This paper is one of a collection of archived papers written for students on the Eigenwelt psychotherapy training programme, now the Tariki Training Programme in Other-Centred Approach.
| INTRODUCTION The first essential move in commencing a phenomenological inquiry is to rid the mind of preconceptions. If the subject of our inquiry is groupwork, we mush begin by divesting ourselves of whatever preconceptions we hold about what groups and groupwork should be. We must attempt to approach this phenomenon in as open a way as possible. The second step is to accept that we will know what groupwork (or whatever other phenomena we are inquiring into) is by means of experience. The phenomena will become real for us as we perceive it in many different ways. If we are to continue to be guided by phenomenological principles, each additional facet of our experience will strike us as new and fresh and will carry with it the possibility of recasting whatever we already know in some new form or constellation. Proceeding in this way, it is apparent that we cannot reach a point at which we know what a phenomenon is in the sense of having a definitive idea or fixed image and so we can never be locked into a single attitude, but we can know what the phenomenon is in the same way as one knows a good friend. If I say that I know you, it does not mean that I can define you. In this kind of knowing there is a relationship which is open to change and development on both sides. Thus, there is always something fresh and unique about each group, and, indeed, about each meeting of a group. Each time people meet it is a new moment with new possibilities. A phenomenological groupworker will, first and foremost, be open to this unpredictability. It is not so much that she knows about groups as that she has a continuing and evolving relationship with groups, with the experience of being in them. It is an on-going journey. A groupworker in this mode, expects to be surprised. He sees the group as a matrix within which there is endless creative potential. None of this means that there is no point in learning anything. Rather the reverse. There is so much to learn that one will never come to the end of learning. What is required is to hold whatever learning one has lightly and so be prepared to receive more. The phenomenologist is one who is continuing to learn. Although a groupworker may have many years of experience and be well read, and will be the better for this, they will still learn from each new group. Actually, the more skilled one is in this approach the more one learns. Phenomenology is, therefore, method (process) rather than product. To adopt a phenomenological approach is to have one's eyes opened rather than to have one's mind filled. In what follows, we will look at some phenomenological principles and see how they apply to working with groups. LIVING VIVIDLY The aim of phenomenological therapy is enrichment of experiencing. This comes about in many ways such as: Seeing new perspectives Creating new constructions upon one's experience Acquiring new associations Enhanced vividness - seeing as for the first time Emotional intensity arising from human encounter Melting/putting down old anxieties Discovering new expressive media Rediscovering awe - a sense of a greater whole Elaborating one's subjective world Sharing - cross fertilization of visions Having things which previously were just information become real experience All of these processes can occur in groups and therapeutic groups have the advantage of making several of these operations more readily available and transparently so. Many therapeutic approaches are concerned with helping people to "adjust", that is, to find a way of reducing symptoms and returning to some concept of normality. Phenomenology, by contrast, is concerned with trying to deeply understand what is actually happening and with discovering as much as possible of the great variety of hidden possibilities in it. We say that phenomenology is constructivist rather than reductionist. It is not so much concerned with getting rid of anything as with asking: "And what else can we make of this?" There is, in this approach, no clear boundary between therapy and creativity. We are talking, therefore, about an approach which is divergent rather than convergent. The therapist strives to appreciate what is going on now in order that she will be tuned in to its subsequent growth and development by which she expects to be surprised. In a convergent approach, the therapist thinks that they know what the right outcome should be and their effort goes into finding a route to achieving it (eg. Egan 1975). On the other hand, we are not talking about an approach which is radically individualistic. This is because phenomenology does not see persons (or any other phenomena) as being separately existing independent entities. All phenomena exist within a "field". Existence means standing out from a background. As one's "angle" of perception shifts, what stands out as foreground and what falls into the background changes. This is true, for instance, in our view of ourselves, which can change radically depending upon context. We do not exist outside of the fields within which our existence becomes meaningful. This is apparent in simple ways as well as profound ones. If you ask a person who he is, he will refer immediately to things other than himself such as his profession or his family or his country of origin which provide a context whereby we can know him. He will, in fact, refer to the groups to which he belongs. In