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This therapy group is designed
for people who wish to create authentic, nurturing, and enduring
relationships in life. Our approach is to identify and heal the wounds of
our past and to learn to build healthy relationships in the present. The
result frees you to create relationships where truth can be spoken,
feelings can be expressed, and trust can exist.
The group operates on the assumption that what prevents your experience of
healthy and nurturing relating is early wounds -- wounds due to abuse,
neglect, alcoholism, or other forms of inappropriate and dysfunctional
parenting. More accurately, it is the protective shields you created
against this abuse which now prevent you from having the kinds of
relationships you desire. It is important to recognize, however, that
these protective shields have served the vital purpose of allowing you to
survive.
This early learning -- and historic repeating -- of patterns of relating
and acting in survival modes resulted in the suppression of your natural
spontaneity and recognition of feelings. This group facilitates your
understanding of how you got to be the way you are and provides you with
tools and opportunities to transform yourself and your experience of
life.
The group provides a forum for risk-taking and trying out new types of
behavior. Being honest with yourself and with others is strongly
encouraged. It is helpful to realize, as you take these risks, that group
therapy is perhaps the safest environment in which you can experiment with
new ways of relating. Members strongly value this aspect of group therapy
and are supportive of each person's efforts at honest, authentic, and
congruent communication. This experimentation and the safety necessary for
it can only develop if members agree to return each week to examine and
work through difficulties that arise.
This therapy group provides an arena in which to explore and experience
aspects of yourself that may be painful and stressful. It's important to
realize that working on one's personality and ways of relating is not
easy. To transform yourself, your relationships, and your experience of
life usually involves this pain and stress. It is often a necessary
condition for positive growth.
Members are encouraged to be honest and direct in expressing their
feelings in the group, at the moment, especially feelings toward other
group members and the therapist. In many ways this can be regarded as the
core of group therapy. It comes with developing trust in the group.
Part of what fosters trust in this group is the principle of
confidentiality. Please do not identify other group members by name if and
when you share about your involvement and experience in this group.
A basic aim of this therapy group is personal growth. Group is a place to
learn what works for you -- and what doesn't -- in relating to others and
yourself. Since patterns of relating have been years in the making, it is
important to recognize that the process of changing these patterns will
also take time. In joining this group, you are making a minimum
three-month commitment to participate. Most participants stay one year or
longer in order to gain the full benefit of the group therapy experience.
Everyone experiences certain stumbling blocks or difficulties along the
way. Entering the group, coming to group even when you don't want to,
finding the strength to share something difficult -- whether it's part of
your own personal history or experience, or involves confronting a group
member or therapist -- all require perseverance, courage, and commitment
to your own growth.
In joining this group you may have an experience of feeling "at home" --
perhaps for the first time in your life -- as you join with others who are
also acknowledging the wounds of their childhood. This may, however, be
coupled with feelings of anxiety and stress as you get closer to the pain
of those wounds.
You will also be joining a group of people who already have been meeting
together and who are familiar with group process. You may have a feeling
of puzzlement, discouragement, anxiety, a feeling of being the "new kid on
the block," as you explore this new environment. It is important to
weather this initial phase as you adapt to the group and its process. You
are encouraged to share in group whatever feelings arise for you about
your experience.
Members often experience "plateaus" in their growth, or even stuck points.
This is a natural process of growth and usually represents a phase of
internal "cooking" as something new prepares to emerge. One learns to
distinguish this phase of growth from a sense of being ready to end one's
participation in group.
Members usually terminate their participation in group when their goals
for joining have been achieved, when they experience nurturing and
sustaining relationships outside of the group, and when they experience a
natural and internal sense of completion.
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