Gestalt and Client-Centered Therapy Theories - Essay Example

Gestalt and Client-Centered Therapy Theories Gestalt Therapy Gestalt therapy is usually defined as an experimental approach that is aimed at enabling individuals recognise the existence of the relationship between them and their environment surrounding them thus in other words this therapy tries to bring an awareness of ones self and through this awareness we find that change is manifested in the individual. This approach is usually found to be a direct experience with the client thus allowing the individual to be attended specially thus creating more space for development and healing that is achieved through interpersonal contact and also insight. Depending on the type of the problem an individual is facing. Thus indicating the advantage of this therapy which is found to be that which the client is enabled to practice self-regulation concerning a particular situation or problem that is surrounding him, the goal of this particular approach is to create awareness for the affected individual who is always referred to as a client and this awareness may include the self recognition, acceptance of oneself and also putting one in a position of developing contacts with other members of the society. (Corey, 2005) This therapy is found to be operating under a number of principles in order to allow the client develop the idea of self regulation, these principles are as follows: Holism psychologists define holism as the principle of the gestalt therapy which provides that individuals can only be understood by putting into consideration all functions of the human nature. Therefore we find that this principle regards nature as a united and rational whole, where differences only occur from particular parts. (Basch, 1986) The other principle is that of the field theory which is found to be basically focused on the rule that an individual must be found in its environment that is believed to have caused such problems to the client. We also find the psychologists in this field always apply the figure formation process which is believed to describe how the client should organize his surrounding from each and every moment of his life, since some of the environments are believed to be the causative agents for an individual to pay more attention as compared to the factors. This goes hand in hand with the organismic self-regulation process which is to be a process where the balance of an individual’s life is disturbed as a result of a demand of a particular need, for all this reasons we find the organism process helps to regulate themselves depending on their capabilities of acquiring that particular need. (Corey, 2005) In this therapy we find that people who are involved are assigned different roles whereby, we find that the therapist has an obligation of engaging and assisting his or her client in the creating of his awareness and how this awareness appear in his present life, thus he is asked to build a relationship with the client whereby the client is enabled to learn and acquire more knowledge about themselves and the therapy they are subjected to. The other role of the therapist is to ensure and encourage the client accept and recognise their present awareness of their senses. In all this processes then the therapist is to play a major role in the provision of a better environment for the client were he can be able to allow change in both behaviour and being. The therapist should also be attentive by observing the non-verbal communication of the client and the like gestures and the body movements during the conversation thus he should be able to recognise any inconveniences while in the process of carrying out the therapy. While the client is expected to convey their reactions and what they observe as they share their life incidents with his or her therapist. Since this theory involves a dialogue between the client and the therapist therefore each of them given the responsibility of establishing a friendly environment in order to understand each other before going on with the experiment (Eysenck, 1997) Client-Centered Therapy Clinical practitioners are found to be defining the client-centered therapy as an approach that is meant to treat a variety of disorders which may include depression anxiety, domestic violence, and drug addiction among others. We also find that this theory is also applied in the treatment of the individuals who are reported to be having a number of disabilities, such as mental and developmental disabilities. In this theory we therefore find that counselling is applied with an aim of reducing the pain associated with various disabilities and in the process dealing with the feelings of despairs that go along with this disorder. (Gask and Usherwood 1997) Client-Centered therapy is a type of counselling that specializes in the creation of changes in the individuals’ personal life whereby the person is always found to be at a risk of being attacked with psychological disorders, thus it involves the therapist to centre his focus on the client. This method works hand in hand with behavioural therapy which brings an establishment of the skills that may be applied in the solving of a number of problems. Research indicates that the counsellors, prefer this method and the reason for this is that it creates a distinction between external problems and internal changes to be made by an individual, we find that the internal changes are meant to help in the assessment of the problems the child is facing, this is usually done by self-evaluation, including the evaluation of other people surrounding the affected person and his the life expectations. External changes are applied in the handling of the present situations by the use of management skills which include communication, life