Marilyn Lammert, MSW, ScD

FAQ'S

Who would benefit from coming?  Beginning or more experiences therapists who want to feel more alive in their work and experience a heightened sense of connection to their clients.

How will this help me if I'm an experienced therapist?  Sometimes you and a client are stuck, frustrated or feel at a loss.  This approach offers a way to 1) go from talking about to direct experiencing, moving the process forward in an organic way, and 2) access the client world for a more complete understanding of what the client is experiencing so you can join together.  Sessions will be more interesting, and you;ll be more effective.

What kinds of client will this help?  Because Gestalt therapy is a process theory, it can be used effectively with any client population the therapist understands and feels comfortable with.  The system adjusts to the client.  Some examples that come to mind are those who: are stuck--in the past in a relationship, in a repetitive pattern; those who want to change and can't seem to, have difficulty connecting to their feelings or whose feelings are scattered; those who have polarized experiences, e.g., a bi-cultural person who doesn't feel completely a part of either world; those who have anxiety depression chronic or psychophysiologic illness.   The effectiveness of Gestalt therapy has been confirmed with a wide range of clinical disorders (such as schizophrenia personality disorders affective and anxiety disorders substance dependencies and psychosomatic disorders).

Will there be experiential learning in the workshop?  The workshop will be a combination of theory and practice concepts, historical background and experiential.

Is there any reading?  When you register you will receive three informative articles which will be helpful but are not required.

What does 'gestalt' mean?  The word 'gestalt' means a unified whole.  People perceive in whole patterns that cannot be grasped by analyzing separate elements.  The relationships of the parts to each other and to the whole must be identified and understood.

What if I'm interested in the group but I'm not an improvising person or can't do role plays?  No one will be required to do something they are not comfortable with.  The group is designed in such a way that each person is encouraged (but not required) to experiment and learn at the edge of their comfort zone and is supported to stand solid in their own felt experience.

Description of Gestalt Therapy

Gestalt therapy is an enlivening and intimate way of being with clients.  It was developed as an antidote to behaviorism and psychoanalysis 50 years ago.  Present-day relational psychoanalysis is closer to Gestalt therapy than to classical psychoanalysis.  Gestalt therapy focuses on therapist-client relationship and interventions into the client's inner experience.

Gestalt therapy is process oriented and experiential, based on a field theory (akin to the intersubjective field) where all experience is co-created and the experience of the therapist is not more valid or objective than that of the client.  The present-centered dialogue is enlivening and allows client and therapist to have an immediate and vivid grasp of current experience, which includes developmental history (since we bring the past to our present experience.)  When emotional process is experienced vividly in the present, the meanings that shape the immediate experience can be explored more directly.

The dialogue is the healing element; creative experiments (or techniques) emerge organically out of absorption in the dialogue.  Experimentation (trying something new) is an alternative to purely verbal techniques.

The relational experience of client and therapist may trigger awareness of something deeper and beyond words, an experience that some call spiritual.

Example

I am working with a client who has been married a long time and wants to leave; I noticed that although she talks very animatedly about how much she wants out of the marriage she comes back each time without making significant steps toward leaving.  I tried gently exploring this contrast with her, but got nowhere.  what would you do?  After several sessions I decided to tell her my dilemma directly.  Her dilemma was that only when she was angry could she move forward, otherwise she gets cajoled into not leaving by her husband.  As she described her dilemma, I realized I couldn't feel anything listening to her words--she wasn't connected, affectively, with the words she was saying.  I said this to her.  She didn't feel connected to her words, either.  But I could feel our connection and from this contact between us.  I invited her to explore these feelings.  I asked her to put herself into a time when she felt cajoled and notice how and where she experienced this in her body.  the same with a time she felt angry.  From there, she located the center of her body, grounded herself in the sensations in her body and in what she coudl see, hear and sense in her surroundings.  I suggested she experiment or try on statements to her husband about what she wants.  She reported feeling strong and I could feel her 'aliveness'.  The next week she had told her son and daughters that she was leaving their father.

Through experiments, the therapist supports the client's direct experience of something new instead of merely talking about the possibility of something new.

BIO

Marilyn Lammert has practiced psychotherapy in the Washington, DC area for 30 years.  She received her Master's in Social Work from Washington University in St. Louis, her Doctor of Science from Johns Hopkins University, and did post-doctoral work at the Gestalt Institute of San Diego.  In addition to her work as a clinician, Dr. Lammert has taught in graduate Social Work programs at Washington University, the University of Maryland and Catholic University.

Call or write.  I'd be happy to answer your questions.

Change as it's understood in gestalt therapy is paradoxical.  The paradox is that the more one tries to become who one is not, the more one stays the same. Health is largely a matter of being whole, and healing occurs when one is made whole again. The more one tries to force oneself into a mold that does not fit, the more one is fragmented rather than whole.

Gestalt therapy was formed in reaction to the same aspects of psychoanalysis that contemporary psychoanalysis is now rejecting.  Basic tenets now shared by contemporary psychoanalysis and gestalt therapy:

• an emphasis on the whole person and sense of self
• an emphasis on process thinking
• an emphasis on subjectivity and affect
• an appreciation of the impact of life events (such as childhood sexual abuse) on personality development
• a belief that people are motivated toward growth and development rather than regression a
• belief that infants are born with a basic motivation and capacity for personal interaction, attachment, and satisfaction
• a belief that there is no "self" without an "other"
• a belief that the structure and contents of the mind are shaped by interactions with others, rather than on instinctual urges