Gestalt Therapy Institute

07/29/2025

Wordle 1,501 4/6

⬜⬜🟨⬜🟨
⬜🟨⬜🟨⬜
🟨🟩🟩⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

02/19/2025

Wordle 1,341 5/6

⬜🟨🟨⬜⬜
⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
🟨🟩⬜🟩🟩
⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

12/06/2024

https://gestalttherapyinstitute.com/self-and-no-self/

Self and No Self by Alan Cohen | May 19, 2015 | Spiritual/Philosophical “In conscious life cosmic being reoccurs as human becoming. Spirit appears in time as a product of nature, and yet it is spirit that envelops nature tirelessly.” Martin Buber This is a topic which includes and transcends bot...

12/02/2024

Wordle 1,262 4/6

⬜🟨⬜⬜🟩
⬜⬜🟩🟩🟩
⬜⬜🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

05/16/2023

Wordle 696 5/6
Feh

⬜🟨🟨⬜⬜
🟨🟩⬜🟨⬜
⬜🟩⬜🟩🟩
⬜🟩⬜🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

08/28/2021

01/23/2021

We have a slow return to sanity, hopefully a sanity which is inclusive and which puts first the welfare and well being of those who live here.
And a slow falling away of the reign of terror that we have suffered with for the past four years. Recovery will be both fast and slow. But, we can start to regain a feeling of hope and, perhaps, trust in the fallible good will of Biden and his administration. This is mostly not about politics. It is about the willingness to rule based on empathy, and the capacity to act on that empathy.

04/21/2020

We are faced with a terrible threat, which is invisible, other than the victims it leaves in its path. We can’t see it. So some think it’s real but not really real. It’s becoming an annoyance, an inconvenience. We should just go back to our lives and ignore it. It will go away.

It won’t.

We have a president and an administration who is also annoyed about this intrusion. It should go away. We should go back to ball games and our bustling economy. And why haven’t the governors taken care of this already so I can take credit for the victory?

We won’t give you credit if we ever vanquish this monster.

We are one human organism. A huge herd that will survive if we keep in mind our interdependence. Or will be vastly crippled if we forget.

Like all major traumas and tragedies, this gives us the opportunity to remember what matters or to devolve into chaos.
We need to remember that the danger is invisible but very real. There is an active shooter who is well armed and hasn’t gone away, and has malice in its viral heart. We need to know the preciousness of life, to protect our own, and in so doing to protect the larger self of our species.

03/25/2020

This is a time which evaporates the world we have constructed, and calls upon us to find ways of navigating this new reality. I hope all who read this are not only protecting yourselves, but considering a larger picture. We are a species, a huge herd, a living organism that is composed of billions of individual units. We survive and prosper by keeping the herd in mind, and not just our individual selves. No individual exists or survives without the herd.
Let’s be mindful, and remember what matters most. You will find it in this new place.

10/06/2019

These are times of pronounced uncertainty. We always live with uncertainty, but usually we are oblivious to it - we assume our routines and structures inoculate us from it. This is true in our personal relationships, our work, and in our government. Now, the uncertainty of our constitutional democracy is particularly figural. The laws and structures that have guided us through the past few centuries are being challenged like, perhaps, never before.
We can tune it out, pretending it isn’t real or doesn’t pose an actual threat. We can assume the worst and live with despair. Or we can see the danger, not tune it out, and do what we can to be part of the citizenry of an imperfect nation which is founded on a sense of realistic optimism.
As PHG said, and I paraphrase, “When the self has power to draw on, it has precisely no sense of security. It has perhaps a sense of readiness, an acceptance of excitement, and a certain foolish optimism about the alterability of reality...this readiness is perhaps what the theologians call faith”.

So faith is not a passive experience; it is an act of engagement and courage. Let us be courageous in our personal lives and in our relationship to our democracy.

01/27/2017

We have to remember that we are part of a whole. When we raise our voices, when we show up, when we speak our truths, we are not alone. We must not feel alone.

10/29/2015

Of all visits to our website - www.gestalttherapyinstitute.org - by far the most frequent inquiry is about the layers of the neurotic personality. There seems to be a hunger for this part of the theory, even though most institutes neglect to teach it. Please read it on the articles page and let me know your thoughts.

Find therapy services in NYC and Westchester, New York. We provide individual, couples and group psychotherapy as well as Gestalt training for therapists.