In this file you get both the video, the PDF, and the slide deck from my talk at the 7th International Gestalt Conference.
"Orienting to Aspects of the Field" an interactive dynamic Gestalt Diagnostic Navigation Flowchart, which supports dialogue and mutual influence.
What do you do when clients have limited or no capacity to explore with awareness or change figure/ground? A frequent and growing challenge in and outside the Gestalt field.
This flowchart presents a framework to understand and work with the entire range of clients on multiple dimensions - offering a very organic, descriptive, non-pathologizing approach to diagnosis. It is extremely accessible, practical as well as specific in how to intervene. It is based on:
- The preciousness of the present moment.
- The insights that neuroscience provides to work with the constant organizing and reorganizing of the field in chaotic, polarized, flexible or integrating ways.
- Applying a view of Self –Other –Context with a willingness to modify your usual way of working and even include asymmetric responsibility, especially in a polarized or chaotic field.
Through a dialogue based in authentic interaction, an intervention may be designed to match what manifests here and now in the field. Tailored interactions and interventions that respond to the relevant need in the field, be it short or long-term processes, in as varying contexts as
- Therapy and coaching
- Training, teaching and supervision
- Consultant tasks or projects in groups or organizations.
Moreover, the flowchart offers ways in which the emerging information from somatic therapies, attachment theory and neuroscience can be fully integrated into Gestalt Therapy.
The impact from meeting with people from many walks of life and ages -and the frustration over static diagnostic models not compatible with a Gestalt perspective - fueled me to develop this flowchart and navigation tool based on 40 years of working experience . Internationally received and also presented at the EAGT conference in Budapest 2019.
