Techniques of gestalt therapy
Four major emphases:
Dreams
- Pay attention to experiences and become aware of the present situation
- Maintain and promote integrity
- Experiment
- Encourage creativity (Perls et al., 1951)
- Awareness is primary vehicle of change
- If people can gain awareness of their unfinished business and their own strength and resources, they can grow and become more actualized
- Emphasis on statements: Talking with someone rather than at someone
- Example: "I am experiencing a loss of contact between us." rather than "Where has your attention gone?"
- "What" and "How" Questions: Gestalt therapists ask "what" and "how" questions because asking "why" brings clients back to the past
- "I" Statements: Gestalt therapists encourage people to use "I" statements
- Example: Instead of saying "we feel that this is not fair" use "I " statement "I feel that this is not fair"
- The Present Tense: When clients talk about past events, Gestalt therapists encourage them to speak on the present events
- Encouraging responsibility: Gestalt therapists encourage clients to take responsibilities for themselves, their words, emotions, thoughts, and behaviors
- Example: "I take responsibility for..."
Dreams
- Awareness comes from assuming the various roles or parts of the dream and enacting the dream as though it is happening in the present
- Example: a man had a dream about a rabbit which was being chased across a field by a fox, escaping into a burrow (Seligman & Reichenberg, 2014, p.211)
Role-Playing Using Empty Chair Methods
Two-Chair Method for Addressing Inner Conflict
Two-Chair Method for Addressing Inner Conflict
- Helps people become aware, resolve inner conflict, develop clarity, and gain insight
- Two chairs are used, representing 2 parts of the person in conflict
- The client sits in each chair and speaks from the perspective that the chair represents
- It is a way to address & resolve unclosed gestalts in imagination
- Empty chair represents another person, conflict within a dream, physical symptom, etc.
- Client expressed thoughts and feelings to empty chair to find a resolution
(Seligman & Reichenberg, 2014, p. 208-213)