groupwork, it is, to a large extent, the sense which members have of the "group" which constitutes the field within which individuals, or aspects of them, come into relief or recede into the background. The sum of all the fields within which an individual phenomenon has meaning constitutes its "world". In a sense, we may say that people carry their world with them, investing it in each field within which they are appearing at a particular time. This idea of investing one's world in one's current context is the widest application of the concept of transference. A group thus becomes a kind of mini-world within which people can experience themselves and others in new ways, ways which can subsequently be carried back into their wider world outside, or, we may say, into other fields. A group also provides a setting in which people can experience the fact that they are affected and changed by interaction with others, that they not only have a world, but it has them. This can have the effect of making people more sensitive, more open to experience and to relationships, more aware of their (and others') vulnerability, and more able to change. It can also be alarming, since the person experiences their belief in their own separateness being undermined by experience. We can say, then, that phenomenological groupwork is a method, or, rather, a range of methods, by which people can enhance their capacity to experience the flow of life, can become aware of the creative potential within their experience and can become attuned to the fact that experience is not something separate and isolated for each person but that it is embedded in a larger matrix of relationships and conditions with endless possibilities for growth and transformation. EPOCHE AND THE GROUP MEMBER Let us develop the idea set out in the introduction that the first step is to suspend preconceptions. Suspending preconceptions is called "epoche" or "bracketing". We can consider this principle from the position of the group member and of the group facilitator. For the group member, in general, we can say that the epoche is likely to operate in a less deliberate way than for the facilitator. People do come into groups expecting something new, a fact which occasions a good deal of anxiety, and they do experience a certain degree of loss of control. In order to change one has to let go of existing fixed perceptions and the success of a group depends upon the extent to which members are able to do this. One can see from this fact that the more definitively the group is structured from the outset, the less anxiety there is likely to be but, at the same time, the less possibility of personal change there may be. This is not to say that all structure is anathema to personal development groups, but rather that whatever structure there is should exist in order to protect areas of freedom rather than to eliminate them. As stated above, a person's "world" is constituted of all the fields of experience which give meaning to their perceptions. A person's sense of self is a reflection of their sense of their world. For many people who are not psychologically sophisticated, the sense of self has never been made explicit to themselves. They simply experience a world and we may construe from that that they have such and such a sense of self but self is not an elaborated concept to the person themselves. For such unsophisticated people, self only comes into relief in moments of embarrassment or triumph. For such people, groups which focus upon self-experience are initially inhibiting and the group worker may be better advised to try to understand the world of the group member as it is than to try to convert them to an unfamiliar mode. The person, as it were, brings their world with them. Insofar as they do not operate the epoche, they come equipped with expectations of which they are not consciously aware as well as some of which they are. When, at the commencement of a group, a worker asks members what they want or expect, replies tend to be hesitant and incomplete because people are being asked to voice things which they have not explored. In a sense, the whole purpose of a phenomenological group is to inquire into just what it is that people expect and help them to find out. they might be a little closer to knowing what they expect by the time the group is over. These unconscious expectations are manifest in the realm of the "taken for granted", the zone which is referred to in phenomenological theory as the "natural attitude". The taken-for-granted is a realm thickly populated by figures and things (collectively referred to in psychological jargon as "objects") which have significance (ie are carriers of meaning) for the person. In this sense each person lives in a world of signs, symbols and signals (an "umwelt") capable of triggering responses and each person is, unwittingly, on the lookout for these. The person does not just receive their world passively but mentally and emotionally grasps it in a particular manner which gives it form and meaning. This manner becomes more apparent within the mini-world of the group and as the person becomes conscious of it, they also become conscious of the possibility of its reversal and of its negation. While something remains in the realm of the taken-for-granted it is not questioned. As soon as it comes into the realm of awareness there simultaneously arises the possibility that something else is possible. What is, might not be. What has always been "this", could become "that". Awareness itself is an epoche. To live