Frank-M. Staemmler (Wuerzburg, Germany)
Michael V. Miller (Boston, U.S.A.)
Enila Chagas (Brasilia, Brazil),
Lynne Jacobs (Los Angeles, U.S.A.),
Jung-Kyu Kim (Seoul, Korea),
Peter Philippson (Manchester, England),
Walter Ferreira da Rosa Ribeiro (Brasilia, Brazil),
Jean-Marie Robine (Bordeaux, France),
Sylvie Schoch de Neuforn (Paris, France),
Gary Yontef (Los Angeles, U.S.A.).
Please, send manuscripts to the editor preferably via e-mail to <IGJ@gestalt.org>
or via mail to
Zentrum für Gestalttherapie
Kardinal-Döpfner-Platz 1
D — 97070 Wuerzburg, Germany.
Annual subscription (two issues, spring and fall) U.S.-$ 48.00 (individuals), U.S.-$ 73.00 (institutions). Orders and correspondence regarding subscription, change of address, purchase of back issues, and advertisements should be sent to the
International Gestalt Journal
P. O. Box 278
Gouldsboro, ME 04607-0278, U.S.A.
or e-mailed to <internationalgj@gestalt.org>
or faxed to +1-775-254-1855.
Orders can also be made at www.international-gestalt-journal.org
International Gestalt Journal 2002, 25/1, 15-35
Gary Yontef
The Relational Attitude in Gestalt Therapy Theory and Practice
Abstract: Gestalt therapy theory is relational in its core, although some talk and practice of gestalt therapy is not consistent with the principles. This paper reviews core relational philosophical principles of gestalt therapy: existential phenomenology, field theory, and dialogic existentialism. The implications for practice are explored. Practices and attitudes about gestalt therapy that are inconsistent with these principles are discussed. The article studies the triggering and treatment of shame in gestalt therapy and gestalt training. The article clarifies what relational gestalt therapy is and what it is not. (note: this article will be reprinted in Gestalt!, volume 9, nuber 2)
International Gestalt Journal 2002, 25/1, 37-71
The Process of Change Study Group – Daniel N. Stern, Louis W. Sander, Jeremy P. Nahum, Alexandra M. Harrison, Karlen Lyons-Ruth, Alec C. Morgan, Nadia Bruschweiler-Stern, Edward Z. Tronick
Non-Interpretive Mechanisms in Psychoanalytic Therapy – The ‘Something More’ Than Interpretation
Abstract: It is by now generally accepted that something more than interpretation is necessary to bring about therapeutic change. Using an approach based on recent studies of mother-infant interaction and non-linear dynamic systems and their relation to theories of mind, the authors propose that the something more resides in interactional intersubjective process that give rise to what they will call “implicit relational knowing.” This relational procedural domain is intrapsychically distinct from the symbolic domain. In the analytic relationship it comprises intersubjective moments occurring between patient and analyst that can create new organizations in, or reorganize not only the relationship between the interactants, but more importantly the patient’s implicit procedural knowledge, his ways of being with others. The distinct qualities and consequences of these moments (“now moments,” “moments of meeting”) are modeled and discussed in terms of a sequencing process that they call moving along. Conceptions of the shared implicit relationship, transference, and countertransference are discussed within the parameters of this perspective, which is distinguished from other relational theories and self-psychology. In sum, powerful therapeutic action occurs within implicit relational knowledge. They propose that much of what is observed to be lasting therapeutic effect results from such changes in this intersubjective relational domain.
International Gestalt Journal 2002, 25/1, 73-92
John R. Morss
Don’t Develop: A Critique of the Role of Developmental Theory Within Gestalt Therapy
Abstract: The role of developmental theory within gestalt therapy is a matter of debate. It is unclear whether any developmental theory, however formal or informal, deserves a place in the gestalt therapist’s intellectual resources or clinical practice. Attempts have been made to assimilate pre-existing developmental theories, to articulate novel ones from within the gestalt profession, and to combine these procedures in a variety of ways. The attempt is made in this paper to outline an argument against developmental theory in its entirety. It is tentatively suggested that gestalt therapy is properly anti-developmental, and that such an orientation is consistent with its phenomenological and occasion
International Gestalt Journal 2002, 25/1, 93-107
Shraga Serok, Nurith Levi
An Experiment in Integration and Co-Existence of the Jewish Population in Israel
Abstract: This paper presents the social condition of the Jewish population in Israel and depicts some of the paradoxical circumstances of this polarized society. Gestalt concepts are applied to describe the social conflicts and a concept of “social gestalt” is developed. Based on gestalt concepts a model for social integration between new immigrants and veteran Israelis is discussed, which proposes operational interventions aimed at the integration process.
