(Music) (Everett L Shostrom)Psychotherapy is such a personal and private process that it is a mystery to most people who have never gone through it The following series is a unique effort that allows us to sit in on what is ordinarily a very private therapeutic experience. An actual patient was courageous enough and considerate enough to allow herself to be photographed while actually engaged in therapy with three different therapists. Thus we're allowed the privilege of seeing and feeling feeling what really transpires. A film series like this, in which three therapists distinguished by their different orientations share their therapeutic endeavors has never been made before. We therefore wish to express our gratitude to Gloria, the patient, and to her therapists for allowing us to share in their therapeutic adventure This series will be divided into three separate films. in the first film we see doctor Carl Rogers founder of client-centered therapy interviewing Gloria. In film number two, Dr. Frederick Perls, founder of Gestalt therapy is working with her and in film number three Dr. Albert Ellis, founder of rational-emotive therapy is our therapist each therapist will first describe his system of therapy briefly. He will then demonstrate his work with Gloria and then he will comment briefly on his work Now here is Dr. Carl Rogers. (Carl Rogers) From my own years of therapeutic experience, I have come to feel that if I can create the proper climate, the proper relationship, the proper conditions, a process of therapeutic movement will almost inevitably occur in my client. You may ask: 'What is this climate? What are these conditions? 'Will they exist in the interview with the woman I am about to talk with, 'and whom I have never seen before?' Let me try to describe very briefly what these conditions are as I see them. First of all, one question is, can I be real in the relationship? This has come to have an increasing amount of importance to me over the years. I feel that genuineness is another way of describing the quality I would like to have. I like the term 'congruent', by which. I mean that what I am experiencing inside is present in my awareness and comes out through my communication. In a sense, when I have this quality, I am all in one piece in the relationship. There is another word that describes it for me. I feel that in the relationship, I would like to have a 'transparency.' I would be quite willing for my client to see all the way through me, that there would be nothing, nothing hidden. And when lam real in this fashion that I'm trying to describe, then I know that my own feelings will often bubble up into awareness and be expressed, but be expressed in ways that won't impose themselves on my client. Then the second question I would have is, will I find myself prizing this person, caring for this person? I certainly don't want to pretend a caring that I don't feel. In fact, if I dislike my client persistently, I feel it is better, that I should express it. But I know that the process of therapy is much more likely to occur and constructive change is much more likely if I feel a real spontaneous prizing of this individual with whom I'm working, a prizing of this person as a separate individual. You can call that quality acceptance, you can call it caring, you can call it a non-possessive love if you wish. I think any of those terms tend to describe it. I know that the relationship will prove more constructive if it's present. Then the third quality: will I be able to understand the inner world of this individual from the inside? And then will I be able to see it through her eyes? Will I be able to be sufficiently sensitive to move around inside the world of her feelings so that I know what it feels like to be her, so that I can sense not only the surface meanings, but some of the meanings that lie somewhat underneath the surface. I know that if I can let myself sensitively and accurately enter into her world of experience, then change and therapeutic movement are much more likely. Well, suppose I am fortunate and that I do experience some of these attitudes in the relationship, what then? Well, then a variety of things are likely to happen. Both from my clinical experience and from our research investigations we find that if attitudes of the sorts that I have described are present, then quite a number of things will happen. She'll explore some of her feelings and attitudes more deeply. She is likely to discover some hidden aspects of herself that she wasn't aware of previously. Feeling herself prized by me, it is quite possible she'll come to prize herself more. Feeling that some of her meanings are understood by me, then she can more readily perhaps listen to herself, listen to what is going on within her own experience, listen to some of the meanings she hasn't been able to catch before. And perhaps if she senses realness in me, she'll be able to be a little more real within herself. I suspect there will be a change in the manner of her expression, at least this has been my experience in other instances. From being rather remote from her experiencing, remote from what is going on within her, it's possible that she'll move toward more immediacy of experiencing, that she will be able to sense and express what's going on in her in the immediate moment From being disapproving of herself, it is quite possible she will move toward a greater degree of acceptance of herself. From somewhat of a fear of relating, she may move toward being able to relate more directly and to encounter me more directly. From construing life in somewhat rigid black and white patterns,' she may move toward more tentative ways of construing her experience and of seeing the meanings in it. From a locus of evaluation which is outside of herself, it is quite possible she will move toward recognizing a greater capacity within herself for making judgments and drawing conclusions. So those are the some of -- those are some of the changes that we have. If I have any success in creating the kind of conditions that I described initially, then we may be able to see some of these changes in this client even though I know in advance that our contact is going to be very brief. ///// good morning I'm curious you must be Barry yes I am I'm service chair no we have half an hour together and I really don't know what we'll be able to make of it but I hope we can make something else be glad to know whatever concerns you well I'm right now I'm nervous but I feel more comfortable the way you're talking in a low voice oh I don't feel like you'll be so harsh on me but um I hear the tremor in your voice ooh a the main thing I want to talk to you about is stuff I'm just newly divorced and I had gone in therapy before and I felt comfortable when I left and all of a sudden now the biggest change is adjusting to my single life and one of the things that bother me the most is especially manhe's and having men to the house and how it affects the children and the biggest thing I want the same keeps coming to my mind I want to tell you about yes I have a daughter 9 who at one time I felt I had a lot of emotional problems I wish I could stop shaking and I real conscious of things affecting her I don't want her to get upset I don't want to shock her I want so bad for her to accept me and will really open with each other especially about sex and the other day she saw a girl that was saving the pregnant and she asked me all about teen girls get pregnant if they're single and the conversation was fine and I wasn't underneath at all with her until she asked me if I'd ever made love to a man since I've left her daddy and I lied to her and ever since that it keeps coming up to my mind cuz I feel so guilty lying there there cuz I never mind wanted to trust me and I want I almost want an answer from you I want you to tell me if it will affect Iran if I told her the truth or would and it is concerned about her and the fact that you really aren't that this open relationship that has existed between you and I you feel it kind of yes I feel like I have to be on guard about that because I didn't when I was a little girl when I first found out my mother father made love it was dirty and terrible and I didn't I didn't like her anymore for a while and I don't want to lie to pan me either and I don't know sure wish I could give you the answer as to what you should tell her all the things you're going to say that because what you really want is an answer I want to especially know if it would affect her if I was completely honest and open with her or if it would affect her because I lied I feel like it's bound to make a strain because I lied to her because she'll suspect that or she will know something's not quite right fine she'll distrust me yes and also I thought would she what about when she gets a little older and she finds herself in touchy situation she probably wouldn't want to get it to me because she thinks I'm so good and so sweet and yet I'm afraid she could think I'm really a a devil and I want so bad for it except me I don't know how much a learner can take and we would both alternatives concern you but you might think you're too good or better than you really are yes she might think that you're worse than you are not worse than I am I don't know she can accept me the way I I think I paint a picture that I'm all sweet and motherly and I'm not ashamed of my shady side too it really cuts a little deeper if she really knew you would she could she accept you this is what I don't know yes I don't want to turn away from me I don't even know how I feel about it because there are times when I feel so guilty like when I have the wheel over I even try to make a special setup so that if I were ever along with them the children would never catch me and that sort of thing because I'm worried about it and yet I also know I have these desires let's click here it isn't only her problem or the relationship with her it's in you as well my guilt oh yeah I forgive um so what can I accept myself as doing yes and you realize that you said observed subterfuges so as to make sure that that you're not caught or something you realize that you are acting from guilt is it yes I don't like the way I would like to feel comfortable with whatever I do if I choose not to tell family the truth to feel comfortable that she can't handle it and they don't I want to be honest and yet I feel there are some areas but I don't even accept if you can't accept them in yourself how could you possibly be comfortable and telling them to her right and yet did you say you do have these desires and you do have your feelings but but you don't feel good about and I thought