Gestalt techniques vs. Gestalt therapy

• Mission Statement by Brian O'Neill, 10/31/96
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    • Gestalt Therapy, Cognitive Therapy, and the Meaning of Life by Jim Pretzer, 11/13/96
      
      

I think there's been a misunderstanding, probably my fault as much as anybody's. In doing, say, two-chair work in the context of cognitive-behavioral therapy, I don't for a moment imagine that I am "doing Gestalt therapy." So far as I am concerned, I am simply borrowing a technique that I have found valuable and productive; in calling it a Gestalt method, I mean only to give its source the credit that it deserves.

I suppose one could argue that a Gestalt technique divorced from the context of full-blooded Gestalt therapy isn't any longer a Gestalt technique. Maybe so, maybe not. To be quite candid, this is the kind of definitional question that some people care a great deal about, but that I can't for the life of me see the point of.

But here you see what David Ogilvy, the celebrated adman that I worked for long ago, called my "brutish, peasant-like mind." (Having once stung me by describing me in a memo as a "purist," he was now paying a compliment.) Ah, well . . . .

• Gestalt Experience vs Gestalt Theory by Kenan Branam, 11/17/96