Moving Forward
In the Gestalt process, as the client makes contact and begins to experience himself in relationship to the other, his self becomes more visible to him and to his therapist. As Jim became more aware of what was going on inside of him, his self began to emerge in the moment. He began to be able to access his internal world in a different way than he had before, and he began to be more aware of the impact of his behavior on others.
As the therapy progressed, he began to feel and express sadness about his low quality of life; and as he experienced his feelings more, his engagement with me improved. Rather than talking at me, he made eye contact and talked to me about his sadness and loneliness, and his inability to be successful in the way he wanted to be with women and with peers.
One of the things that he discovered in our encounters was that as he began to interrupt less and focus more on what I had to say, he became more anxious and unsure of himself. He realized talking so much was an effort to relieve his anxiety—he was scared to slow down and engage people in a more intimate way. Clearly, Jim began to encounter on a deeper level the core issues that were troubling him about his current existence.