you're just gonna sit there and let me experiment laughs I want more I want you to help me get rid of my guilt feeling if I can get rid of my guilt feeling about lying or going to bed with a single man any of that just so I can feel more comfortable and I guess I'd like to say no I don't want to let's just steal in your feelings but on the other hand I also feel that this is the kind of very private thing that I couldn't possibly answer for you that I assure is anything we'll try to help you work toward your own answer I don't know whether that makes any sense to you but I mean it well I appreciate you saying that you sound like you mean it but I don't know where to go I don't begin to know where to go I thought that I'd pretty well worked over most of my guilt and now that this is coming up I'm disappointed in myself I really am I want I like it when I feel that no matter what I do even if it's against my own morals or my upbringing but I can still feel good about me and now I don't like there's a girl at work who sort of mothers me and she just she I think she thinks I'm all sweet and I sure don't want to show my more ornery devilish side with her I want to be sweet and it's so hard for me to to selfie so nil again it's so disappointing yeah I get the disappointment that here a lot of these things you thought you'd work through and now the guilts and a feeling that only a part of you is acceptable to anybody else yeah that keeps coming out I guess I could catch the real deep puzzlement that you feel as to what the hell shall I do yes and you know what I can find doctor is that everything I start to do that I impulse it seems natural to tell Pierre or to go out on a day or something uncomfortable until I think how I was affected as a child and the minute that comes up and I'm all haywire like I want to be a good mother so bad and I feel like I have a good mother but then there's those little exceptions like my guilts with working I want to work and it's so fun having extra money I like to work nice the minute I think I'm not being real good to the children are giving them enough time then I start feeling guilty again then that's when I get some what do they call it a double line that's just what it feels like I want to do this and it feels right but after all I'm not being a good mother and I want to be both I'm coming more and more aware of what a perfectionist I am that's what it seems like I want to be so perfect you know I want to become perfect in my standards or not have that need anymore or I guess I hear it a little differently that what you want us to seem perfect but it means a great matter of great importance to you to be a good mother and you want to seem to be a good mother even if some of your actual feelings differ from them is it okay yeah I feel like I'm saying that no that is what I feel really I want to approve of me always but my actions won't let me I want to prove with me I realize you alright let me understand it the sound of your actions are kind of outside of you you want to approve of you but what you do somehow won't let you approve of your site like I feel but I could approve with myself regarding for example my sex life it is the big thing if I really fell in love the man and I respected him and I adored him I don't think I feel so guilty going to bed with him I don't think I'd have to make up any excuses to the children because they could see my natural caring form but when they have the physical desire and I'll say over why not and I want to anyway then I feel guilty afterwards I hate pleasing the kids I don't like looking at myself and I really enjoy it and this is what I mean if the circumstances would be different I don't think it's also guilty because I feel right about it yeah I guess I hear you saying if if what I was doing when I went to bed with a man was really genuine and full of love and respect and so on I wouldn't feel guilty in relation to Pam I wouldn't I really would be comfortable about that so I said yes and I know that sounds like I want a perfect situation but that is how I feel and in the meantime I can't stop these desires I've tried that also I've tried saying okay I don't like myself when I do that so I would do it anymore but then I resent the children I think why should they stop me from doing what I want and it's really not that bad that I guess I heard just saying - that wasn't only the that I guess I heard you saying to them isn't only the children you don't like it as well honey it really isn't I'm sure that I know that's it probably even more so than I'm aware of that I all love it so much when I pick it up in the children then I can also moans in myself somehow sometimes you kind of feel like blaming in for the feelings you have and why should they cut you off from a normal sex life well a sex life I could say not rule because there is something about me that says that smell they don't think to just go into sex because you feel physically attractive or something or a physical need so something about it tells me that's not quite right anyway it's akhil really the times you're acting in ways that are not in occurred with your own inner standards right great but then we're also saying a minute ago but to feel you can't help that yeah I wish I could that's it and I can't now I feel like I can't control myself as well as I could have before for a specific reason now I can't I just let go and I have there's too many things I do wrong that I have to feel guilty for and I sure don't like that I want you very much to give me a direct answer and I'm going to ask it and I don't expect a direct answer but I want to know do you feel that to me the most important thing is to be open and honest and if I can be able to notice with my joy do you feel that it could handle them if for example I could say to PME I was I felt bad lying to the PME and I want to tell you the truth now and if I tell her the truth and she shocked at me which she's upset but that could bother her more I want to get rid of my job so that will help me but I don't want to put him on her okay he thought I could hurt her I'm sorry I guess I'm sure this will sound evasive to you but it seems to me that perhaps the person you're not being fully honest glib is you because I was very much struck by the fact that you were saying if I feel all right about what I have done but it's going to beg you the man or what if I really feel all right about it then I don't have any concern about what I would tell him or all my relationships with me right all right then I hear what you're saying then all right then I want to work on I want to work on accepting me them I want to work on feeling all right about it now that makes sense that that will come natural and then I will have to worry about him but when things don't seem so wrong for me and I have an impostor driven how can I accept that what you'd like to do is to feel more accepting toward yourself when you do things that you feel are wrong right I feel like like I'm saying yeah I feel like you're going to say no why do you think they're wrong and I have mixed feelings there too to therapy I'll say no look I know this is natural women feel it sure we don't talk about a lot socially so all women fill it in it's very natural I've had sex for the last 11 years and of course going to want it but I still think it's wrong unless you're really truly in love with a man and my body doesn't seem to agree that's why I don't know how to accept it sounds like a triangle to me doesn't it you feel that I or therapists in general or other people say it's alright it's alright natural huh go ahead and I guess you feel your body sort of lines up on that side of the picture but something in you says but I don't like it that way not much it's really right right I have a hopeful sign those are all the things I sorted for myself and I feel the okay now what if you this is the conflict and it's just being soluble and therefore its focus and here you look to me and I don't seem to give you any help than what I am I really really can't answer for me I have to figure it out myself but I want you to guide me or show me where to start or so it won't look so hopeless I know I can keep living with this conflict and I know eventually things would work out but I like feeling more comfortable with the way I live anything I meant is what is it you wish I would say to you I wish you would say to me to be honest and take the risk that Pam is going to accept me and I also have a feeling if I could really risk it with Pammy of all people that I'd be able to see here's this little kid that can accept me and under they know about that if she really knows what a demon I am and still loves me and accepts me it seems like it would help me to accept me more like it's really not that bad I want you to say to go ahead and be honest but I don't want any sponsor berry but it would upset her that's right I might be something you know yeah you know very well what you'd like to do in relationship you would like to be yourself and you'd like to have her know that you're not perfect and do things that maybe even she wouldn't approval to disapprove of to some degree yourself but that somehow she would love you and accept you as an imperfect person like I wonder if my mother had been more open with world maybe I would have had such a narrow attitude about sex if I would have thought that she could be you know pretty sexy and corny and devilish too but I would look at her as being such a sweet mother than she could also be the other side but she didn't talk about that maybe that's where I got my picture I don't know but I want Tami to see me as a full woman but also accept me you know it's not so I'm certain I don't do you mean what I mean is you've been sitting there telling me just what you would like to do in that relationship with him I would but I don't quite take the risk of doing it Leslie already tells me that yes I guess one thing that I feel very keenly is it's an awfully risky thing to live maybe taking a chance on your relationship with her taking a chance on letting her know who you were really even if I don't take a chance if I still have an accepted buyer I'm never going to sell it about it anyway if your love and acceptance of you is based on a false picture of you what the hell is the good of that but I also feeling a lot of responsibility with being a mother what Idol I don't want to feel like I've caused any big traumas and the children they don't like all that responsibility that's what I don't like feeling it could be my fault because that's what I meant when I said life is risky to take the responsibility for being a person you would like to be with her