An international selection of authors provide a detailed exploration of Gestalt as a somatic and relational practice. Covering many aspects of this relationship, the chapters include discussion of our relationships with nature, the role of Eros, energy in Taoism, affect and methods of practice. Both theoretical and practical application of an embodied relational approach to GT are presented, and many chapters include case studies from the contributors' own work. The overall view of the book is that our bodies are inextricably embedded and co-creating with the environment, and that we know our body and the world through our embodiment.

Embodied Relational Gestalt: Theories and Applications

Health, Fitness & Dieting

Mental Health

Gestalt Press

An international selection of authors provide a detailed exploration of Gestalt as a somatic and relational practice. Covering many aspects of this relationship, the chapters include discussion of our relationships with nature, the role of Eros, energy in Taoism, affect and methods of practice. Both theoretical and practical application of an embodied relational approach to GT are presented, and many chapters include case studies from the contributors’ own work. The overall view of the book is that our bodies are inextricably embedded and co-creating with the environment, and that we know our body and the world through our embodiment.

Embodied Relational Gestalt: Theories and Applications (Evolution of Gestalt)

Mending the World: Social Healing Interventions by Gestalt Practitioners Worldwide

Mending the World provides a blueprint for making a difference in the intractable social issues that exist today. It presents the compelling drama of thirteen stories of people on the firing lines in countries in Africa , Europe, Scandinavia, as well as Brazil, Cambodia, North of Ireland, and the USA . The cases involve diverse real world issues, such as AIDS reduction, poverty, political conflict, natural disasters, and dilemmas in supporting the aged. The stories are framed by the editors with theory and historical data, and offer the hope of effective change using Gestalt principles and methods. In these complex issues, you need unique skills to bring people together to work toward a common solution, and to empower yourselves to influence people with positional power, Mending the World shows how use of these skills leads to high-impact outcomes.

Volume II in the Evolution of Gestalt series, Relational Child, Relational Brain continues the development of the paradigm shift that places human development in a field that is deeply complex and fundamentally one of interconnection, taking us away from the limiting view of us as separate individuals. It builds on the foundation of contemporary views of relational neurodevelopment and the profound influence of relationship on brain growth. It shows how, particularly in the first two years of life, but continuing across the whole of childhood and adolescence into early adulthood, the relational field is the context of child development. The focus then broadens out to examine the intersubjective influence of community, culture, and social and physical support. Backed by neurobiological and related research, it offers many examples of relational Gestalt practice with children, adolescents, and their families, with stories of loss, trauma, isolation, and other adversities. Not just an invaluable resource for child and adolescent therapists, Relational Child, Relational Brain goes beyond the Esalen Study Conference from which it emerged and is a further invitation and challenge to apply relational Gestalt practice as a coherent and effective way forward in the troubled world of today.

Relational Child, Relational Brain: Development and Therapy in Childhood and Adolescence (Evolution of Gestalt, 2)

Aggression, Time, and Understanding: Contributions to the Evolution of Gestalt Therapy

Aggression, Time, and Understanding is the first book of Staemmler’s writings to be published in English. In the early sections of this book, Staemmler (supported by his Buddhist wife, Barbara) comprehensively explores and questions the traditional Gestalt therapy theory of aggression and proposes a new approach to working with anger and hostility. Further sections include in-depth examinations of the topics of time (the "Here and Now" and "Regressive Processes") and understanding ("Dialogue and Interpretation" and "Cultivated Uncertainty"). From Staemmler’s "critical gaze," Dan Bloom observes, "concepts emerge as refreshed, re-formed, and revitalized constructs so we can continue to develop the theory and practice of contemporary Gestalt therapy."

Staemmler, Frank-M.

