Gestalt Therapy And The Empty Chair Technique: A Case Study

This assignment provides an opportunity for students to facilitate a counselling session in  Gestalt therapy

Technique : the empty chair

Your practice session will need to address:

• use of general counselling skills to maintain an effective therapeutic relationship
• application of the key skills and concepts of your chosen method of counselling
• evidence of some of the principles and assumptions of the chosen counselling approach demonstrated

The Client's Situation

In this case study it is seen that an Iraquian girl visits a councillor. The girl who visits the councillor is named Prathama. It is seen that the councillor asks whereabouts of Prathama. Prathama was breathing heavily before the councillor. The councillor asked Pratham regarding the reason that has led her to a councillor. On asking this question, Prathama answered started answering the same with lot of anxiety. She said that she is in a much tensed situation. She stated her origin was in Iraq and that she has been a refugee. She also stated that they had entered Australia as refugees nearly 10 years ago. After providing the introduction of herself the councillor tries to acknowledge the problem that she might be facing due to the fact that they were refugee and their origin was not in Australia. Prathama also stated that she has received education in Australia. She also stated that she has scored good marks in HSC and is currently pursuing law in UASW.

 The councillor congratulated Prathama for performing this well in the field of education. After congratulating Prathama, the councillor asked whether her university was going well or not. Prathama replied that everything in University was fine and she also stated that she met a guy named Luke in University and they became good friends. Gradually they became very good friends and then they fell in love with each other and wanted to stay together forever. The councillor acknowledged her issue and Pratahama continued to speak. She also stated that Luke wanted her to shift with him and this was her main problem and her family will not accept this. The councillor asked Prathama that was that her only problem that she has been facing. Pratahama answered the councillor by stating that she had convinced Luke to meet her family and propose. But things did not went the way she had planned. Her father was very angry with the decision that she had made. He was very angry and hurt as well. Prathama’s father was strictly against the idea of her marrying someone other than Iraquians. Prathama also stated that her father wanted her to choose someone form their own community. Prathama also stated that her father did not want her and her sister to mix with the Australian community. Prathama said that her father will not be able to handle this kind of mess and this will affect the prosecution of the cultural mix. In order to portray the fact that the commencement of their staying together to be successful, Prathama had to regain her father’s lost trust. After getting to know the entire fact the councillor wanted to know about Prathama’s physical condition. Prathama told that she wanted to cry and she feels heavy as the relation in between her and her father has been degrading. This is one of the main reason that she has not been feeling very good both physically and mentally.

The Empty Chair Technique

The councillor then suggested her a methodology that is named ‘empty chair’. In this methodology, the main criteria that is present states that the prosecution of the method will be performed by assuming an empty chair to be the main man. This helps in better management pf the project as the prosecution of the management of the project gets easier as there is no real time human needed in his process and only the confessor can confess what he or she wants to confess to the virtual or imaginary personnel. After suggesting this method to Prathama, Prathama started doing this method and with the help of this technique she could confess everything to her imaginary father. This made her a bit more confident and gave her peace. She expressed her feelings towards Luke and this earns the fact that the congestion of the process will be performed with the help of the projection of management. In order to commence the project fact that she loves both Luke and his father she stated everything. She also stated about staying in Sydney for many years and that she considers herself as an Australian and not an Irakien.    

The chosen methodology that is taken into consideration for completion of the project is empty chair methodology.

The objectives of the case were as follows: -

Objective 1: To perform a proper cancelling of Prathama who was undergoing a severe problem that led to clash in between her and her father regarding her love Luke

Objective 2: To state methodologies that could better the relationship in between Prathama’s father and Prathama

Objective 3: Letting Prathama letting her heart speak out in a proper manner in order to make her feel comfortable.  

Empty chair methodology is one of the most efficient methodology that helps the client or victim to recover from the situation he or she is in. in this methodology the main advantage that is enjoyed by the victim is that the cost that is incurred in the process is very low. The main requirement to complete this methodology is a chair and the victim herself. In this methodology the victim speaks her heart out and this helps the victim to regain his or her mental stability (Brown & Brown, 2015). The main advantage that is present in the course of performing this process is that in an empty chair method the victim or the client thinks that he or she has been speaking to the person himself or herself to whom she wants to speak (Rahman & Kasman, 2017). This is considered to be one of the main advantage of this system. In case the victim can speak to an imaginary person who is not present in the room helps him or her to speak her heart out. This is one of the main advantage that is enjoyed by the victim. After commencing this process not gets easier for the victim to confess the same in front of the real person as he or she has already practised the same before and is ready to answer the counter questions that might be thrown at him or her.  This process requires the chair located in an empty room where only the chair and the client or victim will be present. The victim will start confessing the issues that he or she has been facing and this will help him or her in better communication in real life as well.

