What is it about?
The author worked with a client, clinically, for 8 years, the first 4 years were from a Gestalt psychotherapy framework, the second 4 years from a Bowen Family Systems Theory (BFST) framework. The paper discusses the clinical application of each therapeutic framework and the diverging outcomes each had on the client. The article highlights the main difference of each framework: Gestalt therapy worked within the therapeutic relationship and BFST worked outside the therapeutic relationship.
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Why is it important?
Working outside the therapeutic relationship, as with Bowen family systems theory, assists clients to work through their issues in their real life circumstances between sessions, rather than the work occurring within sessions and within the therapeutic relationship. This may lead to a client’s increased resilience in his/her significant relationships. In an era where therapists work mostly in an eclectic or integrative manner it can be useful and important for therapist's to clarify and sharpen their theoretical lens in order to understand the impact they are having on their clients, whether this is working within or outside the therapeutic relationship.
Perspectives
Writing this article was challenging for me as I had to get very clear about how I thought as a therapist when working with a client and how my theoretical orientation guided my interventions. It was interesting and useful for me to get clear about and illustrate my personal transition between one way of thinking and working as a therapist to a very different way of working and thinking.
Ms Martina Palombi
The Family Systems Institute
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: From Gestalt Therapy to Family Systems: How Theoretical Frameworks Inform Clinical Applications, Australian and New Zealand Journal of Family Therapy, November 2018, Wiley,
DOI: 10.1002/anzf.1334.
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