Fritz Perls and Gloria - Counselling (1965) Full Session - CAPTIONED

I am to interview a patient and I'd like to give you some thumbnail sketch of what gestalt therapy stands for. Gestalt therapies work on an equation: awareness equal present 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 gestalt strictly on the I and thou, here and now basis.

Any escape into the future or the past is examined as a likely resistance against the ongoing encounter. Modern man has alienated, given up so much of his potential that his ability to cope with his existence becomes badly impoverished. My aim is this: the patient should recover his lost potential.

He should integrate the conflicting polarities. Understand the difference between game playing, especially the playing of verbal games, on the one hand, and of genuine, authentic, confident behavior on the other. The civil war of inner conflicts weakens the efficiency and comfort of the patient but every bit of integration will strengthen it.

Now, in the safe emergency of the therapeutic situation. I repeat, in the safe emergency of the therapeutic situation the patient begins to take risks and to transform his energies from manipulating the environment for support into developing greater, greater self-support that is reliant on its own resources. This process is called maturation.

Once the patient has learned to stand on his own feet emotionally, intellectually and economically, his need for therapy will collapse. He will 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 frustrate 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.

Principally, I consider any interpretation to be a therapeutic mistake as this would imply that the therapist understands the patient better than the patient himself. Takes away from the patient a chance of discovering himself by himself and prevents him from finding out his own values and style. On the other hand, I disregard most of the conten of what the patient says and concentrate most on the non-verbal level as this is the only one which is less subject to self-deception then his verbal pseudo-self-expression.

On the non-verbal level the relevant gestalt will always emerge and can dealt with in the here and now. We are going to interview for half an hour. I'm scared.

You say you're scared but you're smiling. I don't understand how one 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. Do you have stage fright?

I don't know. I'm mostly aware of you. I'm afraid you're gonna have such a direct attack that you're gonna get me in the corner and I'm afraid of it.

I want you to be more on my side. You say I get you into your corner and you put your hand on your chest. Is this your corner?

Well, it's like yeah. It's like I'm afraid. Where would you like to go?

Can you describe the corner you'd like to go to? Yeah. It's back in a corner where I'm completely protected.

And where you would be safe from me. Well, I know I wouldn't really. Well, imagine.

But I'd feel safer, yeah. Imagine you were in this corner and you're perfectly safe now, what would you do in that corner? I'd just sit.

Just sit. Yes. Now, how long would you sit?

I don't know but this is so funny is you're saying this. This reminds me of when I was a little girl. Every time I was afraid I'd feel better sitting in a corner.

I'm panicky. Are you a little girl? Well, no, but it's the same feeling.

Are you a little girl? This feeling reminds me of it. Are you a little girl?

No, no, no. No at last. How old are you?

Thirty. Then you're not a little girl. No.

So you're a thirty-year-old girl who's afraid of a guy like me. Well, I don't even know if I. Yeah, I do know I'll be afraid of you.

I get real defensive with you. Now what can I do to you? You can't do anything but I can sure feel dumb and I can feel stupid for not having the right answers.

Now what would it do for you to feel dumb and stupid? I hate it when I'm stupid. What would it do for you to be dumb and stupid?

I'll put it like this: what would it 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 cause you're so smart.

Yeah. Oh, yeah, you butter me up right and left. No, I think you can do that all by yourself.

I think the other way around. 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 really. Now what are you doing with your feet now? Wiggling them.

It's a joke now. No. I'm afraid you're gonna notice everything I do.

Don't you want 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 aware of your smile?

You don't believe a word you just said. I do too, but I know you're gonna pick on me for it. Sure, you're a bluff, you're a phony.

Do you believe? Are you meaning that seriously? Yeah.

If you say you're afraid and you laugh and you giggle and you squirm, it's phony. You put on a performance for me. Oh, I resent that very much.

Can you express this? Yes, sir. I most certainly am not being phony.

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 a corner doesn't mean I'm being a phony. Wonderful, thank you. You didn't smile for the last minute.

Well, I'm mad at you. That's right. You didn't have to cover up your anger with your smile.

In that moment, in that minute you were not a phony. Well, at that minute I was mad, though, I wasn't embarrassed. Now but when you're mad you're not a phony.

I still resent that. I'm not a phony when I'm nervous. Again.

I want to get mad at you. You know what I'd like to do? I, I, I, I.

I want you on my level so I can pick on you just as much as you're picking on me. OK, pick on me. I have to wait til you say something that I can pick on.

What does this mean? Can you develop this movement? I can't find words.

I want to. Develop this as if you were dancing. I want to start all over again with you.

OK, let's start all over. I know what corner I'd like to put you in. I'd like to ask you a question because I have a feeling you don't like me right off the bat and I want to know if you do.

Can you now play Fritz Perls not liking Gloria? What would he say? He'd say that she's a phony, for one.

Say you are a phony. You're a phony and you're a flip little girl and you're a showoff. What would Gloria answer to that?

I know what I'd answer. I'd say I think you are too. Now tell this to me.

Tell me what a phony I am. Well, I. Say, Fritz, you're a phony.

Well, phony is not quite the right word but it's more like a showoff. A showoff. Like you know all the answers.

