Exercise For Completing An Unresolved Situation From The Past

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

We all have the scars of the past, otherwise we would not suffer from unsolvable situations in the present.

I present to your attention one very simple exercise. It is based on the method of returning oneself to a situation of unresolved conflict, transferring it to the present and ending it - now.

This technique was invented by "new solution" psychotherapists. The New Solution School combines two approaches: gestalt practices and Eric Berne's transactional analysis. This, however, does not prevent the use of the exercise I have proposed by all practicing psychotherapists, without exception, regardless of their affiliation to a particular school.

We can say that the exercise has entered the general treasury of practical psychotherapy. Having passed, of course, a strict competitive selection, that is, having proved its effectiveness in practice.

The exercise, which I called "Pope" and which is also called "Expanding Perspectives", does not require the help of a therapist - it is performed independently. Therefore - to work, comrades.

If you can learn to do this exercise as easily as calling your cell phone, it will trigger self-healing mechanisms in you. But more on that later. So.

Think back to a situation that you have experienced in your past. This must be a psychological trauma (for you), but no matter how serious - not rape, not the death of your house in a fire, not fatal betrayal with subsequent divorce and division of property.

Something like this:

In the swimming pool (where you were taken by the whole class to take the standards), your bra unbuttoned and all the schools brought there that day, including your best friend, laughed at you.

The parents of your classmate, who you were visiting, caught you for petty theft in their house.

The most handsome boy in the dacha village built a hut and invited all the children to play there, except for you.

You forgot a poem at the performance.

You overheard two classmates discussing you and laughing.

Well, now imagine your situation very well and "find yourself" in it.

You may feel at the same time: anger, fear, shame, envy, resentment.

In this way, we will reveal the unprocessed negative feeling that is constantly present in us.

Now finish exactly three sentences. Taking a pen and a piece of paper.

They are _.

I _.

Life is _.

(after the completion of the exercise, the piece of paper must be solemnly burned, rewriting it on a new one - everything is new!)

However, attention. Do this part of the exercise first, and then read on.

Do you know what you just wrote?

What you have written now about others, about yourself and about life is the very DECISION HOW TO LIVE, the scenario that you accepted at that distant moment.

The character of a neurotic is not shaped by major events, but by a "trifle" like this.

Well, now we begin to experience the same situation in a new way, so as to get out of it as a winner.

The main thing is not to change others! If someone turns out to be a scoundrel or a sadist, he remains calm and a scoundrel and a sadist. Who changes the role in the new play is ourselves.

Therapists who have used this technique see the reason for our failures in the following incorrect premise:

We often cannot get out of a painful situation, because we are always waiting for someone else to start changing.

We want everyone to behave differently THEN. This is impossible. We will behave differently.

So, imagine in your imagination the Ideal Ally, the Friend - on whom you can completely rely.

In this role, imagine whoever you want - the Pope, Big Brother, Ideal Girlfriend.

Having chosen your assistant, take him with you at that very moment of your life. And now let him help you - to win! Only this should be played out as realistically as possible: how exactly would he help you to steer out of this situation and wipe your nose at the offenders? Think about it carefully. Imagine a scene with words, write a script.

You won? If yes, then everything is fine.

But what if not?

There are two options here:

You still persist, expecting others to change and not really get into the game. Well, the usual rigidity. It is removed by perseverance and training.

You have chosen the wrong ally. Think carefully about choosing the right mate for this particular story.

If everything went well, it was the turn of the final stage.

Now analyze all his (her) words and movements towards your offenders. What qualities have you endowed your assistant with? Now give these properties to yourself.

And now return to this situation already Without an assistant, but with his qualities that he "gave" to you. Play the same story in a new way, in your own way, and be the winner.

And the winners are not judged.

If you work through all your traumatic situations from the past to the present in this way, you will see that they are repeated, they are stereotyped.

So you yourself will grasp "what is the point here" and make a new decision.

This is how a simple "imagination exercise" changes our real-life experience.

The main thing is to do and do it efficiently. If you do this exercise well, "you should be sweating all over your leotard" (as my dance teacher used to say). If, after completing the exercise, your swimsuit "does not sweat", this exercise will not help you.