What is Gestalt?

Gestalt Is

Gestalt therapy is a growth-oriented, contextual and relational approach to working with people. The Gestalt approach embraces a person's physical, psychological, intellectual, emotional, interpersonal and spiritual experience in a holistic way. Each of these interconnected aspects of living is considered inseparable from a person's environment, history and culture.

A Well Lived Life

From a Gestalt perspective a well-lived life is grounded in a person's awareness of how they live their life and conduct their relationships, in the present, within their life space. From this perspective, Gestalt therapy seeks to promote a person's awareness, support creative choice and encourage responsibility in a person's effort to realise a meaningful and fulfilling life.

Main philosophical underpinnings

Gestalt is based on the following approaches:

1. An existential approach:
   • It is grounded in the here and now
   • It emphasizes that each person is responsible for his or her own destiny
2. A phenomenological approach:
   • It focuses on the client's perception of reality
   • Aims to increase awareness both of self and of interconnectedness with others
   • It works with the 'what is'; change results from being more fully oneself
3. A dialogical approach:
   • Clients explore what and how they are thinking, feeling and doing with the therapist as an active participant in the process
4. A holistic approach:
   • The wider field is taken into account; past present and future, the individual, family and culture.
   • There is an emphasis on unification, re-owning all parts of self.
5. An experimental approach:
   • Gestalt is not just a talk therapy; action is seen as important and clients are encouraged to try out new ways of being
   • Experiments are always aimed at exploration, discovery and awareness; experiential learning is the aim rather than achieving preset outcomes