management and the skills required to develop a better relationship with environment of the client. (Basch, 1986) The goal of this therapy is to allow the individual to have an opportunity to be optimistic and create reality in his prospects and thus reduction of depression. It therefore enables the dejected individual to be acquainted with life troubles which are decisive and those that are of no importance which help him to come up with positive life objectives that is to be optimistic. We also find that in this theory the problem solving therapy technique is applied whereby the therapist is put in a position of identifying the causative of the disorder and finding the solution to avoid further damage to the client. (Chopra and Kulhara, 1996) The therapist is found to be using the following methods in order to resolve such issues; Therapeutic relationship; under this we find that a better relationship between the client and the counsellor is established. The client is therefore required to build trust and safety on the counsellor although sometimes it is argued that the client finds it hard to build trust on the counsellor thus they end up not giving full information about the causative factor of their illness. According to the counselling practices safety is considered as a leading factor to a safety therapeutic trauma work. In this case the patient may be found to be having a number of characteristics that may hinder him from building trust and safety on the therapist. (Corey, 2005) Counselling has always been regarded as the best method used by this client centered therapy which is believed to be dealing with clients suffering from various disorders, thus it helps the client in handling a number of issues which are found to be causing the disorders. In rare cases this practice requires skilled professionals to deal with issues ranging from education, marriage, individuals and families. These professionals are therefore required to have acquired the following in their practices in order to understand the client’s problem. The therapist should develop good listening skills, empathy, and also should be genuine since he will be required to tell the truth even if the subject matter is not that good to the patient. Therefore therapist is to bring out the truth in a way that the client will be able to handle and understand his situation; the counsellor being the therapist should give unconditional positive regard and also have concreteness in providing any information about the psychological disorder the client is subjected to. (Gask and Usherwood 1997) This therapy indicates that individuals are always found to be responding to the emotional stimulation not normally; this may come up as a result of biological factors and also the way the individual was brought up. It is usually carried out in two forms; that is the weekly psychotherapist that involves the addressing issues that are said to have affected the individual during the week and also coming up with the best resolutions for such factors leading to psychological disorders. The second form is the group therapy which is directed towards the handling of the interpersonal skills, the regulation of emotions and also enabling the individual to accept and also tolerate the disorder. The importance of the Client Centered Therapy is that it helps the individuals found to be suffering from the personality disorders to response to such conditions positively and also bringing up a number of characteristics including that of self-esteem, having and looking for more goals in life and also learning of new methods of behaving. (Eysenck, 1997) Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing; this method is usually offered by client centered therapists in ensuring that the traumatic and psychological experiences are remembered by the patient. In this case we find that the counsellor does this by asking the patient to follow the therapist’s finger in the left right eye movements that is usually done in a rhythmic manner, and by doing this the individual suffering from the psychological disorder is therefore asked to be thinking of the traumatic experience undertaken in the process of being attacked by the disorder. This therapy is believed to be leading to reduced cases of the appearance of the traumatizing images to the client. Many argue that this therapy method provides no control, pre and post treatment assessments (Chopra and Kulhara, 1996) The therapy is regarded as the best method used of helping people who suffer from psychological traumas. This is because many dysfunctions such as traumas resulting form drug abuse, child abuse and other family matters are easily handled by using the patients’ family members who produce a number of information such as personal characteristics that may help the counsellor in handling the person affected by the disorders. This is a treatment that may be used by many counsellors and that they are advised to per take this therapy with regards to carrying a number of methods used in counselling. One of them is the supportive method of counselling which is applied in the counselling with an objective of relieving pain caused by depression on the individual and also by doing this the patient is also allowed to recognize himself as an important member of the society. Most of the disorders make individual face loneliness and discriminated from the rest of the people in the society thus such technique is important. (Gask and Usherwood1997) In many cases we find that the therapists, prefer this method since it creates a distinction between external problems and internal changes to be made by the person, the internal changes are meant to help in the assessment of the problems the person is facing, this is usually done by self-evaluation, including