Theory, Practice and Technique: Self-supervision in Gestalt psychotherapy

Abstract

The stumbling blocks that a therapist experiences working with his clients are both technical and personal. This paper would like to be a "reminder" to help the therapists leaning on the theoretical postulates underpinning the existential-phenomenological gestalt therapy. In addition, we propose a self-evaluation method through which the therapist can monitor his experience (comprised by what the therapist is experiencing about him/herself, about the client and the therapeutic relationship) during each session. The aim is to practice a kind of self-supervision, to bring out the potential crux hindering the therapeutic process. We propose to look to the therapeutic treatment from the therapist's point of view. For this purpose, we suggest to the therapist to write his experience session by session, in order to create a sort of journal that will be used for analysis using the existential-phenomenological methodological framework (Giorgi, 1985). We expect that what emerges from the above-mentioned analysis could be faced referring to the pillars of existential-phenomenological Gestalt therapy, highlighting the infinite dialogue between practice  and theory and the continuous rebound between what happens inside and what exists outside the inner world of the therapist and his practice.

Keywords: Psychotherapy, Gestalt, Phenomenological existential method, supervision, self-evaluation