is a however responsibility it is a very frightening the only way I look at it two ways I like to see myself as being so honest with the kids and really being proud of myself though that no matter what I told them or no matter how bad they may think I was I was honest and down deep it's going to be a much more wholesome relationship and yet you know I get jealous like when they're with their daddy I feel he's more flip he's not quite as real he's not quite as honest but nevertheless they see a sweet picture of their dad you know mozell Phyllis tonight and I'm envious of that too I want them to see was just too sweet if they see him I know he's not quite as well with them so it seems like I've got to swap the one for the other and I know this is really what I want the most but I miss some of that glory so feel I want them to have just as nice a picture of me as the head of their dad that is a little funny then maybe nine I'll have to be - I think that's putting a little too strong that's close I just bring me I know she can have that literature of me if I were honest decide that I do go I'm Luna honored and dad anyway so I'm like you do more things that they disapprove of sounds are you really find it quite hard to believe what they would really love you if they knew that's right you know that's exactly it before therapy who she cares about need a picture of me if I were honest the fact that I do go on loan will honor their dad anyway unlikely bill more things that said disapproval so you really find it quite hard to believe but they would really love you if they knew you that's right you know that's exactly it before therapy I would have definitely chosen the other area I'm going to get respect remain no matter what even if I have to lie alright now I know that's not true and I'm not positive they'll truly accept me something tells me they will I know diva but I'm not positive I'll agree sure I keep wanting this in kind of a no-man's land of probably shifting from one point of view to them to another that boy I'd sure like somebody to say that's right you go ahead and do it yes that's why I get encouraged when I read in a book from somebody I respect and admire but this is the right thing no matter what honesty will win out well then that keeps giving with compliments by gosh and right it it's a damn hard day really choose something on their own isn't it which makes me feel very immature I don't like this I mean I wish I were great live enough for mature enough to make my decisions we stick by them but I need somebody to help me on somebody to push me so she can approach yourself for that I guess until why if I was anybody if I was grown up I'd be mature enough to decide things like this price them right and take more risk I wish that take more risks I wish that I could just go ahead and be this with any however the children go up I've done with this I didn't have to constantly have this conflict and I glide Satan used to say no matter what you ask me kids at least I told you the truth you may not have liked it but it's been the truth that's all now I can admire I just respect people that lie I hate it so you see what a good learner I am is I hate myself if I'm bad but I also hate myself if I lie so it's accepting you want to become more accepting I guess judging here tone of voice you sound as when you hate yourself more when you live and do in terms of things you disappear really I do because this was really bothered me this happen with family about a month ago and it keeps coming to learn I don't know whether to go back and talk to her about it oh wait she may have even forgotten what she asked me that though everyone does you haven't forgotten I have no I like at least be able to tell her this I remember lying and I'm sorry lied and it's been driving me bugs because I did I don't know I feel like now that's solved and I don't even solve a thing but I feel relieved I am I just feel like you've been saying to me you're not giving me advice but I feel like you're saying you really want to know what pattern you want to follow Gloria and go ahead and follow it that's what I feel stacking up for you I guess the way I sense it is you've been telling me that you know what you want to do and yes I do believe in backing up people and what they want to do just a little different slant from the way it seems to you are you tell me one thing that concerns me it's no damn good you're doing something that you haven't really chosen to do that's why I'm trying to help you find out what's your own inner choices in and there's also a conflict there because I'm not really positive what I want to do the lying part yes but I'm not positive what I want to do when I go against myself like when I bring in the end of the house I'm not sure I want to do that if I feel guilty afterwards unless not really wanted to just to say just sure which words you use but you don't want it you don't like yourself or you don't agree with it when you do something against yourself you know this is so different now this kind of thing that we're talking about now it isn't just knowing whether you want to do something or not if I want to go to work in the morning or I don't want to go to look that's easy but when I find myself doing something I don't feel comfortable with I automatically say if you're not comfortable glory it's not right something's wrong all right now what I want to ask you is how can I know which is the strongest because I do it does that mean that the strongest and yet if I disapprove that's just part of the thing that's got to go on with it see it sounds like you I'm picking up a contradiction I'm letting you know falling some of you feeling a contradiction in yourself team oh you what I heard you saying in part is the way you like it is when you feel really comfortable about what you're doing yes and I have at times when I've made a decision now that seems right that feels perfectly right no conflict but then there are times I do things that I feel uncomfortable with so that there is the conflict there it's not the same at all so what I'm saying is how I really know when I'm falling my true feelings if I have conflicts afterwards or guilt afterwards I see because in the moment that may seem like your true feelings yes like if I'm starting to do it okay so it really is tough and if you feel comfortable in a moment about it but then after it don't feel at all comfortable which course of action is really the one you should have followed the most outstanding thing I don't know if you follow me when I say about this conflict the one thing I know is I boil it for example to leave my husband for quite a few years I never did it I kept thinking how nice it would be or how scary it would be but I never did it and all of a sudden when I did it felt right I didn't feel mean toward him I just knew this is what I had to do that's what I know and following myself I'm fine my feelings completely had no conflict there some of the happy things came from it but I still had no conflict that to me is will in following my feelings and in everyday life the small little decisions the small little things to do don't come out that clear at all so many conflicts coming if it's natural although you're saying I expect it is but but you're saying TV you know perfectly well of feeling within yourself that occurs when you're really doing something it's right for you I do I do and I miss that feeling other times it's better way a clue to me you can really listen to yourself sometimes realize no no this isn't the vague feeling this isn't this isn't the way I would feel if I was doing that I we wanted to do but yet many times I'll go along and do it anyway and say oh well I'm in the situation I'll just remember next time I mentioned this one a lot in therapy and most therapists granite knee or gig or something when I say utopia but when I do fall or feeling and I feel this good feeling inside me that's sort of utopia that's what I mean that's the way I like to feel whether it's a bad thing or a good thing but I feel right about me that's what you'll knows utopian moments you really feel kind of whole you feel all in one piece yeah yeah it gives me a choked up feeling when you say that because I don't get that as often as I'd like I like that whole feeling that's real precious to me xscape none of us get it as often as we like but I really do understand don't touch you didn't and you know we're also are just thinking I thought he's done saying it all of a sudden isn't on here is Betsy on right I can talk to you and I want you to approve of me and I respect you but I miss what my father can talk to me like you are way I'd like to say to you like you for my father I only know one that came to me you look to me like a pretty nice gutter but you really do miss the fact that you couldn't be open with your own game you know I couldn't be open below I won't blame it on him I think I'm more open than hit alarm II mean II would never this will be talk like you are and not disapprove but not blowing me down it yeah I thought of this year the day why do I always have to be so perfect I'm why he always wanted me to be perfect I always had to be better and yeah is that it was trying like hell to be the girl he wants you to be you have to same time my darling thank you like I almost started writing in the letter the other day and telling him I'm a waitress which I expected to disapprove of like while at nights and I I always quoted hanging back like no how do you like me and yet I really want acceptance and love from him I mean I really never use slapping and say this is what I am seeing yeah but it amazed me how do you like it but you know what I think I want him to say and this was you all along for me and I really love you I guess you really feel badly you think there's very little chance you'll say that well maybe it isn't here I went back home in about two years ago really really to let him know I loved him although I bit later him but he doesn't hear me he just keeps saying things like honey you know I love you you know I've always loved doing shit up in here never really known you and loved you and this somehow is what brings the tears in time I don't know what it is you know what it never really known you and loved you and this somehow is what brings the tears inside I don't know what it is you know want to talk about it it feels more flip if I just sit still it it feels like a great big hurt down there did I mm-hmm much much easier to be a little flip because then you don't feel that big lump inside over and again that's a hopeless situation I tried working on it and I feel thinking I have to accept my father just isn't the type of