stereotypical and inauthentic
• Phobic layer - fears keep us from seeing
  ourselves
• Impasse layer - we give up our power
• Implosive layer - we fully experience our
  deadness
• Explosive layer - we let go of phony roles

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Contact and Resistances to Contact (PG. 200-202)

• CONTACT - interacting with nature and with other
  people without losing ones individuality
• RESISTANCE TO CONTACT - the defenses we develop
  to prevent us from experiencing the present fully

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Five Major Channels of Resistance

• Introjection
• Projection
• Retroflection
• Deflection
• Confluence

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Therapeutic Goals (PG. 202)
The goal is attaining awareness and greater
choice. Awareness includes knowing the
environment and knowing oneself, accepting
oneself, and being able to make contact. Clients
are helped to note their own awareness process so
that they can be responsible and can selectively
and discriminatingly make choices. Awareness
emerges with in the context of the I/Thou
relationship between client and therapist. With
awareness the client is able to recognize denied
aspects of the self and proceed toward
reintegration of all its parts. Gestalt is an
insight, experiential, and action-oriented.
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Zinken (PG 203) expects clients will

• Move toward increased awareness of themselves
• Gradually assume ownership of their experience
  (as opposed to making others responsible for what
  they are thinking, feeling, and doing)
• Develop skills and acquire values that will allow
  them to satisfy their needs without violating the
  rights of others
• Become more aware of all of their senses
• Learn to accept responsibility for what they do,
  including accepting the consequences of their
  actions
• Move from outside support toward increasing
  internal support
• Be able to ask for and get help from others and
  be able to give to others

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Therapists Function and Role - PG 203

• 1. Create (as a joint venture) experiments
  (I.E. experiences) inviting here now
  awareness
• 2. The therapist is a catalyst to increased
  awareness of both foreground and background
• 3. The therapist works in an I/Thou context
  (joint venture) to search for blocks to awareness
  as they are exhibited in non-verbal ways.
• PG. 204 for language focus

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Therapeutic Relationship
This approach stresses the I/Thou relationship.
The focus is not on the techniques employed by
the therapist but on who the therapist is as a
person and what the therapist is doing.
Contemporary Gestalt therapy stresses factors
such as presence, authentic dialogue, gentleness,
more direct self-expression by the therapist,
decreased use of stereotypic exercises, and a
greater trust in the clients experiencing. The
counselor assists clients in experiencing all
feelings more fully and lets them make their own
interpretations. The therapist does not
interpret for clients but focuses on the what
and how of their behavior. Clients identify
their own unfinished business from the past that
is interfering with their present functioning by
re-experiencing past situations as though they
were happening at the present moment.
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Therapeutic Techniques

• The experiment in Gestalt Therapy
• Preparing clients for experiments
• Internal dialogue exercise
• Rehearsal exercise
• Reversal technique
• Exaggeration exercise

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The Experiment - PG 208
1. Exercises - ready-made techniques for
specific purposes. E.g. Making the rounds in a
group empty chair - dialogue role -
reversals 2. Experiments - spontaneous,
one-of-a-kind, and evolving from the
interaction in the moment, intended to bring
out some kind of internal conflict, and/or
figure - formation process
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Confrontation - PG 212
Your mother wears combat boots OR I wont
laugh when you tell me something sad. OR???
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CONFRONTATION - owned awareness related to
perceived discrepancies. It is anything that
invites awareness that is blocked.
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The Internal Dialogue - PG 213

• The goal is to promote a higher level of
  integration between the polarities and conflicts
  that exist in everyone. Some examples are those
  on page 214.

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Making the Round - PG 214

• The goal is, once again , increased awareness
  that comes from saying something involving
  blocked awareness aloud (often repeatedly) to
  another person. Good example on page 214 related
  to trust.

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The Reversal Technique

• This exercise is sometimes useful when a person
  has attempted to deny or disown a side of his or
  her personality. For example, one who plays the
  role of tough guy may be covering up a gentle
  side. Or one who is always excessively nice may
  be trying to deny or disown negative feelings
  toward others.

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The Rehearsal Technique

• Much of our thinking is rehearsing. It is almost
  as though we rehearse, in fantasy, performances
  we think we are expected to play. In this
  exercise select some situation where you might
  typically be rehearsing all kinds of pros and
  cons. The rehearse out loud. Act out all the
  things that you might experience inwardly. Ham
  it up a bit. Try to get the feel of the
  exercise. For example, you might consider such
  situations as volunteering for something, asking
  a person for a date, applying for a job, or
  facing someone you are afraid of.

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The Exaggeration Exercise - PG 215
The goal is to become more aware of subtle
signals and cues that are sent through body
language. This is especially helpful in
indicating descrepentcies, e.g. saying youre not
angry but clinching your fist. Staying with the
feeling - a way of confronting the blocks to
awareness. It is an invitation. Gestalt Dream
Work - ask the client to become app parts of the
dream, looking for those most energetically
alive. The client then interprets the meaning of
the symbols in their dreams.