The purpose of this hands-on client focused advanced seminar is to help the practitioners deepen their experience and knowledge of individual therapy with many different types of clients. This training is organized around actual experience with clients and, in most sessions, the participants will have an opportunity to interview a client in a small group format or observe the training facilitator interview the client and then process the interview.

In addition to the experiential and training components, the evolving models for the treatment of individual therapy that are being used at the Gestalt Institute of Central Ohio and in many other places around the world will be presented, reflecting the MOST up-to-date thinking from the clinical point of view.

Besides having the opportunity to practice with clients and to observe the facilitator working with clients, participants will also have an opportunity bring their own cases and actual clients to the seminar group and explore their personal work through self report. The focus of this training is to deepen the skill set of individual practitioners, supporting them to develop a whole new level of sophistication, confidence, knowledge, understanding, and style in their work with individual clients.

Topics to be covered will include:

• Using the present moment experience to make accurate diagnosis
• The importance of contact skills in individual therapy
• Assessing contact skills and using them as a framework for engagement
• Assessing the self in the clinical interview and using it to draw a deeper conceptual picture
• Developing themes that the client will stay with and work with over time
• The complexities of the neurotic self
• The interrelationship between character and neurosis
• The models of borderline, fragmented and psychotic diagnosis and treatment including similarities and differences
• Exploring how your countertransferential feelings are a part of the individual design, including self specific messages
• Integrating the gains, materials presented, and new knowledge to become a more successful individual therapist
• Developing your personal creativity and style as a therapist
• Learning to think on your own feet, shift foci, and move with the moment
• Using yourself in grading intensity
• Other issues defined and asked for by the group!