2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43
Running in a circle …
And there will be a run along a closed line,
For something that has the property of a circle
A. Makarevich
In psychology, two types of human activity are known: reproduction and creativity. Both types of activity are indisputably necessary in a person's life. In the case of reproduction, the processes of reproduction, copying, and replication of what is already known prevail in human life. In the case of creativity, we are dealing with the emergence of a new unique product. In Gestalt therapy, special terms have even been invented for these phenomena - passive adaptation and creative adaptation.
Apparently, these processes can be considered in relation to the life of a person as a whole. In this case, the subject of a person's activity will be his life. The psychotherapist encounters such cases when the balance in the pair "reproduction-creativity" is violated towards reproduction. Then such a person (in clinical terms - neurotic) constantly replicates his life stereotypically. And this is experienced by him as a lack of interest in life, boredom, apathy, loss of meaning, even depression. As a metaphor, the image of endless running in a circle most often appears here. An example of a reproductive lifestyle is the feature film Groundhog Day.
When working with clients, you regularly meet with different levels of awareness of the described phenomenon. I propose a typology based on the experience of my practice, described in the form of levels:
1st level - A person runs in a circle, not knowing that it is a circle. He reproduces the same problems in his own life - he constantly “steps on the same rake”, sincerely surprised every time that “the rake is the same”. A person who is at this level is not able to independently analyze and understand the causes of his life problems, considering them a case, a coincidence.
2nd level - A person guesses that he is running in a circle, but does not know how to get out of it. Constantly meeting with "the same rake", he understands that this is not accidental. However, even here he is not able to independently realize their reasons.
3rd level - A person already knows that he is running in a circle, knows where to break this circle, understands and realizes the reasons for the appearance of his psychological problems, but a lot still keeps him from being able to do something differently, in a new way. More often than not, these “something” are habits and fears.
4th level - A person makes attempts to break out of the circle, taking risks, experimenting, gaining new experience … The result of such experiments is the birth of a new self-identity. A person acquires the ability to creatively adapt to the situation, to make a choice.
Movement through the selected stages is not easy and often requires the help of specialists.
The therapist is the person who helps the client to realize and go beyond the infinitely reproduced life circles into the space of creative living of his life through Meeting with himself and with Others.
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