in constant awareness (mindfulness) is to live in a world of possibilities rather than a world of fixities. It is a liberation. Awareness also brings vividness. When a person "sees what they are doing" there is a visible release of energy. The same is true when they really become aware of another person or of any object. These are moments of break-through or realization, times when things become real to the perceiver. The purpose of phenomenological therapy is to pave the way for such experiences. Groups help by enhancing awareness. They can, however, also hinder by setting up new patterns of conformist thinking or by adopting "restrictive solutions" (Whittaker 1985). When working with groups we must never forget that the "natural attitude" which we are trying to bracket is itself a group product. Groups thus have their dangers just as they have their advantages. The influence, even tyranny, which groups can exert over their members is well known (Freud 1921; Myers 1979). EPOCHE AND THE GROUP FACILITATOR Against this background, the group facilitator attempts to suspend their own preconceptions in order to see the group with new eyes. In practice, this may be best done not so much by trying to shut out what one thinks one knows about groups but rather by being willing to entertain all manner of possibilities. If you think that a group develops in such and such a way, it is hard to stop thinking this by act of will. On the other hand, if you are already aware of six different ways in which groups might develop it is not difficult to entertain the possibility that this particular group may well invent a seventh way. Paradoxically, therefore, the epoche may be more successfully achieved by knowing more rather than less, provided that this knowledge is lightly held. What does the epoche mean in practice for the group facilitator? It will include: Willingness to hear all members equally Interest in listening deeply (positive regard) in order to understand (empathy) Willingness to keep irreconcilable viewpoints in play concurrently (unconditionality) Keeping track of unexploited possibilities which have arisen (unfinished business) Entertaining reversals and negations Entertaining possibilities which have not been raised by any group member at all Freedom from attachment to preferred modes of expression Willingness to hear all group members This point seems obvious but presents numerous difficulties in practice. Not all members volunteer to speak and the rapid emergence of consensus amongst a subgroup can shut others out. Willingness must therefore be evident, that is, demonstrated. The groupworker needs to find opportunities to demonstrate that there is space in the group for all opinions because most groups will otherwise be restrictive in this respect. There is such comfort in being amongst those who affirm one's opinions that a group culture which stifles interaction can emerge very easily. Since the whole point of phenomenological groupwork is to create a safe space (EI paper no. 32) in which the epoche can operate, this is essential. It is usually the case, however, that it must be actively achieved. This means looking out for an opportunity, which is bound to arise sooner or later, to demonstrate willingness to hear views or feelings which run against the general current. It may also mean, sometimes, inviting the quiet member to speak. Somehow group members need to arrive at an experience which gives them conviction that listening deeply to one another is worth the effort and even pain that it may initially involve. Interest in listening deeply in order to understand The facilitator will only be able to work effectively if she does have a genuine (congruent) interest in what is going on. Since groups are about real human lives, it does not work to have a clinically detached professionalism. The healing ingredient in human relations is love, but there are many different kinds of love. Most love (positive regard) is not unconditional and insofar as it does have strings attached it, alongside its positive effects, sows seeds for further trouble or grief. Healing (ie making whole), is a function of understanding. Again, however, there are different kinds of understanding corresponding to the different ways of knowing that we have already discussed. The kind of understanding which we need in therapy and in phenomenology is generally referred to as empathy. Empathy exists when I understand the other person's world well enough for me to be able to say that I can see full well how, if I were them, their behaviour, ideas and feelings would seem natural to me. This is not quite the same as taking their side, which slips over into identification. As a groupworker, one needs to be able to empathize with several different group members without taking sides. One needs to be able to understand them all. And, often, one needs to also have some appreciation of the viewpoints of people, real or imaginary, who are not present in the flesh but whose presence is, nonetheless, an important element in the worlds of those who are here. Understanding should not be shallow. Nobody communicates explicitly and directly all the time and indirect communication is an important way of working up to important revelations. We need, therefore, to listen for what is not being said as well as for what is being made explicit. This is not always easy. It requires attention to body language as well as words and it requires of us that we bring into play not just what the person is saying now but also the background of all that we have