Yeah. And I want you to be more human and that doesn't seem very human to me. To know all the answers is not very human.

Yeah, to right away find out how I'm kicking my feet and why am I doing like this. Why are you doing like that? Oh dear, I've got eyes, I can see you are kicking your feet.

I don't need a scientific computer to see that you're kicking your feet. What's big about that? You don't need to be wise to see that you're kicking your feet.

I know but it seems like you're trying to find some reason for it. I don't. It's your imagination.

OK, I know what I'd like from you. Can I tell you what I'd like from you? Yeah.

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. Did I ask you to explain?

You said why am I or what am I doing. No. Well, what am I doing, you said.

That's right, kicking your feet. I didn't ask you to explain it. That's your imagination.

That's not this Fritz. It's the Fritz of your imagination. It's a big difference.

(Exhaling. ) Now do this again. (Exhaling.

) Again. (Exhaling. ) How do you feel now?

I don't know. Playing stupid. I'm not playing stupid.

I don't know the right answer. You say I don't know. This is playing stupid.

You did something with your hair there. Is there by any chance something in my hair what you object to? No.

OK. No, but your hair and your features go along with the feeling I had about you earlier. I had a feeling I could be afraid of you.

And you're the type of person that seems like you demand so much respect. Please play Fritz. I demand so much respect.

Play this 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 as Gloria, something similar as Gloria? Go through the same act as Gloria. I demand respect because.

I don't know. You don't know? No, I don't.

I identify it with my father but not me. I don't feel I demand respect. You don't demand respect?

No. Shame on you. As a matter of fact, I'd like more.

I'd like you to respect me more. Now you see, so you demand respect. All right, yes.

Yes, as a matter of fact, if I could demand respect from you I would. Well, do it. Who's preventing you, except yourself?

Cause I feel if I get myself out on the corner you're gonna let me just drown. You're not gonna help me one bit and I know that I can't quite come up to standards with you. What should I do when you're in the corner?

Encourage me to come out. Ah, you don't have enough courage to come out by yourself. You need somebody to pull the little damsel in distress out of her corner?

Yes. So any time you want somebody to pay attention to you, you crawl into a corner and wait to the rescuer comes over. Yes, that's exactly what I'd like.

And this is what I call phony. Pardon me. This is what I call phony.

Why is it phony? I'm admitting to you what I am. How is that a phony?

That is a phony because it's a trick. It's a gimmick to crawl into a corner and wait there til somebody comes to your rescue. I'm admitting it.

I know what I'm doing. I'm not being phony. 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 as real sitting in that corner as I am out here all by myself.

But you're not sitting in that corner. 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 somewhere. I call anybody phony who puts on an act.

And if you like somebody and you want to meet this person, to go to this person, tell them I would like to meet you, I would call not phony. But if you coyishly go into that corner waiting to be rescued, this I call phony. This I call putting on an act.

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 they're being a phony. Well, I resent it.

Good. Now play Fritz passing judgment. You are.

You're sitting up there in your big ol' chair. I am Fritz, I pass judgment. Pass judgment on me now.

I don't feel close to you at all, Dr Perls. I feel that's phony. I feel like you're playing one big game.

Right. Sure we are playing games but in spite of the games I think I've touched you now and then. I think I helped you when I called you a phony.

Well, of course you did. And I think I hit a bull's eye. That's why you feel hurt.

I don't know. All I know is when I feel the way I feel with you right now, it's like you don't have feelings. Now, exaggerate this, what you just did.

(Laughing. ) That's it. Now talk to me like that.

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 old must I be?

My age, thirty. Good. I'm thirty now.

Imagine I'm thirty and now you're scolding. OK, don't be so cocksure of 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 damned smart and you know all the answers as much as me sitting in my corner. Oh, and I like the feeling of you being younger.

I'd like to embarrass you. Embarrass me. Tell me what the.

You wouldn't get embarrassed. You seem unaffected. Tell me, embarrass me.

Tell me how old, how ugly I am. You don't look old and ugly. You look distinguished and that's all the more on your side if you look so distinguished then.

See, that's more on your side, too. Well, Gloria, can you say this one thing, we had quite a good fight. No, no.

I don't think you're fighting with me. But I felt you came out quite a bit. Well, I'm mad at you.

Wonderful. But you seem so detached. You don't even seem to care that I'm mad at you.

I feel like you're not recognizing me at all, Dr Perls, not a bit. This is quite true. Our contact is much too superficial to be involved in caring.

I care for you as far as, let's see. You're right now my client. I care for you as far as I'd like to, like an artist, bring something out which is hidden in you.

This is how far as I say 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 you again it would frustrate me to feel like there hadn'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, ooh, that frustrates me. That bothers me more than being angry with you.

I'd rather we were angry and fought than 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 affect you, you really hate me or something. And I feel like you're purposefully staying out of contact with me. How should I be?

Give me your fantasy. How could I share my concern with you? I can't say in words.

I know the feeling I'd see 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 want respect? Yes, I do.

I see. This is a different kind of respect than I meant the first time. Never mind.