reality like I'd like somebody more understanding and caring he cares but not in the way that we cooperate and communicate you'll note that I am permanently cheated hmm that's why I like substitutes like I like talking to you and I like limit I can respect doctors on my I keep sort of maybe underneath feeling like we're real close you know and it's sort of like a substitute father I don't feel this became well they're not really my father no I meant about the real close business we'll see I think about pretending to because I can't expect you to feel very close to me you don't know me that well all I can do is what I am feeling that is I feel close to you in this moment in spite of feeling initially artificiality of the situation particularly the hot light I very quickly became oblivious to the outside situation and I think the Gloria did too in many ways I'm glad that she kept pushing me for an answer to her Rea personal questions about her sex life and her relationship to her daughter I say I'm glad of this because as the relationship developed it became I think completely clear to her as well as to me that she was seeking something a good deal deeper than that incidentally I'd like to pay my tribute to her deep honesty and being willing to talk about herself so freely although every individual is entirely unique and in this respect I was definitely unprepared for and sometimes surprised by the material she brought up still in another sense this was very typical of my experiences in therapy when I'm able really to let myself enter into a relationship and I feel that this was true in this instance then I find myself not only being increasingly moved by being in touch with the inner world of my client but I find myself bringing out of my own inner experience statements which seem to have no connection with what's going on but which usually proved to be approved to have a very significant relationship to what the client is experiencing I felt there were one or two incidents of this kind in this brief interview I was genuinely moved I probably showed it by the fact that she told me near the end of the contact she saw me as the father she would like to have my reply was also a thoroughly spontaneous one that she seemed to me like a pretty nice daughter I guess I feel that we were only playing the real world of relationships when I talk about such an experience in terms of transference and countertransference I feel quite deeply about that I want to say yes we can put this experience and do some such highly intellectualized framework that when we do that it completely misses the point of the very immediate eval quality of the relationship at such moments I felt that Gloria and I really encountered each other and that in some small but I believe lasting way we were each of us enriched by the experience I'm saying these things almost immediately after the conclusion of the interview and as is characteristic of me there are not more than one or two statements or incidents which I recall from the interview I simply know that I was very much present in the relationship that I lived it in the moment of its occurrence and I realized that after a time I may begin to remember it too but at the present time I really have a very nonspecific memory of the whole interview I'll try to look at it though a little bit more from a intellectual rather than a strictly feeling point of view Gloria showed that I've come to feel our characteristic elements of therapeutic movement in the first part of the interview she was talking about her feeling and they were past feelings she was talking about aspects of her behavior and of herself as if she didn't quite own them she was looking outside herself for a center or locus of evaluation some source of authority she saw some of the things she was talking about in fairly black-and-white - fashion by the end of the interview she was experiencing her feelings in the immediate moment not only as evidenced by her tears but by her ability to express very directly and with immediacy her feelings toward me she was also much more aware of her ability to make her own judgments and choices I guess put in terms that have become somewhat commonplace you could say that she moved from the there and then of her life to the here and now of elements that she was discovering in herself and feelings that she was experiencing in the moment in her relationship with me all in all I feel good about the interview I guess I feel good about myself in the interview and like Gloria I feel very real regret that the relationship cannot continue you I am to interview a patient and I'd like to give you some thumbnail sketch of what Gestalt therapy stands for Agatha is working on an equation awareness equal Pleasant time equal reality in contrast to depth psychology we try to get hold of the obvious of the surface of the situation in which we find ourselves and to develop the emerging to start strictly on the eye and thou it now basis any escape into the future or the past is the exam as a likely resistance against the ongoing encounter modern man has edited even up so much of his potential but his ability to cope with his existence becomes very impoverished my aim is this the patient should recover his lost potential he should integrate the conflicting celeritas understand the difference between being playing especially the playing of verbal games on the one hand and of genuine authentic be a confident behavior on the other the civil war of inner conflicts weakens the efficiency in comfort of the patient but every bit of integration strength need now in the same emergency of the therapeutic saturation I repeat in the safe emergency of the therapeutic situation the patient begins to take risks into transforms energies from manipulating the environment for support into developing greater greater self support when its reliance on his own resources this process is called maturation once the patient has learned to stand on its own feet emotionally intellectually and economically his need for therapy will collapse we wake up from the nightmare of his existence the basic technique is this not to explain things to the patient but to provide the patient with opportunities to understand and to discover himself for this purpose I manipulate and fasted the patient in such a way that he's confronting himself in this process he identifies with his lost potential for instance through assimilating his projections by acting out by acting out the alien parts of himself instantly I consider any interpretation to be a therapeutic mistake as this one implies that the therapist understands the patient paper and the patient himself takes away from the patient he chance of discovering himself by himself and prevents him from finding out his own values and style and the other hand I guess I got most of the content of what the patient says and concentrate most on the nonverbal level as this is the only which only one which is less subject to self-deception in his verbal pseudo self expression on the nonverbal level the relevant is start and always emerge and can deadly in the here and now we are going to interview for happened right away I'm scared you see you're scared but you're smiling I don't understand how it can be scared and smile at the same time and I'm also suspicious of you I think you understand very well I think you know that when I get scared I laugh or I kid to cover up but do you have stage 5 I don't know I'm mostly aware of you I'm afraid that I'm afraid you're going to have such a direct attack that you're going to get me in the corner and I'm afraid of it I want you to be more on myself I get you in your corner you put your hand on your chest this is your call well it's like yeah it's like I'm afraid no way would you like to go can you describe the calling like to go to yeah it's back in corner where where I'm completely protected they would be safe of me for me well I know I wouldn't really well in their chosen yeah made you in this color you're perfectly safe now but what you doing the girl I just said mister just see how long would you sit I don't know but this is so funny as you're saying this this reminds me of when I was a little girl every time I was afraid I feel better sitting in a corner okay you hanneke I didn't get you good well no but it's the same feeling are you good this feeling reminds me of it oh you know no not oh are you when you're not the little kid yeah okay so your thought your girl who's afraid of a guy like I don't even know yeah I don't know I'll be afraid of you I get real defensive with you know what can I do to you you can't do anything but I can sure feel down and I can feel stupid for not having the right answers now what would it do for you to be feel dumb and stupid I hate it when I'm stupid what would it do for you to be dumb and stupid don't put it so like this what would you do to me if you would play dumb and stupid it makes you all the smarter and all the higher above me then I really have to look up to you because you're so smart yeah but me how practically no I think you can do that all by yourself I think the other way along if you play dumb and stupid you force me to be more explicit that's been said to me before but I don't buy it I don't know what I do with your feet now wiggling joke now oh I'm afraid to go knows everything I do she told me I want you to help me become more relaxed yes I don't want to be so defensive with you I don't like to feel so defensive you're acting like you're treating me as if I'm stronger than I am and I want you to protect me more and be nicer to me are you will feel smile don't believe about your cords sure bluff your phony do you believe you mean it seriously yeah if you see your faded you laugh and you bigger than you still it's funny put the performance for me oh I I resent that very much explicit yes sir I most certainly I'm not being funny I I will admit this it's hard for me to show my embarrassment and I hate to be embarrassed but boy I resent you calling me a phony just because I smile when I'm embarrassed or I'm put in the corner doesn't mean I'm being a phony wonderful fiction he didn't spend for the last minute well I met you I am that's right it didn't have to cover up your hangovers your smile no in that moment in that minute you had not therefore well at that minute I was mad though I wasn't embarrassed neither to you mention of the phony I still resent that I'm not involved with him nervous again I want to get mad at you I you know what I want you on my level so I can pick on you just as much as you're picking on me okay pic of me I have to wait till you say something I can pick on better what does this