Those who grow up in chemically dependent families have strong survivorship skills. Unfortunately, for too many, they continue to present to the world a false self often becoming our "closeted" depressed, angry and addicted client. This workshop focuses on 1) treatment orientation and priorities, and 2) core clinical issues. Due to the managed care environment, experiential focus will be on homework assignments.
The human reflex to summarize and animate experiences is a springboard for the formation of selves. Through lecture and live therapy demonstrations, Dr. Polster will show how to identify the population of selves within and how to restore linkage among them, creating a dependable sense of personal identity.
Patients come to therapy because they have problems. These problems range from difficulties in working, in social and sexual relationships and in functioning. Symptoms may be depression, anxiety and fear, or a general sense that life has no meaning. In all cases it can be seen that the body is emotionally crippled by chronic muscular tensions which limit the person's energy and decreases his vitality. In this workshop Lowen explains how one recognizes these tensions and how they can be released.
Szasz considers the role of responsibility in religion, civil and criminal law, medicine and the mental health professions; the differences among existential responsibility, moral blameworthiness and legal accountability; that connections between (mental) competence and responsibility; and relates all of the above to problems in psychotherapeutic theory and practice.
The main principles and most popular techniques of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) will be presented and detailed. There will be live demonstrations with volunteers from the audience.
This experiential workshop will begin with a guided silent meditation. Gendlin will work with volunteers from the audience to show how to find "Focusing." The physically felt body sense of a problem is at first unclear and gradually opens and becomes clear. There will be discussion and demonstrations to show how Focusing is used in the context of psychotherapy.
How does one master the practice of psychotherapy? Should training emphasize theory, technique, or research? What about the personal growth of the clinician? We will identify seven essential "postures" through a series of graduated, Psychoaerobics exercises. Attendees will participate in growth games and group hypnosis to explore the merging of discipline and spontaneity that occurs in the most artful and effective clinical work. The program focuses on refining the therapist's lenses (perception), muscles (therapeutic power), heart (compassion), and hat (social role).
Educational Objectives:
(1) List three therapist postures that were especially well-developed in Erickson.
(2) Given a case, describe how to use a Psychoaerobic exercise.
This workshop summarizes the strategy and tactics of psychodynamic psychotherapy with these patients. The role of interpretation, transference analysis, technical neutrality and countertransferenece will be emphasized. Specific technical approaches will be summarized, particularly contract setting, management of suicidal threats, paranoid regression and dishonesty in patients' communication. Finally, supportive psychotherapy with those patients who cannot be treated with an exploratory approach will be outlined.
Fundamentals of Group Therapy: Selection of patients, preparation, group development, tasks and techniques of the therapist. Use of video vignettes will illustrate fundamentals.