In modern psychotherapeutic practice, many methods are used that were developed in the last century, but are appreciated only today. These methods include imagotherapy.
Imagotherapy (from lat. image - image) - a direction in psychotherapy, developed in 1966 by I. E. Volpert. The essence of this play method is to reproduce a number of characteristic images for therapeutic purposes. Both dramatic, literary and role images can be used as patterns - in order to develop communication skills or to work out the zones of personality development, to teach the patient an adequate response to certain life circumstances, to mobilize his life experience.
Imagotherapy is a popular trend today art therapy. In essence, this is theatricalization of the therapeutic process, which allows the patient to better imagine the image actions and reactions that this or that life situation requires of him, or that he himself wants work out.
The history of the formation, goals and objectives of the method
Ilya Volpert
Imagology is based on the concept of the image, as well as on the position of the unity of personality and image. Through a combination of various tools and techniques during individual or group sessions, the patient learns to live those reaction images that are adequate in life situations - learns to be who he wants to be, to react the way he would like, do not hold back his fear, shyness, insecurity and others restrictions.
Simply put, imagotherapy is a bit like a theatrical performance, where it is important not only to play a certain role, but also to realize the emotions and sensations that it brings, to assimilate patterns of behavior and associative row.
Psychiatrist and psychotherapist Ilya Volpert once developed imagotherapy as a method of treatment neuroses. Part of his scientific heritage was also devoted to a critical analysis of the teachings of Z. Freud on dreams. The scientist effectively applied behavioral practices to treat neuroses and correct the behavior of patients with other psychiatric diagnoses. By the way, imagotherapy and its courses (for example, puppet therapy, fairy tale therapy) are effectively used in speech therapy for working with children with speech deviations and development.
Stages of work
Effective imagotherapy involves the sequential passage of several stages of therapy, at each of which a certain set of techniques is used:
- At the first stage the patient must say how he sees himself, how he sees his reactions to certain life situations, how he sees his image from the outside, what features he endows himself with. At the next stage, together with the psychotherapist, he proceeds to the theatrical replay of those images that need to be “worked through”.
- Second stage often resembles "theater of improvisation". If classes are held in a group, dance and movement therapy, elements of acting, pantomime, etc. can be used to warm up. The task is to play the desired images, not disdaining even the use of deliberately grotesque techniques.
- Stage Three - the stage of systematization. Everything played and worked out is moved to the stage, to the studio. It can even be performances and dramatic performances, in which patients must holistically embody the images on which they were working, as as a rule, according to the principle of contrast - a shy person needs to work on the image of the "soul of the company" and a liberated merry fellow with sparkling jokes; emotional people should try on the image of a calm and reasonable phlegmatic.
Imagotherapy according to a special Tibetan method:
Techniques and tools
Imagotherapeutic practice is aimed at working out the reactions of the second signaling system *. For this, the following therapeutic techniques can be used:
- dramatic speech training;
- distraction, persuasion, explanation, suggestion;
- imitation and improvisation;
- grade;
- teaching new behavioral skills;
- competition, inspiration, collective creativity;
- self-regulation;
- catharsis, etc.
∗ The second signaling system is a special type of human higher nervous activity.
Method value
The possibilities of imagotherapy are not only in the development of behavioral and communication skills and the development of auxiliary patterns of behavior, as one might think with a superficial approach.
In fact, the postulates of imagotherapy are rooted in deep neural connections that exist between reactions, behavior, sounds, and representations. Today, it has been proven that behavioral reactions cause an impulse of the immune system, which can affect the functioning of organs and systems in different ways.
If you work out the behavior correctly, especially if you need to correct it and "return to square one" (after an injury, for example, as a result of which a person has lost his previously inherent properties personality), then it is possible to cause a directed immune impulse, which will help restore the previous neural connections and restore the lost mental properties of the personality, restore its mental circuit. Not to mention how beneficial such therapy can be to solve physiological problems with a psychosomatic nature. And this, according to WHO, is the reason for about 42% of all visits to doctors.
Today imagotherapists successfully use this method to treat hypertension and other cardiovascular diseases, gastrointestinal diseases, bronchial asthma, neuralgia.
And of course, the person who passed the session will have the best communication skills and a whole arsenal of techniques for getting rid of stress and reducing psycho-emotional stress. He will develop ready-made behavioral patterns and will incur less emotional costs than his “not worked out” colleagues in business and everyday communication.