mean can you develop this movement it's I can't find words I want to develop this but if you went dancing I want to start all over again with him okay that's some fun I don't Collier I'd like to put you on I'd like to ask you a question and because I have a feeling you don't like me right off the bat and I want to know if you do can you not play put spells not like a Gloria what would he say he'd say that she's a phony for one see you our food you're a phony and you're a flip little girl and your show-off what would look absolutely I know what I'd answer I'd say I think you are too you'll say tell this to me he told me what before you got him secret tip for for me I'm not quite the right word but it's more like a a show-off sure I can't know all the answers yeah and I want you to be more human and that doesn't seem very human to me no it's not about you Yeah right away find out how I'm kicking my feet and why am i doing like this why are you doing like that oh yeah I've got eyes I can see you're kicking your feet I don't need a scientific computer to see that you're kicking your feet let's think about that I don't need to be wise to see the chicken feet I know but it seems like you're trying to find some reason for it I don't this year imagination okay I know what I'd like from you can I tell you what I'd like Sunita I'd like you to be aware that I'm kicking my feet and to be aware that I'm giggling when I'm really nervous and accept it instead of putting me on the defensive having to explain it I don't want to have to explain why I'm doing these things you could scream you said why am i or what am i doing well what am i doing he said it's right kicking your feet I didn't ask you to explain the see imagination it's not this for it is the foots of your imagination big difference to the circuit again you feel now hello stupid I'm not playing stupid I don't know this is plain stupid you get something with you here there it's very chance something my hair with you object to know okay no but I your your hair and your features go along with the feeling I had about you earlier I had a phone I could be afraid of you and you're the type of person that seems like you're Demian so much respect and song Europe these favorites I demand so much respect okay that's what you just saw well you know how smart I am I know more about psychology than you do Gloria so anything I say of course is right can you say the same is Gloria something similar is global but the same I guess Chloe I demand respect because I don't know no I don't identify it with my father but not me I don't feel like a man respect the man no sure I mean I think I'd like more I'd like you to respect me more well you see so your demand respect alright yeah yeah so am i right if I click demand respect from you I would do who's preventing you except yourself because I feel if I get myself out on the corner here let me just drown you're not going to help me one bit and I know that I can't quite come up to standards with you what should i do then you're the chrome encourage me to come out oh we don't have enough courage to come out by yourself you need something for little limbs in the stairs out of it oh yeah so anytime you want somebody to pay attention to you call into a corner and wait till your car service that's exactly what I'd like and this is what I call fun part knee this is for the court for me why is it funny I'm admitting to you what I am how is that a funny that is a phony because it's a trick it's a gimmick the quality of Colin wait until somebody comes to us I'm admitting it I know what I'm doing I'm not being funny I'm not pretending I'm so brave I resent that I feel like you're saying unless I come out openly and stand on my own I'm not a phony baloney I'm just just as real sitting in that corner as I am out here all by myself but ends up sitting in New Mexico well not now and besides that it's like passing judgment when you call me phony I just hate that anyway now we are getting something I call anybody phony who put some necked and if you like somebody you want to meet this person to go to this person tell them I would like to meet you I would call not for me but if you consciously go into the corner and waiting to be rescued this I call for me here's a copy and I still think you're judgmental you know what I have a feeling you've never felt this way in your life you feel so secure that you don't have to feel anybody that does something like this you're gonna pass judgment on their being a phony while I resent it no play puts passing judgment or you're sitting up there in your big old chair I'm the type a stretcher how's catchman on Mila I don't feel close to you at all dr. pearls I feel that's Tony I feel like you're playing one big game what sure it playing games but in spite of the games I think I touch you now and then I think I'm out you in our culture food of course you did and I think I hit the bull's eye that's why you feel hot I don't know all I know is when somebody when I feel the way I feel with you right now I it's like you don't have feelings right now accentuate this but you just like that's it talk to you like I can't I can't I want to laugh I want to I'd like you to be younger than me so I could really scold you how it must have been my h3 good at something now imagine I know yours could okay don't be so cocksure yourself don't think you're so doggone smart don't act so proud because you've never been in the corner I think you can be just as big a phony parading around like you're so damn smart you know all the answers as much as me sitting in my corner oh and I like the feeling with you being younger I'd like to really I'd like to embarrass you it does when you every what you wouldn't get embarrassed you see my affected Bettis me how hard how ugly I am you don't look alike when you look distinguished that gives us all the more on your side if you look so distinguished then see that's more on your side too right oh yeah can you see Swanson with quite a good fire no I know no that's it I don't think you're fighting with me but I thought you came out quite a bit know how manager wonderful but you seem so detached you don't even seem to care that I'm mad at you for not recognizing me at all doctor Pearl's not a bit this is quite true our contact is much too superficial to be involved in cave I care for you as far as let's see you all right now my client I care for you as far as I'd like to like an artist in something hug which is hidden this is fire care well I'd like you to I'd like to feel that there's some it's frustrating if I were to leave you right now and not see again it would frustrate me to feel like there haven't been more contact I feel completely out of contact with you like I'm talking to the baby that doesn't understand me or something like that I don't feel like we're a bit in contact and that frustrates me that bothers me more than being angry with you I'd rather we were angry and fought and to have no contact yeah this reminds me of when my husband and I used to fight he sits there and he listens to me but he's not even aware of how much I hate him and how mad I am at him I'd rather say I'd love it rather affect you you didn't really hate me or something and I feel like you're purposely staying out of contact with me how should I be give me a fantasy how could I share my concern with here I can't say in words I know the feeling I'd seen on you but I can't say it's just a feeling like I don't know it's like I want you to respect me more as a human being that I've got feelings now we come back to the beginning so you won't respect yes I do I do this is a different kind of respect and I won it the first time but you want to eat this yes I respect you so much as you deem that I refuse to accept the phony part of yourself and I trust myself to the genuine part right now the last few minutes we were wonderfully generally women playing anymore I could see you very good okay well I don't feel I've got it right when I felt like somebody or I disagree what somebody's doing if if I should respect them if they're above me they're superior to me I don't feel I've got a right to really really tell you how mad I am it's it's village we're not take it to chicken you're taking pic to your safe corner that's the way it feels that's what the seed corn feels like to me now go back to your safe crop because we have to pop well so you steal yourself collar you came out for a moment you nearly met me could get a little bit angry with me okay for your safety I feel like you're telling me the only way you respect me as a human being if I'm aggressive and forceful in strong yeah I thought you couldn't even accept mine I'd be scared to death to cry in front of you I feel like you'd laugh at me and call me a phony I feel like you don't accept my weak side only when I'm yelling back at you were hollering at you you must define Memphis well I wouldn't even give you the satisfaction see this again no see the ticket I try not to I try not to cry in front of you or show my weak spot for period jump on me again hey that your eyes are most I'm aware that I feel more jokey yes I feel it could you choke me pretend but not for real women for me because I don't hate you that much anyone who took my history with me to choke you so you would be crying I'd like to I'd like to choke you it would be to make you cry I'd like to see you weak I'd like to see you hurt and vulnerable refer to this thing for you make me feel like I'm I have more of a right to be heard you went jump on me so quick would you jump on me if I would cry no but I would jump on you if you would cry you sure this no I'm not sure but what would you like me to do if you were to cry are you smiling you're trying something off well because I got two feelings I was gonna say I want you to I want you to love me and hug me but then I thought no I don't want to what's your passion I'd be scared to be too close to you now we're getting somewhere first you want to be close to me now your fate to be too close just what I'm saying that's right now we got the two ports of exist look they're two different feelings close I mean emotionally but not physically affected two ports of existence now I have a far away in the corner I'll be so close that you can melted to run with other person the penalty travel between the two extremes I do you know what I'm thinking when I am really hurt and really upset about something and I want someone to love me like my girlfriend will do a lot and she'll come up to hug me I don't I don't want it see what I'm talking about you cannot sustain contact okay this isn't damage but I think if you hit too close to your foe and if you let