International Gestalt Journal 2002, 25/1, 109-122
Michael Vincent Miller
The Aesthetics of Commitment: What Gestalt Therapists Can Learn From Cézanne and Miles Davis
Abstract: This article puts forward a conception of commitment derived from basic principles of gestalt therapy. The central argument replaces commitment as a cultural imperative with a vision of commitment as full attention to subjective experience. The conclusion is that such a vision is common to gestalt therapy and the working methods of artists. This view is illustrated by drawing on the lives and works of the painter Paul Cézanne and the jazz trumpeter Miles Davis.
International Gestalt Journal 2002, 25/1, 123-128
Natalia Lebedeva, Elena Ivanova
Letter from Russia
Abstract: The paper describes the structures and activities of the gestalt therapeutic community in Russia.
International Gestalt Journal 2002, 25/2, 11-29
C. R. Snyder, Stacy C. Parenteau, Hal S. Shorey, Kristin E. Kahle, Carla Berg
Hope as the Underlying Process in the Psychotherapeutic Change Process
Abstract: A new theory by Snyder and colleagues (Snyder, 1994) suggests that hope reflects goal-directed thinking in which a person has the perceived capacity to produce routes to the goals (called pathways thinking), along with the motivation to use those routes (called agency thinking). It is suggested that such hope is a common factor underlying the positive outcomes for psychotherapies in general, as well as gestalt therapy in particular.
International Gestalt Journal 2002, 25/2, 31-57
Leslie S. Greenberg
Working With Emotion
Abstract: Theory and research on emotion are reviewed to demonstrate the role of emotion in human functioning and psychotherapeutic change. The importance of assessing different types of emotion as a guide to differential intervention is emphasized. Three principles of change in the emotion domain — emotion awareness, emotion regulation and a more novel principle that of changing emotion with emotion — are offered as processes of change that are rapidly gathering empirical support. The importance of understanding emotion sequences, interruption processes and the difference between core emotions and core states is also discussed.
International Gestalt Journal 2002, 25/2, 59-93
Frank-M. Staemmler
Splitting and the Empty Chair: A Little Festschrift for Gary Yontef
Abstract: This paper was written as a festschrift for Gary Yontef’s 65th birthday in January 2003. It picks up on Yontef’s demand for “Assimilating Diagnostic and Psychoanalytic Perspectives into Gestalt Therapy” (1988). The psychoanalytic term “splitting” is chosen and explained in its phenomenological dimensions. Technical aspects in the work with clients who use splitting are discussed with special attention to the use of the “empty chair.” A modified application of the “technique of soliloquy” is suggested in order to deal adequately with the therapeutic necesseties in this kind of work.
International Gestalt Journal 2002, 25/2, 95-120
Gordon Wheeler
Shame and Belonging: Homer’s Iliad and the Western Ethical Tradition
Abstract: The dominant value system of Western culture since the time of the Greeks has been an ethic of mastery and conquest — itself a consequence of the Greek paradigm of individualism, the positing of an individual self above and apart from the world of nature, experience, and other selves. This worldview is laid down in the great bible of Greek culture, Homer’s Iliad, a cautionary tale of punishment by the gods for any backsliding toward an older ethic of participation, care, and equal status for “masculine” and “feminine” principles. A gestalt field perspective at last enables us to see the philosophical connections between extreme individualism and this ethic of conquest — and lays out the choice facing our troubled world today.
International Gestalt Journal 2002, 25/2, 121-127
Jungkyu Kim
Letter from Korea
Abstract: The paper describes the structures and activities of the gestalt therapeutic community in Korea.
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/1, 9-13
Frank-M. Staemmler
The IGJ Transcript Project: An Introduction
Abstract: The IGJ transcript project consists of this introductory paper and the following six other papers. In the first, a transcribed gestalt therapy session is presented. The next four papers are different comments on the transcript. One commentator regards the transcript as representing both an individual and a field-theoretical approach. Another commentator sees it as an example of the undoing of retroflection. The following commentator contemplates about “The Ecology of Psychotherapy,” and the last commentator writes about “repetitive and recursive loops.” The series of papers concludes with a response to each of the comments by the therapist, who provided the transcript. She finally raises the question “What is gestalt therapy and what is it not?”
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/1, 14-20
Sally Denham-Vaughn
First or Nowhere?
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/1, 21-25
Jacques Blaize
Comment 1: An Individualistic or Field-Oriented Point of View?
