Psychopathology and Atmospheres: Neither Inside Nor Outside

Abstract

When I got my hands on a copy of Gianni Francesetti and Tonino Griffero’s collection of essays on Psychopathology and Atmospheres, I was drawn to their subtitle: Neither Inside nor Outside. I was interested in how the editors’ formulation might reflect Rumi’s musings, Buber’s relational theology, Lewin’s social field theory, or the descriptions of consciousness that are spoken of in the Vedas, the most ancient Hindu scriptures. All of these notions speak to the non-separateness of all. These were the sensibilities that first attracted me to Gestalt therapy over 50 years ago, and which have felt to me to be underdeveloped in our theoretical writings and our clinical work. Gestalt therapy began as an integration of several philosophical and theoretical developments and ways of looking at human experience. As such, it invites and calls for further development that broadens our understanding, while maintaining the sensibility of the original formulation. In my own investigations, I have been looking at how broadening our understanding of awareness can deepen our understanding of pathology (chronic, unaware contact interruptions) and health (constancy of awareness). So, the subtitle seemed to offer promise.The authors of this book seem to adhere to the new phenomenology developed by Hermann Schmitz (2007). I was not familiar with Schmitz; his work was discussed fairly extensively in a previous issue of Gestalt Review (for an overview, see Amendt-Lyon 2018). His questionable politics became a focus of the journal reviewers, given a fairly sympathetic book on Hitler (Schmitz 1999). I will not be addressing Schmitz nor his writing here; I will be focusing on the writings in Francesetti and Griffero’s edited volume.The first thing that struck me is that there is actually no clear definition of “atmospheres” in the book, although each author refers to “atmospheres” as their guiding principle. This has made it difficult for me to try to understand the concept, and whether or not it is a useful addition to Gestalt therapy. We have a concept of contact boundary; it refers to the meeting of organism and environment, of me and not-me. It is a place that both separates and connects. It allows for the assimilation of the not-yet-me into the me, while rejecting that which is toxic or not enhancing to the organism. This boundary creates the possibility of growth while preserving the integrity of the organism. Gestalt therapy theory in this case is the “me”; “atmospheres” are the not-me. My task in reading this collection is to consider what may be novel in a useful and growthful way for our theory and practice. But how to do that when there is no agreement about what “atmospheres” refers to?First, there is simply an assumption that atmospheres exist. That there is an external, objective affective force: a “quasi-thingly” entity (7) that affects all in a particular way. A room has an excited atmosphere or a depressed atmosphere, and so on. But, what is this ether that exists and enters our consciousness, like an energy that seeps into our pores? This is never explained. Nor is a basic premise of field theory and phenomenology considered: that each person who is in a given circumstance will give meaning to it and have an emotional response to it on the basis of her own life space. Akira Kurosawa understood this idea when he directed the psychological thriller/crime film Rashomon (1950); Viktor Frankl (1962) expressed this powerfully in Man’s Search For Meaning, in recounting his experience in the concentration camps. So, a dark room may have a depressive atmosphere to one person, while it may have a comforting atmosphere to someone standing next to that person. A room may have an excited atmosphere to one person, and yet have a chaotic and anxiety-provoking atmosphere to the next person. The fact that proponents of this new phenomenology would not understand the basics of phenomenology is confusing and frustrating to this reader, especially when there is no attempt to describe or explain the particulars of this formulation: exactly what is it that they are referring to as “atmospheres” or “atmospheric”?There is a good deal of time spent by some of the authors distinguishing the atmospheric approach from the digital, hierarchal, and medical model approaches. This, I take it, is meant to contrast this approach from behaviorism, cognitive behavioral therapy, neuroscience, and other biologically based approaches; and from psychoanalysis, diagnostic categorization, and other objectifying approaches. Gestalt therapy is given the nod as (the) one approach which accounts for field-based experiences, and for the value of subjective experience. But in reading, I found myself confused by this need to form a zero sum frame between the “atmospheric” approach and these others. As a Gestalt therapist I assume that, while “objective” behaviors and biological states exist and are likely related to subjective experience, we value and work