Group therapy is often the most valuable experience of therapy we can have. Just as we are ourselves communities of cells, I believe humans are by nature community- and group-oriented. We are born into a group and our early experience of family, school or other group will influence us all our lives.
I want to
Love you without clutching
Join you without invading
Invite you without demanding
Leave you without guilt
Criticize you without blaming
Help you without insulting.
-
Virginia Satir
The nature of the bond between members of a therapeutic group allows us to experiment with our social behaviour. It is a place to grow interpersonally, to express feelings with spontaneity and immediacy, a forum for self-disclosure, for trust, for honest feedback and for staying in the here and now. This can mean discovering our social acceptability and disassembling the defences we have put up in response to past hurts.
I do my thing and you do your thing. I am not in this world to live up to your expectations and you are not in this world to live up to mine. You are you and I am I, and if by chance we find each other it’s beautiful. If not, it can’t be helped.
-
Virginia Satir
In a therapy group we learn to take greater individual responsibility, so that we ask ourselves “What am I learning about this person?” rather than “What is this person doing to me?” We can learn greater respect for others without diminishing ourselves: “I’m not a copy of you, my characteristics are right for me and you may even come to value the ways in which I’m different from you.”
In a way all the things you have done up to the present if you are still around have ‘worked’. The question is: What is the price and could it have been lower?
-
Virginia Satir
Even if we have not had a personal history that included a really healthy, nurturing family, the therapy group can give us a reparative and healing experience. By a ‘healthy’ family, I mean one in which every member is permitted a sense of self-worth, there is safety and effective communication, rules that are explicit, defined and age-appropriate, and plentiful links to the outside world and the community.
Groups can be short-term or long-term, and may be themed or unthemed. Follow these links for current information about themed workshops coming up soon:
coming home (for ex-boarders)
- 7/8 March 2012
body image (for men)
- 7 October 2012
assertiveness
- 28/29 November 2012
anger management
- 22/23 February 2012