the evaluation of other people surrounding the sick person and the expectations of the person in his life. External changes are usually used in the handling of the existing problems by the use of various management skills including, communication, life management and those required to develop a better relationship with those who are not affected by the disorders. Exposure in counselling plays a major role in helping the people with such disorders; it is usually identified in two forms, one being exposure to the feared solutions which is a method that involves tackling repeatedly a situation that is said to be causing a particular disorder every time it indicates its reappearing. This is found to be making the person suffering to get used to such a problem until it doesn’t cause more traumas. The second form is the exposure role plays which is said to be a bit similar to that of the exposure to feared situations. The only difference is that this practice is done on a simulative basis; that is one can repeatedly do the activity which is similar to what is causing the disorder. A good example of this is that when an individual suffering from anxiety always finds it difficult to communicate with his employer, he can therefore try to avoid this problem by trying to talk to someone who is senior to him in the working place and after sometime we find that he will be able to overcome this fear of facing his employer. (Basch, 1986) Existential Psychotherapy is usually a type of psychotherapy which intends at improving self-knowledge in the users and giving them permission in the process to take full control of their lives. There are many objectives of existential psychotherapy and includes the following; it allows individuals to become more honest with their lives, to broaden their perceptions on their lives and that of their surrounding and to clarify on how to carry on in the future days when carrying on with lessons from the past and coming up with viable ways that will guide them in their present lives among other aims. (Deurzen and Arnold-Baker, 2005) A good example where existential psychotherapy can be applied is to politicians since majority of them are not honest with themselves. Under client centered, such politicians can be trained to become sincere in their work of governing. Politicians often have a lot in their minds and therefore they are subjected to a lot of thinking which in the process may lead to them being insincere in their lives in their aims to satisfy their own motives and those of their constituents. Therefore it is prudent for such politicians to be subjected to Existential Psychotherapy in order to nurture them to be persons of integrity in their day to day activities. In essence the nature of politician’s jobs requires professional guidance and such guidance is that of Existential Psychotherapy. Also Existential Psychotherapy can influence Gestalt therapy for instance; existential therapy can be useful whereby a professional or an individual is so pessimistic in his life. With such therapy the person can be nurtured through existential Psychotherapy to understand himself fully, to clearly know his responsibilities, to be fully aware of happenings in his surroundings and to embrace commitment and involvement in their personal endeavours. Existential philosophy on the other hand is an approach that makes it possible for persons to face the apprehensions of their own lives head-on and embrace the situation of isolation, to participate in the autonomy to select and to take full accountability for their preferred choices. Such philosophy bravely advocates for good living in their wheel of their daily lives and move in whatever way they decide and such a move is guided by their own courage. (Deurzen and Arnold-Baker, 2005) Existential philosophy provides an array of hope and an individual does not have to apprehend thoughts of meaninglessness, instead it provides them with new meanings for their being. Existential philosophy encourages good life by building, creating affections and by creating good environment that favours their adventures. Under Existential Philosophy an individual recognizes one's personal humanity and in the process prevail over panic of death. A good example of Existential philosophy in the aspect of Gestalt theory is that of a counsellor providing counselling practices to an individual who has fear of something and often has a negative perception over such an issue. The individual is guided to develop positive way of thinking and avoid concentrating on negative perceptions that may cause him tribulations in his life. However, existential philosophy is more effective under client-centered therapy in that the counsellor concentrates on with one individual who has certain problems and must be guided in order to remain positive in life. For example, Existential Philosophy is effective when used in counselling those individuals who are HIV positive. (Deurzen and Arnold-Baker, 2005) Counselling plays a key role in treatment of psychological disorders and patients with such disorders should be subjected to such programs in order to aid them to recover slowly from such attacks which may affect their lives by applying both the gestalt therapy and the client-centered therapy. Under the two therapies we find that counselling programs designed should be well formulated to address all the problems that the patients with such disorders are facing in the society in order to avoid the repeat of the attacks. These therapies should be made easier in terms of getting access to it for example building counselling centres in all parts of the county. The relevant authorities should also chip in and offer the counselling services for free or at affordable rates to the members of the society. (Basch, 1986) Read More