Gestalt Therapy and How It Works

by Frederick Salomon Perls

Live Recording - One Cassette

A montage produced from several short lectures by Perls provides a continuous and thorough description of Gestalt Therapy.

Note: The inherent difficulties of live recordings and the age of some of the recordings can cause variations in the sound quality.

FRITZ PERLS (1893-1970): Founder of the Gestalt school of psychotherapy, German-born Perls was known as a strong-willed teacher and therapist who pushed his students and clients beyond their habitual defenses.

Genres: Psychology

Audio Cassette

First published January 1, 1966

About the author

Friedrich (Frederick) Salomon Perls better known as Fritz Perls, was a noted German-born psychiatrist and psychotherapist. Perls coined the term 'Gestalt therapy' to identify the form of psychotherapy that he developed with his wife, Laura Perls, in the 1940s and 1950s. Perls became associated with the Esalen Institute in 1964, and he lived there until 1969. His approach to psychotherapy is related to, but not identical to, Gestalt psychology, and it is different from Gestalt theoretical psychotherapy.

The core of the Gestalt Therapy process is enhanced awareness of sensation, perception, bodily feelings, emotion, and behavior, in the present moment. Relationship is emphasized, along with contact between the self, its environment, and the other.