heard them say before and of what triggered or preceded their current remarks. Meaning comes from context. Above all, however, one needs to give evidence of seriously making the attempt. This is because, although there is a direct therapeutic effect in the positive regard which the worker has for the group member, there is a more powerful effect in the modelling which takes place. It is more healing for group members to rediscover their own capacity to love than simply to receive the good regard of the worker (Brazier 1993). The important thing in groups is not so much that people learn something, important as this may be, as that they learn how to learn. The worker's approach, therefore, must speak of a serious attempt to understand all parties and of encouragement to other group members who attempt to do the same. There will be times when understanding is offered more effectively by another group member. As a general rule the worker is well advised to prefer having his job done for him by other members to having to do it himself. The worker may thus find that facilitating a response from a group member may be more effective than facilitating an initial contribution. Keeping track of unexploited possibilities There is never time for a group to deal with every possibility which arises. There is a role for the facilitator, however, to keep track of what has come up in order that, when the group has pursued some line of interest to its limit, they may be reminded of what else has been begun but remains unfinished. In particular it is useful to keep in mind how the current track of the group became established: who initiated it, who took it up and whether the intentions of those who introduced the matter were actually fulfilled. Thus it is common for a subject to become established by one member asking a question of another. The responder may thus become the focus of group attention but the facilitator will notice that it was the questioner who had the original impulse to bring the issue forward. Similarly, the facilitator will keep track of questions which are raised and not pursued, of possibilities suggested which were not taken up at the time, and of the concerns of those members who never gain the group's attention. Reversals, negations and unbroached possibilities The task of a facilitator is not merely to follow where the group leads. The facilitator should also be able to let his imagination have some freedom to elaborate the material. In particular, he needs to be able to consider, "What if this were not so?" and "What would the opposite of this be?" The group member who affirms a strong emotion, such as love or hate, toward another person, may well also be harbouring its reversal. The term "reversal" has also acquired a particular technical meaning through the work of Apter (1989) who has pointed out the way in which similar experiences can be taken in diametrically opposite ways according to context. Thus driving one's car fast in a race can be experienced as exciting whereas driving the same car at the same speed might be experienced as anxiety provoking if one were late for a meeting. Equally, doing nothing can be experienced as peaceful on one day and boring on another. This is a further development of the basic phenomenological principle that things only have meaning in context. Bearing in mind that such reversals are common, the role of facilitator can be, especially as the group becomes more established and in danger of falling into fixed attitudes, one of provocation. It is very important that provocative interventions are made from a standpoint which is genuinely compassionate in its regard for the people and uncommitted in its relation to the ideas. Provocation should be to stimulate creativity, not to impose a view. This is a particular use of the epoche, challenging group members to reconsider what has come to be taken for granted. For instance, a group member may state a clear agenda, such as, "This evening I want to look at my relationship with my mother because I know that I need to tell her that I am angry about what she did to me." The other group members are likely, on hearing this, to proffer their support and quite quickly the whole group has settled into a consensus about what needs to happen. The experienced worker, however, will know that if an agenda is stated with this degree of clarity, it may well prove not to be what is actually needed. The worker will facilitate the group member getting into the piece of work, perhaps by setting up a psychodramatic scene in which there can be an enactment of a meeting between mother and daughter. If the worker is still in the epoche, however, he will continue to expect to be surprised by what happens and he will not be locked onto the idea that this protagonist necessarily needs to fulfil the agenda she has set for herself. Perhaps, as soon as the scene is set up, the protagonist will look at the "mother" and burst into tears and say, "I miss you so much." Thus we will discover that for this person at this point, the sadness is stronger than the anger. Often a group will set itself an agenda. This does not mean that this is what will happen. The phenomenologist is more interested in what the reality is than in what it is supposed to be; is more interested in what the group actually does than in what it has set itself to do. Whenever an agenda is set, the worker will have a little voice inside which will say, "And perhaps they will actually do something else." Similarly, if a consensus becomes set in a group about an idea or a