Let’s introduce order into Gestalt terminology: Method, concepts and techniques, and their development after 70 years of Gestalt psychotherapy

Gestalt psychotherapy has been practiced by specialists from all over the world for 70 years. It is not new, yet it continues to be described with vastly varying terminology, which may result in ambiguities as well as reinforcing stereotypes about what exactly is Gestalt psychotherapy. Offering a review of selected theoretical issues, this paper proposes to organize the terminology. We focus on the technical side of psychotherapy – the article presents the phenomenological method, concepts, and main techniques used in this approach (psychodrama, body work, chair work, dream work), coming together in a full picture of what working in this approach entails. In addition, we discuss the transformation processes that Gestalt psychotherapy has gone through over the past 70 years. We emphasize that the use of techniques alone is not yet equivalent to conducting psychotherapy in the Gestalt approach, especially considering that the primary conditions necessary for such a therapy to occur are: contact with a holistically perceived client, an increased awareness (including body), and working in keeping with the principle of here and now. Analyzing the terminology used in relation to Gestalt psychotherapy leads us to the conclusion that the toolset of a gestaltist is grounded in the following factors: the phenomenological method, the concepts of Gestalt psychotherapy that are strongly associated with that method, and the techniques consistent with these concepts. We posit that using these categories (i.e., the method, concepts, and techniques) introduces much-needed order into the theoretical framework of Gestalt psychotherapy.