Cocreating the Field is about developing a radically new story to shift our perception of who we are as humans from a focus on our separate individual natures to our complex interconnectedness. The core Gestalt model offers a theoretical and pragmatic frame for addressing urgent concerns in a wide range of crucial arenas. Topics include the new relational neuroscience and how it interfaces with Gestalt's assumptions about healthy human process; how one therapist is working with children in Dharamsala, India and Capetown, South Africa to help them digitally tell their stories in support of resilience; how transformational thinking brings pro-social and, for some, spiritual questing into focus; and how Gestalt-trained practitioners, therapists, coaches and consultants can become citizen-practitioners in a troubled world. Going beyond the original Esalen Institute study conference on the Evolution of Gestalt, Cocreating the Field offers guidance for moving forward effectively and joyously as awakened interdependent participants in these stressful times.

CoCreating the Field: Intention and Practice in the Age of Complexity

Lynne Jacobs and Richard Hycner assemble an international group of Gestalt theorists and clinicians for an engaging and insightful investigation into the integration of relational approaches within Gestalt therapy. The book is divided thematically into three sections. The first section speculates on the history and development of relationality in terms of Gestalt therapy. Chapters that discuss the patient-therapist relationship comprise the second section, and include explorations into uncertainty in interpretation and understanding, attunement and optimal responsiveness, working with shame, and negotiating individuality and "betweenness." The last section opens up to groups and organizations, applying relational approaches to Gestalt therapeutic encounters with more than one patient.

Relational Approaches in Gestalt Therapy

The Secret Language of Intimacy: Releasing the Hidden Power in Couple Relationships

In The Secret Language of Intimacy, shame and its consequences are foregrounded as a major, if not the major, impediment to the healthy functioning in the relationships of couples. In the first part of the book, Robert Lee presents the "Secret Language of Intimacy Workshop," developed and presented for the first time at the 1998 Annual Conference of the Association for the Advancement of Gestalt Therapy. Lee not only describes how the hidden forces of shame and belonging regulate couple dynamics, but also how the workshop itself has facilitated the acceptance of these forces and promoted therapeutic resolution, utilizing clinical vignettes. The second half of the book is comprised of internationally contributed essays from leading names in the Gestalt perspective, each adding to and redefining the role of shame and belonging in the theory and practice of Gestalt couples therapy. Their conclusions, however, are just as insightful for purveyors of other psychoanalytic and psychodynamic therapies as well.

Lee, Robert G.

In this original and penetrating work, the origins of the Gestalt psychotherapy model are traced back to its roots in psychoanalysis and Gestalt cognitive and perceptual psychology.  Drawing new implications for both Gestalt and psychotherapy in general from these origins - and with special emphasis on the neglected work of Lewis and Goldstein - Wheeler develops a revised model that is more fully "Gestalt" and at the same time more firmly grounded in the spectrum of tools and approaches available to the contemporary psychotherapist.  Along the way, a number of new insights are offered, not just in Gestalt, but in the working of the psychoanalytic and cognitive/behavioral models.  The result is an integrated approach giving a fresh perspective on the universal processes of contact and resistance, both in psychotherapy and in social systems in general.  The practitioner is given these tools for "addressing problems at the intra- and interpersonal level and wider systematic levels at the same time, and in the same language." Each chapter stands alone, and makes a fresh and significant contribution to its particular subject.  Taken together, they constitute a remarkable excursion through the history of psychotherapy in this century, weaving powerfully through social psychology, behaviorism, and Gestalt itself, yielding a masterful new synthesis that will interest the practitioners of Gestalt and other schools alike.

Gestalt Reconsidered: A New Approach to Contact and Resistance

Wheeler, Gordon

Bridging the gap between psychology and politics, Lichtenberg presents a powerful argument for applying the methods and insights of the Gestalt perspective to social and political problems. Focusing on the inner dynamics of power and abuse relationships, this thoughtful treatment of victim/oppressor fusion has stimulated new thinking about abuse, exploitation, and the processes and methods essential to personal and political change.

Community and Confluence: Undoing the Clinch of Oppression (Gestalt Institute of Cleveland Book Series)

Lichtenberg, Philip

See the best price to sell, buy or rent books by the Gestalt Press publisher. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Gestalt Press