value system, the worker will simply note "This is what this group thinks at the moment," and will continue to be aware that things do not have to stay this way. Freedom from attachment to preferred modes of expression One particular form of consensus which can readily become established in groups is the idea that there is only a limited range of acceptable ways for people to express themselves. Thus members may get criticised for being too theoretical or too emotional or for talking about others instead of "owning" their material or for talking about themselves all the time without regard for other people, and so on. If the worker also subscribes to some such view as this, it will limit the range of what is possible in the group unnecessarily. Staying in the here and now We can summarize much of what has been said in this section by saying that the facilitator is primarily concerned with what is actually happening in the group in the here and now and that the facilitator is free from vested interest in the group adopting a particular direction, mode or outcome. What the facilitator provides is not direction so much as ballast. If we draw an analogy between a group and a sailing boat, we may say that the group members are like the crew who must co-operate with the natural elements as best they may. The facilitator assists this process not so much by telling them what to do, nor by pointing out where they should be going, but rather by ensuring that the vessel does not capsize in the process. It is for the members themselves to learn how to direct the craft. The nature of this "ballast" is a kind of faith. The worker believes in the process of groups and in the potential of their members to reach deeper understanding of themselves and each other. The worker does not feel the need to force the pace, but expects opportunities for insight and change to arise naturally. Equipped with such trust, the worker is able to free herself up from having to work everything out and can thus give much better quality attention to what is actually going on. It is probably true that the majority of groupworkers miss most of what goes on in their groups because they are too busy inside themselves working out what should happen and what they are supposed to be doing about it. The epoche required by a phenomenological approach is miraculously liberating in this respect because it reorients the worker away from such scheming and toward actually listening deeply and appreciatively to what is going on, without worry or anxiety. PERCEPTION, EXPERIENCE AND APODICITY Phenomenology is experiential. Phenomenological groups are experiential. Even when the medium used is dialogue, it is the experience of encounter with a world which effects change and growth. Psychologists of many schools of thought have long acknowledged that there is a natural tendency for people to "grow", to change their outlook upon life in constructive directions. There has been less clarity about how this happens, although all would generally affirm that it is somehow a "product of experience". Phenomenology suggests that this growth tendency is governed by certain principles: openness to experience can be increased (epoche) doing is believing experience cannot be undone apodicity generally thought follows experience, not vice versa the principles of gestalt formation growth of "self" is a reflection of growth of one's "world" Doing is believing Most people remember most of what they do, about half of what they see and only a small part of what they hear about. This is fairly obvious. We are more engaged in what we do. Perception is not an abstract process. In phenomenology, therefore, we talk about embodied perception. Perceiving (experiencing) is indissolubly linked to action, to being in a body which moves about. Memory is, to a large degree, body-memory. If we want to recall something which is almost lost to memory, we may be successful if we put ourselves imaginatively back into the action of it, thus "So, I was going into such and such a place when I met so and so and he said...." and so on. This is why scene setting is so important in psychodrama. If the aim is to make our experiencing more vivid, then action has an important part to play. This is, however, a principle which has often been lost sight of in education. In groupwork we should never lose touch with the fact that, whatever form a group takes, it is more than just a stream of dialogue. It is also an event, a "happening", and a spectacle. A groupworker needs a sense of the dramatic. This also means that groupworkers need courage and to achieve this they need support. It is a risk to do something dramatic, to cut through a dialogue which is becoming stale or circular, say, and move into action which carries a degree of risk. In one large (about 30 people) training group, a member made a series of outspoken remarks which caused other members considerable embarrassment. Although members were feeling increasingly irritated and becoming, alienated nobody in the group was willing to confront the outspoken member. The two group facilitators observed what was happening for some time and then one of them intervened: "Can I have the group's attention, please?" Silence was established. She turned to the outspoken member: "I am very interested in the points you have been making, John. I also have the impression that you are a person of some self confidence. I wonder if you would be willing to co-operate in allowing me to use you as the focus of a group exercise?" This was said in a warm manner and