* rigid, conflict-torn family situations
* crisis intervention: treating individuals in despair who have lost the will to live or are suicidal
Gestalt therapy is not generally the treatment of choice for people whose lives are out of control or who show signs of psychosis. Gestalt therapy relies on your capacity to make your own practical life decisions, to tolerate the stress and frustration of being in the hot seat, and to benefit from being challenged by the therapist to confront your own pretenses, distortions, and confusions. People who have lost these capacities for the time being due to problems such as alcoholism, drugs, and loss of touch with reality tend not to benefit from Gestalt techniques.
TRANSACTIONAL ANALYSIS
For less troubled people who want to improve
the effectiveness of their communication skills
and break free from frustrating, self-destructive
patterns.
Transactional analysis has perhaps done more than any of the other main approaches to therapy to increase the sensitivity of the public to the psychological dimensions of human relationships. It has achieved widespread popularity in a short time largely because of its simple, commonsense vocabulary that is easy to apply to personal, family, and group situations.
Eric Berne (1910-1970) completed his medical training in 1935, then finished his psychiatric residency at Yale in 1941. He soon separated himself from psychoanalysis and began to formulate his theory of transactional analysis (TA).
By the mid-sixties, TA was gaining in popularity: Berne wrote his book, Games People Play, primarily for professionals, but it became a best-seller filling a need for an easy-to-understand and easy-to-apply approach to therapy.
TA is based on the premise that human personality has three parts: Berne called them the Parent, Adult, and Child. Although similar in meaning to Freud's superego, ego, and id, Berne's terms were intended to name dimensions of personality that could be observed directly; his three "ego states" are not theoretical constructs.
The Child ego state is the source of fun, humor, creativity, wishful thinking, and irresponsibility. It is impulsive and resists control.
The Parent ego state is the repository of values, attitudes, and expectations inherited from one's parents. Shoulds, oughts, hands-on-hips, and finger-wagging gestures are common expressions of the Parent.