her hug you the only thing I'm aware of is like when I perspire it embarrasses me that should feel how wet I am and it should hold my body up close and I don't know I'll feel fish it's question yeah yes I am I do this more geeky is it itchy I can just feel what it is I don't like it you see this to me put your icky you know that's a difficulty because I feel like if you really believe me that one hurt your feelings oh you must love my feelings wow I thought that was so indifferent sissy before that road nothing could touch me now you suddenly discovered the way to touch me isn't it well you know what I believe I believe you're the type of person sort of like really that you act like it wouldn't hurt your feelings but it really would Black's strong but you you're soft and vulnerable inside there too I think your feelings could be hurt sure but I don't think you'd show it very easy look what I do I would I could see to my feelings I turning it back on me I think now what did you get from that Gloria you turn the whole thing back on me instead of showing another jewel now can you see this to puts out to you what did you get out of this face see this to me would you get out of what but you just see Mississippians sure I know what you'd get out of it if I said what did you get out of this rich kid say nothing it didn't bother me it was you that didn't you still wouldn't let me know you were hurt but I know what it would be if you told your true feelings but you didn't want to show your hurt so you covered it up same way with me in the corner not if I well if I would cry what would you do this you would be you wouldn't be so superior to me you'd be more vulnerable and I could pacify you and make you feel better good hard for me yes and I could be the babe yes yes I'd like that he had feel more on my level I wouldn't have to feel so done with you the other way Paul who would have to be my baby she would cry we would like to pay the baby and be comforted in Parkton the poor thing every man to attend something came to mass closure he came to little bit of understatement I think we finish this simple situation well the demonstration was in my opinion quite successful and consistent with my theoretical outlook the avoidance of the genuine encounter manifested itself in three ways the patient was first taking control by putting on a smiling sophisticated phony mask of oscillating between the pretense of being frightened and yet at the same time having me figured out that's being or believing to be fully in control of the situation secondly she was withdrawing by fantasizing of hiding in a corner Berkeley she was blocking the real encounter of melting through crying which then would have been the real emotional meaning of this meeting the patient was capable of identifying her surface several fantasies she had projected onto me she was this was especially evident with regard to her initial denial for need to be respected the need for environmental support started to come out beside so need to get respect it was normalized in a wish to be cared for rescued from the corner and so on I broke off the session when the first tears begin to appear she began to play the role of a lonely child and apparently wanted to be hugged and comforted adhere to a simulation of a projection began to work she began to experience holding me like a baby apart from assisting in assimilating and some projections they made therapeutic factor was to show how the inconsistency of a verbal and nonverbal behavior for instance saying that she was frightened and smiling at the same time a frightening person does not smile may I fear it was in the direction of embarrassment this embarrassment was protected by the brazenness and anger to get to exist the existential embarrassment we would have to work through and eliminated the phone in this that is the ease with which we can superficially assume any role that is required for a specific situation this suit adaptation is her way of coping with life this is about what I got out of this session you rationale therapy a rational emotive therapy also called RT for short is based on several fundamental propositions or hypotheses the first of these is that the past is not crucial in a person's life the past affects him a good deal but he effects himself much more than the past affects him because no matter what he has learned during his historical development the only reason why these things that have happened to him and have been told to him affect him today is because he is still re indoctrinating himself with the same philosophies of life the same values that he usually imbibed and taught himself to early in his childhood so we stick largely in the present in rational emotive psychotherapy rather than in the past and we believe that today the individual experiences negative emotions self-defeating behavior inefficiencies because he now is indoctrinating himself with what we call simple exclamatory sentences which involve ideas human beings can tell themselves ideas in all kinds of languages and pictures in sign languages and non verbal expression in man for example but they normally speak to themselves in simple English if English is their native tongue and when they talk to themselves in an irrational or an illogical way then they create they literally create their negative feelings or emotions in the behavior that follows their from now just to give an example the individual usually tells himself when he's upset first the same sentence and then an insane that the same sentence is something along the order of I don't like the thing that I've done I dislike my own behavior and that would be fun but unfortunately he follows it with an insane sentence which says to himself and because I don't like my behavior I am a louse I am worthless I am a no-goodnik and this thoroughly insane sentence which is a sentence of faith unfounded on fact which has no empirical reference which is a kind of superstitious or dogmatically religious system creates what we call his anxiety and through his anxieties depression his guilt there's other forms of self defeatism or again the individual tells himself the same sentence I don't like your behavior when let us say somebody's acted badly with him and instead of following that up with that because I don't like your behavior I can still stand it and I'm going to try to change to get you to change your behavior he says I can't stand your behavior or in an absolute istic god-like grandiose manner you shouldn't be the way you are because I think that I don't like the way you are now it's the second B sentences which upset the individual or another way of putting it as epictetus a Roman philosopher said many years ago it's not what happens to us at point-a that it upsets us it's be a view of what happens to us and in rational emotive psychotherapy we go after this individual the patient's view and show him that whatever he thinks is upset him usually some external situation what somebody else has done it's really what he's telling himself about this thing this event which upsets him and although he may never be able to do anything about the external event at a he can change the internal event his sentence is belief to himself at D now in rational emotive psychotherapy we try to show the patient three kinds of insight and counted distinctions to some other therapies which usually emphasize one magic on the first kind we try to show him is that all his behaviors especially his negative self-defeating behavior which we're interested which is upsetting him has clear-cut ideological antecedents he may have learnt these as I said before in the past but right now today he must still believe these same ideologies else he would not get the negative behavior that flows therefrom and insight number two which is most important than which is unfortunately neglected and many other systems of psychotherapy is that he being as Ernst casera once said a symbolizing animal is continually re-induction aiding himself with these ideologies and that's the issue that's why he's now disturbed now in sight number three is that even when he sees clearly what he's telling himself and that he's telling himself nonsense only by work and practice by continually reassessing and revaluing his own philosophical will he ever get better now we also stress the fact that action is necessary to change an individual just talking about things thinking about things is nice but not necessary I should say it's not a necessary condition for psychotherapeutic can change the change what the individual has to do in addition usually is act and we therefore give him concrete homework assignments and get him to act these out and check up and follow to see whether he does these homework assignments and our final goal is to get the individual to learn and learn for the rest of his life to challenge and question his own basic value system his own thinking so that he really thanks for himself he must do this particularly when he feels miserable he feels anxiety or depression or guilt or too much frustration or anything else that is negative or when he behaves very inefficiently and finally he was able through this kind of you thinking rethinking his own assumptions to apply what we call the scientific method to the facets of human living and to be truly scientific in his behavior to question and challenge his own assumptions as we do in science and thereby to minimize or never entirely to eliminate the terrible anxiety and the atrocious hostility which unfortunately affects most of us in this existence well Gloria I'm not relevant yeah after we hit it well would you like to tell me what's bothering you most yeah I think the things that I'd like to talk to you the most about are adjusting to my single life mostly men I guess America diet I don't know if I'm doing the wrong thing but I'm going to refer to your book anyway because this is what I'm impressed with this book about the intelligent Woman's Guide to man 9 yeah tried to follow it and I believe in it this is why it's so fun reading your book because I'm not much of a reader but I sort of believe the same way you do but then I've got a problem is there healthy men that I do I'm attracted to or the type of man I'd like to become closely as always I can't seem to meet or I get to shower with or something that I don't it just doesn't click the men I seem to be dating nowadays are the ones that I don't respect much the ones I don't enjoy much the same blip and uninteresting and I don't know if it's something about me or what because I really do want to meet this kind of man well let's talk a little about your shyness let's suppose you meet somebody who