the outspoken member agreed. The facilitator continued: "I would like to ask you to remain silent for thirty minutes and observe the group. I will then ask you to give us feedback on what you observe, or on whatever conclusions you draw from it. Do you agree?" He agreed. By this time, there was a feeling of considerable tension in the group, a feeling of anticipation, members wondering what might be coming next. Alienation had been replaced by intense interest. The facilitator then turned to the rest of the group: "This is a training group. We are here to learn how to be group facilitators. I would like to invite everybody to discuss for a time how, if you had a group and had a member who acted like John, you should, as facilitator or as group member, respond to the situation." After a moment's shock, there followed a heated discussion, some of which was on the topic suggested, some of which was supporting or attacking the facilitator for making such a suggestion and some of which was further development of the points John himself had previously been making alone. At the end of the half hour, the outspoken member who had stayed quiet for the allotted time, was able to give some useful feedback to the group and to share some of his own personal feelings about what had happened. Most people who participated in this event found it an important learning experience. The facilitators, afterwards needed to confer and debrief. The whole session had been very emotional and challenging and a facilitator who provokes such a scene needs some support in the aftermath, however successful or otherwise the event may have proved to be. The events just described did not involve "action" in the sense of people moving from their chairs, but they were dramatic. Drama involves dialogue, but dialogue which has no dramatic element tends to be experienced as dull. For a group to make an impact upon its members, something has to happen. Of course, events of this kind cannot be pre-planned. They depend upon the facilitator being aware in a particular way, aware of the aesthetic and human potentialities of events as they unfold. This is not a function of cleverness, which generally serves only to stifle spontaneity. The groupworker needs to be "living on the edge" all the time as the group potentialities emerge. Experience cannot be undone A basic principle of phenomenology is the observation that we cannot really go back to the past. When something has happened, we have to begin from here. Although therapy may often involve recall of past events, it is always recall from the present vantage point. There is no point, as Moreno would say, in having a "primary catharsis" if it is not linked to a "catharsis of integration" (Moreno 1946 in Fox 1987, p.16). Simply reliving the painful events of the past without learning anything from them is mere retraumatization. The skill of a therapist is not to be measured by the sheer amount of emotion they provoke. The purpose in going back is to be able to go forward again better. Much work in groups, therefore, involves members as protagonists recalling, representing or reenacting scenes of past experience. The urge to re-present material in this way is powered by a sense of "unfinished business". The protagonist is still carrying her history around with her. The worker has to encompass the fact that although the group member is talking about "history", they are actually unfolding something before us which is still part of their present reality. The world which each of us inhabits is largely a construction of our mind and heart imposed upon our physical environment. In this sense, all recall is multi-layered, it is history and it is the present world, and it is future projection simultaneously. Past, present and future are all present realities in the subjective "world" of the person. It is more valuable for a person to acquire the ability to elaborate their vision of their world in creative ways than it is to pursue "damage". We should be alert to the fact that therapy has sometimes been criticised for making people unduly concerned with the negative aspects of life. Not only do these principles apply to the personal material which members bring to the group, they also apply to the collective experience which the group accumulates of itself. A group is a group by virtue of having gone through things together. The sooner this sense of collective experience is established, the greater the potential for group cohesion. Thus, it is not always a good policy to arrange too much in advance. A group which has to take collective action to establish a home for itself, to find a comfortable working space or to solve some basic problem together as a preliminary to its work, may sometimes proceed more co-operatively than one for which everything has been provided. Things become worth something insofar as we have invested some action (effort) in them. Perception become vivid through doing. Apodicity We can see therefore that there may be moments in the life of a group which are critical to its development, turning points. There are times when something becomes apparent that had not been acknowledged before. These are moments of collective realization. An example might be an occasion when one group member comes to be seen in a new way: the scapegoat is seen to have a human heart. The task of the facilitator may be to precipitate such moments. Paradoxically, again, this is not something that can be planned. It has to be done by seizing the moment, or it is nothing. A great deal depends upon the facilitator's