• From the above case, it can be easily evaluated that the process of empty chair is very useful as the entire process was capable enough to heal Prathama to a great extent (Arntz, 2018). This healing will result in better management of her feelings and constrain the excitation that she has been holding from a long time.
  
  
• This process was so effective that Prathama even felt better after completion of the method. The physical constraints that were present in the project commencement was also set in a better manner. This was then main reason that the commencement of the duty that was to be performed gets better with time (Delisle, 2018). This is the sole reason that the processing of this method acts to be better with time. This is considered to be one of the most important reasons that has been affecting the project commencement and the management of the sentiments of the victims who visits the councillor.
  
  
• At time there are phases when the victims are not that capable enough ti speak out their problem to the councillor. In that case usage of this method acts to be successful. This is one of the main reason that the commencement of the project gets successful (Seubert, 2018). In case the victim is capable to confront the problem he or she is facing inform of an imaginary personnel it gets easy for the victim to recover faster and return to his or her life in a better and more efficient manner.

The suggestion that are required for better completion of this method are as follows: -

• Setting up of the questionnaire by the councillor: Setting up of the questionnaire by the councillor is important as the victim might not understand what he or she needs to confess in order to complete the therapy in a better manner. The victim might forget certain instances that he or she needs to confront in order to complete the entire project in a better manner.
• Recording must be done: In order to complete the therapy in a more efficient manner recording of the confession might be done by the councillor in order to make the victim where he or she is going wrong and rectify the faults that are present by analysing the recording.  

Effectiveness of the methodology is very high as this helps in performing the confrontation of the victim to the imaginary personnel to whom he or she wants to confront in real life.

References

Arntz, A. (2018). Modifying Core Beliefs. Process-Based CBT: The Science and Core Clinical Competencies of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, 339.

Brown, P., & Brown, M. (2015). Pastoral Group Counselling at a High Security Prison in Israel: Integrating Pierre Janet’s Psychological Analysis with Fritz Perls’ Gestalt Therapy. Journal of Pastoral Care & Counseling, 69(1), 40-45.

Delisle, G. (2018). Fifty years of Gestalt therapy. In Object Relations in Gestalt Therapy (pp. 3-9). Routledge.   

Guerin, B. (2017). Deconstructing psychological therapies as activities in context: What are the goals and what do therapists actually do?. Perspectivas em análise do comportamento, 8(1), 097-119.

Kolmannskog, V. (2018). The Empty Chair: Tales from Gestalt Therapy. Routledge.

Lobb, M. S. (2015). Fundamentals and development of Gestalt Therapy in the contemporary context. Gestalt Review, 19(2), 1-24.

?ysiak, M. (2017). Dialogical Temporal Chair Technique. British Journal of Guidance & Counselling, 1-9.

Mistler, B. J. (2017). FOUNDATIONS OF GESTALT THEORY. Integrating the Expressive Arts Into Counseling Practice: Theory-Based Interventions, 137.

Mondada, L., Svensson, H., & van Schepen, N. (2017). A table-based turn-taking system and its political consequences. Journal of Language and Politics, 16(1), 85-111.

Rahman, I. K., & Kasman, R. (2017). Best Practice Islamization of Science on Gestalt-Profetik (G-Pro) Guidance and Counseling Model. International Journal of Islamic Education Ta'dibuna, 1(1), 47-52.

Seubert, A. (2018). Becoming Known: A Relational Model Utilizing Gestalt and Ego State-Assisted EMDR in Treating Eating Disorders. Journal of EMDR Practice and Research, 12(2), 71-85.

Thoma, N. C., & Greenberg, L. S. (2015). Integrating emotion-focused therapy into cognitive-behavioural therapy. Working with emotion in cognitive-behavioral therapy: Techniques for clinical practice, 239-262.