primarily with the person’s phenomenological experience. I had assumed that this was a war that Gestalt and other humanistic therapies had fought (and won or lost, depending on one’s point of view) decades ago. The need to relitigate that argument seemed a bit unnecessary to me.As I read on I became a bit more confused: in chapter 1 Griffero speaks of the therapist’s office as having a “good atmospheric setting” (11), which, it seems, may be purposely planned. These factors include relative quiet, soft lighting, and neutral colors: “The setting should prevent pathological influences” (12). So, is Griffero saying that atmospheres are inclusive of interior design? We mostly take for granted that a therapist’s office should not be overly stimulating; that it should be a comfortable place to be, and to be safe being vulnerable. But is this what Griffero is referring to as atmospheres? And how does a setting prevent pathological influences, beyond not introducing jarring levels of noise, color, light, and disturbing images? Are we not in a process of discovery of what pathological influences emerge in the client’s experience? Our safe, neutral setting optimally serves to set the ground for such emergence, not prevent it. Such emergence allows for a collaboration of noticing and sharing curiosity between the therapist and the client. Further, Griffero reminds us here that open-ended questions are atmospheric, and that we should avoid closed-ended questions. I am not sure what he means here about “atmospheric,” but I do think that we have known for quite some time that open-ended questions leave room for clients to shape them to their own form, rather than being predefined. But, again, did we not already know that?But, as per my task, I will try to separate out the valid and novel (to me) aspects of this book from the redundant or baseless assertions. This is what occurs at the contact boundary: useless or toxic elements are rejected, while useful and growthful aspects are taken in.At its best, this book seems to be an effort toward a field-based phenomenology. If we eliminate the contradictory or unfounded assertions (e.g., a quasi-thingly essence that is an unseeable, yet present objective state), we can see on the part of some contributors an attempt to orient to a self which is not a fixed entity, but rather is affected and formed by field elements at play. These “new phenomenologists” place an emphasis on the pathic, receptive element of experience, polarizing that from the rational (logos), and active element of experience. In my understanding of the contact continuum (see Perls, Hefferline, and Goodman 1994, 179–207), one leads to the other, resulting in need satisfaction or resolution; this is not a zero sum situation, but a set of complementary capacities. But the effect of the field elements prior to a clear figure/ground formation, prior to the forming of a self-experience, is what Francesetti seems to be interested in. And, to some extent, I see this as a valuable consideration. If self is a function of the field, and is not a structure “owned” by the organism, then the field exists prior to an awareness of those “impinging” field elements. We begin to have experience prior to a clear cognitive sense of what the experience actually is, or what the field elements creating the experience are. An openness to that process allows us to access that which is not predefined.Francesetti’s process description of his session illustrates this openness to experience prior to cognition. And it illustrates the value of being present with that uncertainty, waiting for the figure to form. And, in my experience, in that state of openness I seem to know before I know how I know. Yet, I am again left with the question of how is this concept of “atmospheres” useful? We have had field theory for several decades, as we have had the Gestalt therapy concepts of awareness, self, contact boundary, and fore-contact. All of this is described in the theoretical formulations that we already have, much of which was laid out in the volume of Perls, Hefferline, and Goodman (1994) more than 70 years ago.But more confusing to me than putting out an idea that already exists, and claiming to have “invented” it, is the apparent lack of agreement among the authors about what this idea actually is.Griffero describes a weak handshake as “atmospheric”; tapping is “atmospheric”; the color of the room is “atmospheric” (14). Griffero seems to not be able to identify that which defines his concept. Is he speaking of nonverbal, noncognitive expression? Is he talking about elements that exist prior to becoming figural? We do not know, apparently because Griffero does not consider the importance of defining his terms. Apparently, everything can be “atmospheric,” and therefore this term does not seem to be valuable.Francesetti does seem to have a bit more clarity when using the term. He speaks of the pre-dualistic field, where figures have not yet formed. He speaks of the fluid self, which is actually a function of the