nerve and capacity for spontaneity, and also upon the extent to which the facilitator is able to simultaneously listen deeply to what is naturally unfolding while allowing himself freedom for creative inspiration. Apodicity means certainty arising from demonstration. The events which occur in the course of a group demonstrate something to each member. We cannot be sure in advance what this will be. Will they lead the members to a conviction that other people are not to be trusted, that to share personal material is to invite condemnation, that the only way to gain relief from inner pain is to blame someone else? Or will they lead to a realization that we are here to love one another, that growth and intimacy are possible, that life can be trusted? The point here is that what happens in groups is a microcosm of life. What we learn there really matters. It is not simply an entertainment or an academic exercise. People come out of groups changed and they may be changed for the better or for the worse. They may be made into better people or worse ones. We all, therefore, have a very serious responsibility. There are many moments in the course of a group when we have opportunities to do things which will swing the balance one way or the other. Thought follows experience If a group proceeds well, there will be much for members to think about because they will have experienced much. Thinking is part of "working through" new experience. Sometimes people try to make thinking a substitute for action, which does not work but thinking which is based upon actual experience may be very productive. Group members will need time and opportunity to discuss and reflect upon what they have experienced and a range of different formats for this may be useful. Growth of self reflects growth in experience of one's world I would like to quote Moreno. The following refers to psychodrama, but in this respect all good groupwork is psychodrama:
There are several important points in this passage. Firstly there is the idea that we emerge as people from a group context (the family etc.) and so it is through groups that we can effect change in our selves by going back into the same kind of matrix from which we emerged. Secondly, there is the affirmation that a person who shares their experience with a group is engaged in an act of love. It is common for people in groups to worry that they are "taking the group's time". A therapy group, however, does not function at all unless people are willing to contribute. Furthermore, those who help someone to unravel their story, whether it be by facilitating, by playing auxiliary roles or by attentive listening, all gain. We all gain and grow by taking in something real from the other person's world which resonates with and enriches our own experience. A reversal is required here in the way we regard what is happening in a group. The person who "works" benefits the group by providing something personal which enriches everybody. It is possible and common to say that they are doing something just for themselves but this does not really seem realistic. They make the group possible by making a gift of their experience. A group which operates in this latter spirit is likely to function better. We all grow as our world's grow and our worlds grow in proportion as we are able to understand the phenomena around us more deeply. Everything then becomes multi-dimensional. The person who works in a group, works for everyone. THE WHOLE GROUP When we think of the person in the context of the group, it is apparent that on one dimension we can consider each member as a self-responsible individual and on another dimension we can see each member as acting in ways which are a function of the needs of the group as a whole. These two dimensions do not appear simultaneously so at any one time we have both a visible and an invisible group (Agazarian & Peters 1989). When the worker allows the group itself to be in the foreground, the members can be seen to be enacting collective needs. This will affect, for instance, the roles they take. Thus in a group of timid people, there will still be a need for some leadership. One of the less timid will probably find themselves in a position of direction and responsibility which, in the context of their life elsewhere, seems quite out of character. Groups can be coercive in this way. There are thus creative contrasts to be seen between the way a person describes and presents themselves and the way they are perceived to be in the group itself. This does not negate their description. rather it illustrates that there is more to them than they themselves believed. Again, the groupworker needs to be able to listen deeply not just to the individual voices of members but to the overall tone and condition of the group as a whole. If one thinks that it is as though the group were an entity in its own right which was using the individual members as its spokes-people, one may be able to tune into a sense of the collective direction or mood which is quite different from that of any individual considered in isolation. Sometimes this takes the form of an unconscious preoccupation. The group members as individuals may be discussing a film seen on TV the night before, but the theme of the film and the fact that it is holding the group's attention may betray something more significant than a concern with entertainment. Perhaps the film is about how people who take risks get into difficulties, and perhaps it reflects a sentiment common in the group but, as yet, unacknowledged. Again, the