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/1, 26-29
Marie-Claude Denis
Comment 2: The Undoing of a Retroflection
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/1, 30-37
Joel Latner
Comment 3: The Ecology of Psychotherapy
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/1, 38-45
Lynne Jacobs
Being a Repeat, Repeating Being
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/1, 46-58
Sally Denham-Vaughan
First or Nowhere? — A Quest for Existence: Response to the Comments
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/1, 59-78
Norman Friedman
Bringing Together Some Early and Later Gestalt Therapy Theory Concepts
Abstract: This article attempts to show that, contrary to common opinion, the later F. S. Perls developed gestalt therapy theory in ways that were basically consistent with the early text, Gestalt Therapy, by Perls, Hefferline, and Goodman (1951). In order to accomplish this task, an alternating structure is used, going from the later text, Gestalt Therapy Verbatim (1969), to the earlier and back again several times, and in relation to three key terms and concepts — topdog and underdog, the hot seat and empty chair technique, and the paradigm of the layers or change process. By way of conclusion, a case example is presented to illustrate the previous terms and concepts.
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/1, 79-128
Karl Duncker
Phenomenology and Epistemology of Consciousness of Objects
Abstract: After Karl Duncker’s death I found among his papers the manuscript of an article “Erscheinungslehre und Erkenntnistheorie des Gegenstandsbewusstseins.” It seems that the article was completed in 1935, but that the author was not entirely satisfied with his work and therefore postponed publication. However, since the investigation appeared too important to be left unknown the following translation was prepared. It reproduces the argument of the original most faithfully. — Wolfgang Köhler
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/1, 129-135
Shraga Serok, Nurith Levi
Letter From Israel
Abstract: The paper describes the structures and activities of the gestalt therapeutic community in Israel.
International Gestalt Journal 2002, 26/2, 7-22
Mary Henle
Gestalt Psychology and Gestalt Therapy
Abstract: This paper examines the relations between Gestalt psychology and gestalt therapy, as presented in the writings of Fritz Perls, who claims that his perspective derives from Gestalt psychology. Intellectual traditions, philosophical assumptions, and specific theories and concepts are considered. It is concluded that the two approaches have nothing in common.
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/2, 23-46
Paul Shane
An Illegitimate Child: The Relationship Between Gestalt Psychology and Gestalt Therapy
Abstract: Gestalt therapy took its name from gestalt psychology in 1951 prior to the publication of Gestalt Therapy: Excitement and Growth in the Human Personality (Perls, Hefferline, & Goodman, 1951). The authors, at that time, attempted to solicit an endorsement from Wolfgang Köhler for their new psychotherapy and were rejected, mainly for using the gestalt name without justification. Mary Henle, an U.S. American historian of psychology, who studied under both Kurt Koffka and Wolfgang Köhler, was one of the three last American psychologists along with Rudolf Arnheim and Solomon Asch. Henle and her associates resented any connection between gestalt psychology and gestalt therapy. Their resentment became increasingly exacerbated as gestalt therapy became widely popular in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Henle issued several public statements in the mid and late 1970s negating any connection whatsoever between the gestalt psychology and gestalt therapy. Her argument, however, focused exclusively on Frederick “Fritz” Perls who was not a gestalt psychologist. Henle's analysis formed the basis the opinions of subsequent historians of North American psychology for almost thrity years. It remained unchallenged until recently when contemporary scholars examined the role of Laura Perls in the development of gestalt therapy and her doctoral studies under Adhemar Gelb at the university of Frankfurt in the late 1920s, thus making Laura Perls the historical bridge between gestalt psychology and gestalt therapy.
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/2, 47-70
Kathleen Höll
Philosophical Anarchism as a Source of Gestalt Therapy: Its Importance for Therapeutic Practice and for Orientation in the Political Field
Abstract: Existential philosophy and anarchism are important roots of gestalt therapy and shed light on its central concepts. Landauer’s and Buber’s philosophical anarchism aims at profound social change through individual growth. Consciousness raising is considered a precondition for political work. This was enriched by Perls, who contributed Friedlaender’s teachings on creative indifference. Goodman’s critique of the political structure of the US-American society is, in anarchistic philosophical tradition, fundamental: He regards the western democracy as a society built on constraints. Philosophical anarchism offers some orientation in respect to a possible critical macro theory of the western societies in the times of globalization. This is of high importance, as psychotherapy needs socio-political background theories.