field. Self is not fixed but an emergent process. This is interesting to me, but I fail to see how the concept of “atmospheres” adds to the discussion or to our theoretical understanding. Field, fluid/emergent self, forming of experience prior to a clarified figure/ground relationship—all this has been part of Gestalt therapy and its forebears for decades.Here, I personally would be interested in a fuller discussion of awareness. We speak of awareness largely as a figure/ground phenomenon. But clearly, awareness exists prior to the forming of a clear figure/ground, for example, in the fore-contact experience, where self is “weak.” But self is not awareness; it is the awareness of the emergent figure/ground, its development, and its resolution. Here, the “atmospherists” might have spoken to pre-dualistic (or as per the Vedas, non-dualistic) awareness. This would, in my opinion, have been a contribution that expands the Gestalt therapy view of awareness, and therefore of our dependence on certain figure/ground relationships to have a continuous experience of “our” self. This is where Rumi would be helpful: the experience of all things leads to the experience of no-thing. We are left with awareness, existence, but no figure. It is with this clean slate of awareness, of non-preformed ideation, that fresh contact with the field can occur.But, the “atmospherists” do not offer this frame. Instead, they offer a contradictory array of ideas and advice. Jan Roubal describes the “depressed situation” (69), an atmospheric situation or configuration that the patient (and then the therapist) seem to be trapped in. This is not seen as a function of the accumulation of reified contact interruptions, or of a stagnant self/world construction, but rather as an external circumstance. He says that the client “becomes organized” by the “depressed field.” This seems to be external to the client, and to eliminate his/her agency, history of unfinished gestalts, and so on, Roubal also assumes that the therapist gets “pulled down” (73) and wants to get out of the whirlpool by getting patients to let go of their depression. But this seems to me to be the process of an inexperienced or untrained therapist, one who is unaware or unable to be curious about how patients construct their own helplessness, or what trauma or mourning remains unfinished. The experience of heaviness or absence of “lively” contactfulness can be important information for the experienced therapist, rather than a quicksand that pulls both down. Therapists are invited by Roubal to not try to change their depressed patient but to accept the situation as it is. This is an interesting idea, which was famously written about by Arnold Beisser (1970) over 50 years ago. Again, I am curious why this is being stated as an innovative idea, when it has been central to the Gestalt therapeutic approach for well over half a century, and has long since found its way into other schools of psychotherapy. But Roubal goes on to describe how “the atmosphere gets thick” (93) without telling us what the atmosphere is, what its thickness consists of, and whether he is speaking metaphorically, or he is referring to a concentration of the atomic structure of the air surrounding him and his patient. And while Roubal’s clinical example displayed a skillful expression of separateness, empathy, curiosity, and reframing, it did not, in my reading, either display or require an orientation to “atmospheres.” It did involve an explication of various field elements (e.g., her history of working nonstop, her body “refusing” to keep up), but Roubal’s reframing of the situation (“your body is needing a vacation”) shifted the patient’s meaning making and therefore opened new possibility. This did not change an “atmosphere”; it changed the patient’s relationship to her own experience.This review format has allowed me to open some questions about this new phenomenological concept of atmospheres, to reject the vagueness and the semimystical approach to experience, to accept some of the field relational experiential descriptions and formulations, and yet to question the necessity and relevance of this concept. Again, the theory of the fluid self, the omnipresence of field and life space, relational interconnectedness and inter-effectedness, and so on has all been present in our work and our theory for decades. If “atmospheres” describes the above, I do not see what growthful novelty is being contributed; if it describes mysterious objective affective forces that surround us like dybbuks, I do not see how it has a place in any serious inquiry into human experience.But “neither inside nor outside” is still alluring to me. There is a paradox in our experience of being separate, contained beings, and simultaneously being an element, afloat in a field of existence and life. A further investigation into this paradox could actually be an important contribution to our work and to the enablement of the fluid self. For self is a field function of awareness, and awareness has no form.