Gestalt Therapy

We use elements of Gestalt therapy, alongside NLP, in all of our training.

Experiential learning is a key part of our training, which engages participants in drawing on real life experiences in order to learn.  The interactive nature of our workshops helps to inspire people to get excited and empower them take ownership of their learning in order to make change.

Gestalt is a German word and mean’s ‘pattern’ or ‘constellation.   Gestalt therapy is an existential/experiential form of psychotherapy that emphasizes personal responsibility, and that focuses upon the individual’s experience in the present moment, the environmental and social contexts of a person’s life, and the self-regulating adjustments people make as a result of their overall situation.

The objective of Gestalt therapy is to enable people to become more fully and creatively alive and to become free from the blocks and unfinished business that may diminish satisfaction, fulfillment, and growth, and to experiment with new ways of being.  For this reason Gestalt therapy falls within the category of humanistic psychotherapies. Because Gestalt therapy includes perception and the meaning-making processes by which experience forms, it can also be considered a cognitive approach.

Arnold Beisser described Gestalt’s paradoxical theory of change. The paradox is that the more one attempts to be who one is not, the more one remains the same. Conversely, when people identify with their current experience, the conditions of wholeness and growth support change. Put another way, change comes about as a result of “full acceptance of what is, rather than a striving to be different”.

Chris Laney  – Positive Change Consultancy – Mobile 07947 724977  email [email protected]