But you want, you need respect. Yes. I respect you so much as a human being but I refuse to accept the phony part of yourself and I address myself to the genuine part.

Now the last few minutes you were wonderful and genuine. You weren't playing anymore and I could see you were really hurting. I don't feel I've got a right when I don't like somebody or I disagree with what somebody's doing.

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. That's garbage. You're not checkity checkity.

You're getting back into your safe corner. That's the way it feels. That's what the safe corner feels like to me.

That's right. Now go back to your safe corner because we have to part here soon. You stay in your safe corner.

You came out for a moment. You nearly met me. Got a little bit angry with me.

Now go back to 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 and strong. I feel like you couldn't even accept my.

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 or hollering at you.

You mustn't cry in my presence. Well, I wouldn't even give you the satisfaction. Say this again.

No. Say this again. I'd try not to.

I'd try not to cry in front of you or show my weak spot for fear you'd jump on me again. Are you aware that your eyes are moist? I'm aware that I feel more chokey, yes.

I feel that. Could you choke me? Pretend, but not for real.

Why not for real? Well, because I don't hate you that much. You want to choke my tears here.

You want me to choke you so you wouldn't cry? I'd like to. If 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. What would this do for you?

Make me feel, heck, I have more of a right to be here and you wouldn't 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're sure of this? No, I'm not sure of it.

Uh huh. What would you like me to do if you were to cry? I wasn't.

You're smiling. You're smiling something off. Well, because I got two feelings.

I was gonna say I'd want you to love me and hug me but then I thought no, I don't want to. What's your objection? I'd be scared to be too close to you.

Now we are getting somewhere. First you want to be close to me. Now you are afraid to be too close to me.

It is what I'm saying. That's right. Now we got the two parts of your existence.

But they're two different feelings. Close, I mean emotionally but not physically. But we've got the two parts of your existence now.

Either far away in a corner or be so close that you could melt into one with the other person. It appears you 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 it a lot and she'll come up to hug me, I don't want it. Exactly.

See, that's what I'm talking about. You cannot sustain contact. OK, this is garbage.

What are you afraid if you get too close to your girlfriend? If you let her hug you? The only thing I'm aware of is like when I perspire it embarrasses me that she'd feel how wet I am and that she'd hold my body up close.

I don't know. Are you aware of your facial expression, kind of disgust? Yes, yes I am.

Do this more. Ugh, it's icky. It's just icky.

I can just feel that it is. I don't like it. Can you say this to me: Fritz, you're icky.

No. No? What's your difficulty?

Cause I feel like if you really believe me that would hurt your feelings. Oh, you mustn't hurt my feelings. Well.

I thought I was so indifferent as you said before that nothing could touch me. No, no, no. Now you suddenly discover a way to touch me, isn't it?

Well, you know what I believe? I believe you're the type of person sort of like me that you act like it wouldn't hurt your feelings but it really would. You act strong but 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. What would I do? How would I conceal my feelings?

By turning it back on me. By saying now what did you get from that, Gloria? You'd turn the whole thing back on me instead of showing how hurt you were.

Now can you say this to Fritz: what did you get out of this, Fritz? Say this to me. What'd you get out of what?

What you just said, just your sentence. Sure, I know what you'd get out of it. If I said what did you get out of this, Fritz, you'd say nothing, it didn't bother me.

It was you that did it. You still wouldn't let me know you were hurt. But I know what it would be if you told your true feelings.

That you didn't want to show you're hurt so you covered it up. Same way with me in the corner. Now if I were a girl, if I were to cry, what would you do with me?

You wouldn't be so superior to me. You'd be more vulnerable and I could pacify you and make you feel better. You could hug me.

Yes. And I could be the baby. Yes.

Yes, I'd like that. It'd feel more on my level. I wouldn't have to feel some dumb with you.

And the other way around, you would have to be my baby. You would cry. You would like to play the baby and be comforted and heartened.

Poor thing. Well, I'd like that, too. I'll tell you something, Gloria.

I think we came to a nice closure. I think we came to a little bit of understanding. I think we've finished this situation now, all right?

All right. 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 figure it out. Thus believing to be fully in control of the situation. Secondly, she was withdrawing by fantasizing of hiding in a corner.

Thirdly, 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 herself with several fantasies she had projected onto me. This was especially evident with regard to her initial denial for a need to be respected.

The need for environmental supports started to come out besides her need to get respected. It was verbalized in her wish to be cared for, rescued from the corner and so on. I broke off the session when the first tears began to appear.

She began to play the role of the lonely child and apparently wanted to be hugged and comforted. But here, too, the assimilation of her projection began to work and she began to experience holding me like a baby. Apart from assisting her and assimilating her in some projections, the main therapeutic factor was to show her the inconsistency of her verbal and non-verbal behavior.

For instance, saying that she was frightened and smiling at the same time. A frightened person does not smile. Where I feel it was in the direction of her embarrassment.

This embarrassment was protected by her brazenness and anger. To get to her existential embarrassment we would have to work through and eliminated the phoniness. That is the ease with which we can superficially assume any role that is required for a specific situation.

This pseudo-adaptation is her way of coping with life. This is about what I got out of this session.