you consider eligible but you might walk now let's see if we can get at the source of your shyness just what you're telling yourself to create this you meet this man and you feel shy and Bharath yes but I don't usually show that I usually act slip right back yeah I act like the other man act to me of America kayak flip I don't seem near as intelligent I act like a typical dumb blonde I'm just I'm just not myself with him I'm more on a tease yes well as you probably know from x-man hunting I believe that people only get emotions such as negative emotions of shyness embarrassment shame because they tell themselves something in simple explanatory sentences now let's try to find out what you're telling yourself you're meeting this individual now what do you think your sink is up before you get I didn't know what it is that I'm not I don't stand up to his expectations I'm not quite enough for him he's superior to me although I want this type of man I'm afraid I won't have enough to attract him well that's the first part of the sentence that might be a true one because maybe he could be spirit to you in some ways maybe he wouldn't be attracted to you but that would never upset you if you were only saying that I think he may be superior to me now you're adding a second sentence to that which is if this is so that would be awful well not quite so extreme as that because I thought about that too it usually I've missed my chance again because when I want to become I want to show the very best of myself because I think I have self-confidence and I have enough to offer when I get afraid like that then I show all the bad qualities i ĂŹm flip on then I'm so much on the defensive that I can't show my good qualities and it's like I miss my chance again there was a good opportunity to be close to this man and I Loused it up again all right but even let's suppose you're saying that and I think you're really off but you must be saying something else too because if you were just saying hell I missed my chance again you'd say all right next time I'll take advantage of what I learned this time and do it a little better now you still must be saying if you feel shame embarrassment shine there's something pretty bad about your error in missing your chance again I don't know if this follows in contact what you're saying but the thing I do feel is that I get suspicious then am I the type of woman that will only appeal to the ones that are not my type of guy anyway is there something wrong with me am I never going to find the kind of man I enjoy I always seem to get the other one all right now you're getting closer to what I'm talking about because you're really saying if I am this type of woman that none of these good eligible males are going to appeal to then that would be awful I never get what I want and that would really be something frightful I don't like thinking of myself that way I want to put myself on a higher standard I don't like to think that I may be just an average Jane Doe so let's just suppose for the second argument at the moment that that were sir that you were an average Jane Doe now would that be so terrible would be inconvenient it would be unpleasant you wouldn't want it but would you get an emotion like shyness embarrassment shame out of just believing that maybe I'm going to end up like Jane Doe I don't know I don't think it could because you still would have to be saying on some level as I think you've just said and it would be very bad it would be terrible I would be a no-goodnik if I would just watch it I don't never get what I want if I were just a Jane Doe and I thought I have to accept it I'd never get what I want and I don't want to live the rest of my life with just kicking in well why not necessarily so you've never you really mean your chances would be reduced because we know some icky girls who get some splendid men don't yeah if they say you're generalizing there you're saying it probably would be that I'd have a more difficult time but then you're jumping to therefore I'd never get at all you ain't a catastrophizing there that you jump to yes but it feels that way to me at the time it seems like forever that's right but isn't that a vote of non-confidence in you an essential vote of non-confidence and the non-confidence is because you're saying one I don't want to miss out on I think I would like to get the kind of a man I want and be a in your word superior kind of girl who gets a superior kind of man yes but if I don't then I'm practically on the other side of the chain completely a no-goodnik somebody will never anything that I want which is quite an extreme away isn't it yes and that's what I call catastrophizing taking a true statement and there is a good deal truth what you're saying if you didn't get the kind of a man you watch it that it would be inconvenient annoying frustrating which it really would be and then saying I'd never possibly get what I want and even beyond that you're really saying and then I couldn't be a happy human being aren't you really saying that but let's just look at that let's just assume the worst the spiritual Russell once said years ago assume the worst that you never got at all for whatever the reasons may be the kind of a man you want look at all the other things you could do in life to be happy well I don't like the whole process I don't even like if I'm going through it I don't all right even if it wasn't a catastrophe yeah even if I didn't look at it as a catastrophe I don't like the way I'm living right now for example when I meet somebody that I'm interested in that could have some potential by the way I find I'm not near as relaxed with him I worry more should I be friendly should I kiss him goodnight should I do this if it's just a Joe doe and I don't give it on I can be anything I want to be I turn out to be more of a person when I'm not as concerned I don't like the way I'm up well I would you're not you're not really concerned you're over concerned you're anxious because you were just concerned you do your best you'd be saying yourself if I succeed great if I don't succeed top right now I won't get what I want but you're over consider actions you're really saying again that's what you said a moment ago if I don't get what I want right now I'll never get it and that would be so awful that I've got to get it right now that causes the anxiety doesn't it yes or else work toward it yes but if I don't get it right now that's alright but I want to feel like I'm working toward it yes that you want a guarantee I hear my trained ears hear you saying I would like a guarantee of working towards there are none sir well no dr. house I don't know why I'm coming out that way what I really mean is I want a step toward working toward it well I bother you I don't know I thought well what I was hoping is whatever this isn't me why I don't seem to be attracting these coming and why seem on the defensive why I seem more afraid you could help me when it is I'm afraid of so I won't do it so much well my hypothesis is so far that what you're afraid of is not just family with this individual man which is really the only thing at issue when you go out with a new and we're talking about eligible males I will rule out the ineligible one you're not just afraid that you'll miss this one you're afraid that you'll miss this one and therefore you miss every other and therefore you prove that you are really not up to getting what you want and wouldn't that be awful you're bringing in these catastrophe you sound more strong in it but that's similar I feel like this is Cecilia if I keep this up because I think I'm doing there's something I'm doing that to be as real a person with these men that I'm interested as write your defeating your own ends but I've done it again if I weren't so doggone anxious about trying to hook this guy I could be more real he's going to enjoy me more if I'm real anyway so I'm only giving him the stinky part of me right how can anybody I respect respect it's a church and that's what I am when I don't really come through but look how you just devalued yourself let's just suppose in sake of argument you kept giving the stinky part of you a human being another person who's trying to get interest in you might not like these attributes these characteristics of you but I don't think he's going to despise you as a person who's you are really doing I don't I'm writer on myself and I think that's exactly of course like me there's not enough to me right and I say before if people just didn't like you when you went through enough of lemon it would be hard to go through enough that it would be possible you'd eventually find one who did like you and whom you like but as long as you devalue yourself personally in your own eyes you complicate the problem enormous ly and you're not focusing on how can I be myself change the traits if you for example Hedy let us just say a mangled arm and you wouldn't accept your whole person being because of this mangled arm then you would focus so much on that mangled arm that you wouldn't be able to do things that you wouldn't otherwise be able to do it's almost what I did yes yes you say that's exactly so you taking a part of you an arm and focusing almost completely on that in just to bring it down to our own conversation taking a part of you your shyness you're not being yourself with males and focusing so much on that part that you're almost making not at the whole of you and you get an awful picture of your total self because of this defective part and we're assuming you and I didn't is effective we're not glossing opens they know you're doing alright you're not doing that well right now you can accept yourself for the time being with this defective part with these attributes and not beat yourself over the head as I see of you definitely in doing then it becomes a relatively simple problem to work and practice to work and practice against this negative attribute in other words let's get back to that now how to be yourself let's just suppose for the moment that you really were fully accepting yourself with your failings alright you know you're going to go how you know you're gonna screw up with the next man man after that an old probability but you're saying alright I have to go through a learning process that's too bad I won't be very good during this while but I'll do it just as I would add ice skating where I have to fall on my neck for a few times before I learned to ice skate okay now let's suppose that man if that was so you were really accepting you you go out take the risks of being you because after all if you do in one of these then you have to be yourself you're not winning them for a day