groupworker may profitably ask inwardly, "what is this group telling me?" There will be messages about whether the facilitator is being too abrasive or intrusive or too timid or whatever. We are not talking here about direct and conscious challenges from group members, but rather things which only become apparent from mulling over the gestalt which the group presents as a whole, including such things as how ready or reluctant people are to work or to return to the group room after breaks, how close they sit, whether people are listening to each other, the volume and tenor of conversation and so on. Is the group rumbling or squeaking, flowing or sticking, warm or cold? The perception which each person present has of the group as a whole will not be the same. Each will have their own perspective upon it because the group has a different relationship with each of them. There is often much to be gained by articulating, exploring and comparing these perspectives. We have earlier seen how it is the relationship with what is other than self and in particular the relationship with groups which gives people a sense of identity. Each group member has their own sense of their own identity modified or even transformed by the way their relationship with the group evolves. In particular Bennis and Shepard (1956) have identified what they call the "barometric event" which is an occasion when the members of a group begin to assume responsibility for their own relationship with the group and, by doing so, symbolically dethrone the facilitator from her initial mediating role. This fundamental shift in the member's relationship with the group, as it appears in his or her phenomenal world, is a moment of apodicity which has important consequences not only for the life of the group but also as a demonstration of how people can take responsibility for their relations with one another more generally. SUMMARY Group therapy is the deliberate use of groups as a medium for personal change. Personal growth comes about not so much by self study as by involvement in and creative elaboration of one's "world" and by enriching that world through exposure to and cross fertilization with the worlds of others. Groups provide a good route for such work when there is a depth of personal sharing by members, a willingness to give feedback in an open and acceptant way and mutual care and compassion. The process of empathy is the main route by which our lives are enhanced. This approach thus provides the basis, not for finding out what is wrong with people and putting it right, but for creative discoveries and constructions which give rise to the conviction that each of us has more potentialities than previously imagined. A corollary of this is that groups which are too self-consciously concerned with therapy may actually sometimes be less therapeutic than groups which are oriented toward some creative or expressive focus. The role of the facilitator is a challenging one. It requires a capacity for spontaneity which must be continually renewed. Groups are powerful generators of consensus and it may often be the role of the facilitator to disturb the equilibrium of the group. Commonly this is done by the simple means of drawing out, through empathic reflection, the feelings of the silently dissenting member. On other occasions, however, it may happen in more dramatic ways as the facilitator finds some creative way to exploit a seeming impasse or a chance incident. In this work it is essential that the facilitator have no other predetermined agenda than a loyalty to the "truth of the moment" and a genuine compassion and wish to understand. In therapeutic groups we can all learn a great deal about ourselves and about human potential, but it is generally the facilitator who stands to learn most. While the uninitiated tend to see groups as an assemblage of individuals, from phenomenologically it is clear that the group itself assumes an importance in the lives of its members which has an influence beyond that of its members considered separately or aggregatively. The group becomes a vision. It gives members a sense of identity and belonging within a medium which permits them to find that they have power to influence what that identity and role may be. The group is a situation in which people can experiment with the crucial formative experience of being part of something greater than themselves, without the "greater" being so much so that they become its victims. Groups are a forum in which people can regain contact with their capacity to love and understand in deeper ways. REFERENCES AGAZARIAN Y. & PETERS R. (1989) The Visible and Invisible Group. London: Routledge* APTER M.J. (1989) Reversal theory. London: Routledge* BENNIS W.G. & SHEPARD H.A. (1956) A theory of group development. In Human Relations, 9, 4, pp.415-437# BRAZIER D.J. (1993) The necessary condition is love: Going beyond self in the person-centred approach. In Beyond Carl Rogers: Toward a psychotherapy for the 21st century(pp.72-91). London: Constable* EGAN G. (1975) The Skilled Helper. Pacific Grove, California: Brooks Cole* FOX J. (1987) The Essential Moreno. New York: Springer* FREUD S. (1921) Group psychology and the analysis of the ego. In Penguin Freud Library, Volume 12: Civilization, Society and Religion. (pp.91-178). London: Penguin (1991)* MYERS D.G. (1979) How groups intensify opinions. In D. Krebs (editor) Readings in Social Psychology: Contemporary perspectives (pp.176-180). WHITTAKER D.S. (1985) Using Groups to Help People. London: Routledge* Dh.D.J. Brazier |