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/2, 71-84
Beth Hassrick
Gestalt Therapy and American Pragmatism: Kindred Perspectives on the Self
Abstract: Given that almost every major concept in gestalt therapy theory finds a corollary in the ideas set forth by the American pragmatists, it is somewhat curious that discussions of pragmatism are so hard to come by in the vast gestalt therapy literature. I offer this paper in part as an opening gesture toward making up for this discursive scarcity. More importantly, however, I hope the reader will find here something novel in the pragmatic orientation — a tone, locution, accent, cadence or color of mind — that will serve to shed a revitalizing light on some of the philosophical assumptions upon which gestalt therapy theory is founded and from which it continues to grow. In drawing from the work of three pragmatists — William James, John Dewey and W. V. O. Quine — I envisage that I am cracking a window for further suggestion and study. And, since it would be impossible in a paper of this scope to explore each of the myriad points of convergence between gestalt and pragmatism, I have chosen to focus on two related, and richly variegated, themes that I take to be foundational: The experiencing and ever-becoming self as a function of organism/environment contact and the organism’s tendency to make experience cohere.
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/2, 85-110
Jean-Marie Robine
Intentionality in Flesh and Blood: Toward a Psychopathology of Fore-Contacting
(Translated from French by Bettina Bergo)
Abstract: Working in a field perspective requires a radical change in our approach to the therapeutic encounter. We need to focus on what is called “the situation,” and the concept of intentionality should take on great importance. The personality function of self often leads to repetitive intentions through acts or meaning-making that prevent contact with novelty. For this reason, gestalt therapists could fruitfully ‘go back’ to the concept of intentionality, as prior to any formation of conscious intent or agency. My assumption is that the intentionality of one who is in the presence of another person has to be sought through affectivity, that is, through the way in which the other is affected by the encounter. Far from any premature differentiation or assignation of responsibility, unaware pre- or non-conscious intentionality should be approached as it becomes more and more aware, and available to new and provisional differentiations. As a result of this proposed shift, some new ground is given to a psychopathology of fore-contact. The therapist’s self-revealing receives new meanings.
International Gestalt Journal 2003, 26/2, 111-117
Enila Chagas
Letter from Brazil
Abstract: The paper describes the structures and activities of the gestalt therapeutic community in Brazil.
International Gestalt Journal 2004, 27/1, 9-54
Uwe Strümpfel
Research on Gestalt Therapy
(Translated from German by Martin Courtney)
Abstract: This article will present an overview of process and evaluation research in gestalt therapy. Our starting point will be what research shows about the practice in gestalt therapy. In the following section we will take a close-up look at research on detailed or “microscopic” aspects of processes discernible in therapeutic work. We will be seeing fine-tuning aspects in the course of the dialogue between therapist and client. Our path will then take us to ‘macroscopic’ dimensions of the therapeutic process where developments are identified. We will then come to paradigms relating therapeutic processes to long-term effects of therapy. Finally we will discuss differential effects of gestalt therapy from clinical evaluation studies, including comparisons with other psychotherapeutic treatments.
International Gestalt Journal 2004, 27/1, 55-82
Stephan Tobin
The Integration of Relational Gestalt Therapy and EMDR
Abstract: In this article I attempt to show how the integration of “eye movement desensitization and reprocessing” (EMDR) techniques within a relational gestalt therapy approach results in a more powerful method than either therapeutic method alone. I describe the steps in the EMDR standard protocol, as outlined by Francine Shapiro, the founder of EMDR. I briefly discuss what we now know about how trauma affects brain functioning and EMDR’s effectiveness in resolving ‘simple’ trauma. I then explain how EMDR, within the context of a relational gestalt approach, can help to resolve therapeutic impasses, enhance the working through process of therapy and trigger associations that neither therapists nor clients anticipate or predict.
International Gestalt Journal 2004, 27/1, 83-95
Gordon Wheeler
Lineage and Identity: Gestalt Psychology and Gestalt Therapy — A Reply to Paul Shane
Abstract: Since the articulation of the gestalt therapy model at mid-century, debate has been ongoing about the relationship, if any, between gestalt therapy and gestalt psychology. Unfortunately Goodman and Perls failed to articulate this connection clearly, probably because they had only a cursory familiarity with the ongoing developments in gestalt psychology since the work of the founder generation — essentially the elaboration of the gestalt epistemological stance of constructivism, particularly in the work of Lewin and his followers. However, these ideas were “in the air” in the post-war period, and thoroughly inform Goodman’s and Perls’s work. A reconsideration of the gestalt therapy model in the light of Lewin’s contribution, in particular, shows the direct and organic conceptual development of the therapy model out of the essential research and tenets of gestalt psychology, and the basic theoretical unity of the two bodies of work.