you're not winning them for a fair I assume you want to marry one of these individuals eventually and be relationship I don't think so yeah he reaches along alright a long relationship in the course of which you couldn't ask so we don't want to give you something I think well that he'll later find that was a role playing good thing so you have to eventually be yourself now if you really weren't so disturbed about these present current failings views you could go out and be this self of yours ask yourself what do I really want to do with man to help and join him and have him help and join me because that's the basic function of life enjoyment which we can't lose and you force yourself to take the risk of being back because if you succeeded great if you fail too bad either you not for him or he may even not be for you because don't forget you said before when these men are projecting you assume right away it must be my doing a my fault you know they may not be your cup of tea and you may not be their cup of tea and it's nobody's fault it's just true incompatible with it yes you say yes so if you would really accept yourself as you are and then force yourself as if you were one of my regular patients I would give you this homework assignments and then check up on you to see whether you can force yourself to open your big mouth and be you for a while even though it hurt with these nails you would find the a you would start being yourself and gradually laughing off these inefficiencies which incidentally are the result of not being you but watching yourself from the outside while you trying to be you which is almost impossible because you can't spy on yourself and still be yourself very well at the same time no but it would become like a habit after a while if you took the risks and force yourself to as I said open your big mouth and even though you thought maybe it'll come out badly maybe he won't like me maybe I'll lose him complete me and so on and so forth then you start swinging in the groove and being what you want to be and I would almost guarantee that you'd become more practice than less inefficient especially in terms of the shyness because you wouldn't be focusing on oh my god isn't this awful how bad I am you would be focusing on what a place individual this is and how can I enjoy him which is the oh the focus well you see my relationship other way how can I be more attractive to him and how can he be pleased by me because underneath if I am NOT then I cannot enjoy myself I refuse to accept myself unless I attract and win this good individual isn't that what you basically yes and I even go further dr. must win when there is one of these men I come in contact with and I find that I want it called a bit more of a relationship well if he accepts me I'm going along pretty great I find myself constantly on the defensive honestly watching the way I see it not drinking too much the whole time instead of just relaxing a single eater like Mary doesn't supposed in psychotherapy you're giving a very good illustration of why other directors this is business other directors it doesn't pay because if you really are defining yourself in terms of others estimation of you then even when you're ahead of the game and you're winning them you have to be saved yourself will I win them today will I win them tomorrow will I keep winning them and you're always focused on am i doing the thing to please him and you never are yourself you never have itself while if you're saying what do I want to do in life there must be some human beings who would like me the way I am let's see if this is one of those human beings then that's the only way isn't it that you can be you see you know we haven't got too much car now so let's try to get it off on a constructive notice more concretely what you can do you asked before where you can go how you can meet new people I'd say that I don't know this particular area but it's almost any place if you could do what we are talking about really take risks and focus on what you want out of life and on the fact that it's going to take time which unfortunately it does and then it's not awful and you are not awful while it's taking that time then you can leave yourself open unsure lead to all kinds of new and counselors and these encounters can take place on buses while waiting for a streetcar they have streetcars in this area at cocktail parties anywhere you can talk to people who look eligible you can ask your friends to get you eligible but males but the main thing is that you have to pay like yourself while you're not doing badly and be not be intolerance against conditions which are bad and I'm agreeing with you that they are now as I said I would give you if your aphasia mind the homework assignment of deliberately very deliberately going out and getting yourself into trouble in other words taking the most eligible males you can find at the moment and forcing yourself risking yourself to be you are you saying even if it were like if I went into a doctor's office to start a conversation with him because he was attractive to me or he appealed to me right if I go so far as to starting out a conversation with him personally and why not it is an eligible individual any kind of an eligible individual I know you accept that but that seems awfully brazen I symbol X suppose it is brazen what have you got to lose the worst he can do is reject you and you don't have to reject you if you were thinking along the lines that we've been 25 minutes a second so yeah now can you try to do that I think I think so in order to give me a spurt to go out and see you're right that's all I can do is be rejected right and that needs you intact it just leaves you unfortunately not for the moment getting what you want so you try to go anywhere in red and I'll be very interested in finding out what happened oh I'm excited and father well it was certainly very nice meeting you for thank you doctor I enjoyed talking with this interesting and I think highly courageous patient and thought that it gave a the session gave a pretty good illustration of a fairly typical session of rational emotive psychotherapy how was it typical in several ways in the first place I was able rather rapidly and quickly to get to some of what I think are the philosophic cores of the patient's disturbances to show her that the reason she is feeling shy and the shame frayed in this instance is because even though partially unwittingly she is defining herself in a very negative way or devaluing herself by blaming herself too much for imperfect behavior because perfectionism is the root of most human evils and she was showing some fairly typical perfectionistic notions so very quickly as is usually done in rational emotive psychotherapy we skip some of the asides we skip going back into the history of some of the psycho analysts do and we skip some of the transference relations between us and the patient and we skip some of the nonverbal expression not that we think these things are quite unimportant that we think there are relatively little relevance to the basic core of the patient's disturbance which is her philosophy of life typically again this patient showed both anxiety and low frustration tolerance which most patients showed and these were intertwined and again very usually she was then beating herself over the head blaming herself condemning herself for feeling these kinds of feelings now she did not see very clearly at least I thought so at the beginning of the session exactly what the claritin sentences and exclamatory sentences she was telling herself to create these feelings and I endeavoured to show her some of these sentences and what could be done about it among other things I also though briefly because this is just one brief session tried to give her a homework assignment that you could go and get her teeth into and actively try to do 2d propagandize herself by going out and taking risks which normally up to now she hadn't been taking that much of it's interesting to note that again quite typically in this session although I was attacking fairly vigorously the patient's attitudes or philosophies she did not feel an attack on her she felt that I was supporting her anything and she ended up I thought rather optimistically feeling that I had given her several ideas of what she could do in the future again rather typically in this session I kept persuading the patients and attacking her ideas and showing her that her philosophy of life not only was such and such but that if she stuck to this kind of philosophy she had to get negative and self-defeating results from it and then I kept persistently going on even though a time she became defensive and wasn't quite accepting by any means what I was saying I didn't let this bother me but kept going on against her basic core system her value system because this is again what bothers patients that they give up very easily on attacking their own negative evaluations of themselves and therefore they persist forever now the world limitations of course especially in terms of time through the session and these limitations did have some effect for example it wasn't a not enough time for repetition in several sessions I would have gone over much of the same material until I was sure that hadn't sunk in then I would have had time to get feedback from the patient to see whether she really understood in action in particular what I was talking about and whether she was following it up or leading herself up some other diverting pathway which people can do there was no time to emphasize that she would have to continually reassess her evaluations of herself and her general philosophies and do rethinking for the rest of the life time to show the patient very much that even during this session in relation to me and what she was saying about herself that she was displaying her bad attitudes toward herself and finally there was no occasion because this was an individual session to see how she related specifically to other non therapists so she would in group therapy and in the midst of this group situation to show her exactly what was going on and what she could do about it but I do feel hope hopeful about the session and think that perhaps I was able to at least to give the patient a few ideas which he could then go out and work on on her own because unless patients do work themselves with the material that we therapists give them in psychotherapy nothing eventually happens it isn't any magic that we have for them but we can give them certain catalytic ideas and influences which then if they work and practice at work and practice that will do them good for the rest of their lives