International Gestalt Journal 2004, 27/1, 97-109
Dan Bloom
The Emergence of Foundational Gestalt Therapy Within a Teaching/Learning Community: The NYIGT Celebrates Its Fiftieth Anniversary
As the New York Institute for Gestalt Therapy celebrated its, and gestalt therapy’s, fiftieth anniversary this spring, I used the occasion to consider our history. In the following paper, I describe the history and continuing development of gestalt therapy at the institute and the emergence of “foundational gestalt therapy” within our unique “teaching/learning” community. Our model of gestalt therapy draws on its deep and varied sources and develops it in a community where teaching and learning are a contact-boundary experience.
International Gestalt Journal 2004, 27/1, 111-120
Margherita Spagnuolo Lobb
Letter From Italy
Abstract: The paper describes the structures and activities of the gestalt therapeutic community in .
International Gestalt Journal 2004, 27/2, 13-31
Paul Barber
Are We the True Freudians? — Humanistic Psychology and Gestalt Therapy’s Honoring of Freud’s Philosophical Legacy
Abstract: The history of psychotherapy describes a history of forgetting and remembering, a process where problems and ideas once venerated fall out of sight only to resurface at a different time and place to be heralded again as novel and new. What was well known to Sigmund Freud is now only half remembered by the Neo-Freudians, largely unknown to their successors, and has ended up being reinterpreted and integrated with humanistic psychology! Although humanistic psychologists and therapists have a tradition of railing against Freud, it is my contention that we share much in common with him, and indeed, that in some respects we honor his core philosophy much more than the so-called Neo-Freudians. This paper explores the above territory and looks backwards to sources of the 60’s and 70’s, especially to Jacoby (1977), to illuminate lessons of history, for this is an old debate lost in time. Though this paper avoids answers, it nevertheless cautions against gestalt therapy in its movement towards professional respectability losing sight of its unique and revolutionary nature, or taking the socially adaptive route of the Neo-Freudians.
International Gestalt Journal 2004, 27/2, 33-57
Frank-M. Staemmler
Dialogue and Interpretation in Gestalt Therapy: Making Sense Together
Abstract: In gestalt therapy interpretation has come to have a bad reputation. The history of this development is outlined. Its erroneous character is analyzed in the light of phenomenological, dialogical, and hermeneutic philosophy as well as illustrated both with a fictitious meeting of friends and a clinical vignette. It is argued that a meaningful therapeutic dialogue cannot take place without many interpretive processes, by which new meaning is created by both participants together. Moreover, interpretation is essential for human life to be colorful and creative.
International Gestalt Journal 2004, 27/2, 59-84
Garry Prouty
Pre-Therapy and Pre-Symbolic Experiencing: Evolutions in Experiential Approaches to Psychotic Experience
Abstract: Pre-therapy is described as an evolution in humanistic psychotherapy. It evolved from Rogers’s (1959) concept of “psychological contact” as the first and necessary condition of a therapeutic relationship, and Perls’s (1969) concept of “contact as an ego function.” Pre-therapy is described as a theory of psychological contact. The result of this fusion is the hypothesis that psychological contact is the necessary function, or pre-condition, for a therapeutic relationship. Pre-therapy develops or restores the psychological contact necessary for psychotherapy with contact-impaired clients such as psychotic or retarded patients. In the second part of the paper the concept of pre-symbolic experiencing is introduced as a theoretical description of the structure and processing of the schizophrenic hallucination.
International Gestalt Journal 2004, 27/2, 85-96
Peter Philippson
The Experience of Shame
Abstract: In this paper, I examine the experience of shame from the perspective of the person feeling it, and propose a description of this experience in terms of gestalt therapy theory: as retroflection of the disgust reflex. I then discuss the clinical implications of this theory. Finally, I make some more general comments about development and integration of gestalt therapy theory.
International Gestalt Journal 2004, 27/2, 97-101
Ruth Lampert
The Case for Going Gentle
Abstract: It is almost axiomatic in the current zeitgeist that illness and death are enemies against which we must wage all-out war. This essay suggests a different view.
?International Gestalt Journal 27/2, 103-107
Arnold Beisser
The Paradoxical Theory of Change
Editor’s note: In his famous paper on “The Paradoxical Theory of Change,” Arnold Beisser claims “. . . that change occurs when one becomes what he is, not when he tries to become what he is not.”
International Gestalt Journal 27/2, 109-116
Janine Corbeil
Letter From Québec
Abstract: The paper describes the structures and activities of the gestalt therapeutic community in Québec.