Expressive therapies at Castlewood- Laura Wood
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Transcript of Expressive therapies at Castlewood- Laura Wood
EXPRESSIVE THERAPIES AT CASTLEWOOD TREATMENT
CENTER
Laura Wood, MA, RDT, PLPC, CCLS
“The body remembers what the mind forgets’”-
Moreno
WHAT ARE EXPRESSIVE/CREATIVE ARTS THERAPIES?
Drama Therapy
Dance/Movement Therapy
Art Therapy
Music Therapy
Poetry Therapy
WHAT IS DRAMA THERAPY?
Drama therapy is active and experiential. This
approach can provide the context for participants to
tell their stories, set goals and solve problems,
express feelings, or achieve catharsis. Through
drama, the depth and breadth of inner experience
can be actively explored and interpersonal
relationship skills can be enhanced. Participants can
expand their repertoire of dramatic roles to find that
their own life roles have been strengthened.
(www.nadt.org)
“Reparative ritual activity has a magical, non-
rational quality as, for example, a child plays out
his fears through decapitating a doll, and a Vogul
woman plays out her sadness over losing her
husband by embracing a doll. Their actions do not
affect the empirical world of cause and effect but
rather the subjective world of feeling…The magic
of the drama is realized at the subjective level of
feeling. The players achieve a certain satisfaction
by controlling a reality which is literally beyond
their control.”
-Landy, 1994
IMPROVISATION
“The spontaneous individual, is the most liberated.
He chooses to behave as he does. He is aware of the
social context before him, but he is able to risk the
possible disapproval of others in presenting an
authentic role of him self” –Landy, 1994
IMPROV AT CASTLEWOOD
Principals of Improv: 1) Yes and…2) No apologizing
3) No red lights 4) everyone participates
Mental flexibility, social anxiety, spontaneity, fear of
judgment, control, playfulness, pleasure, laughter therapy.
Warm-up, Action, Closing game, Process
What happens in the microcosm of improv becomes the
trailhead for the macrocosm in life.
ATTACHMENT/EXPRESSIVE
Expressive becomes a way to look at complex attachment
concepts and understand them in an embodied way
Becomes a bridge to creating cohesive narrative
Creates a container to explore the complex feelings that
arise from relationship
Provides an opportunity of mastery and moving towards
earned secure attachment embodied
INDIVIDUAL EXPRESSIVE WORK
Masks and embodiment
Creating a self revelatory performance
Playing different parts of ones self, opportunity for
protective parts to get airtime
Sand tray
Empty chair
“Catharsis in drama therapy does not need to be a
large outburst of feeling, a gushing forth of tears or
a paroxysm of laughter. It is often a modest reaction,
a gentle moment of recognition. Catharsis implies
the ability to recognize contradictions, to see how
conflicting aspects of ones psychic or social life, of
ones thinking, speaking, or feeling can exist
simultaneously.” -Landy, 1994
GROUP EXPRESSIVE
Empty chair work
Play your eating disorder
Play a part of you, group as compassion curiosity panel
Family Sculpt
Parts at the….(dinner table, family gathering, etc)
Re-visit a scene from the past
Family Week Expressive Work
QUALITATIVE RESEARCH AT CASTLEWOOD ON EXPRESSIVE
FORMATS
“ I think emotions are more sometimes more free flowing during expressive
because I think it lets people guards down a little bit and I don’t think they feel as
protective of their emotions and umm, I don’t know there is just something about
seeing things and hearing exact phrases that maybe abusers would say or
perpetrator would say or just things that have made impacts on people’s lives that
makes it so much more real rather than talking about it from a third person
stance, it really just puts you in the scene and you’re able to feel what the other
person felt or was feeling and it’s like being there with them so that can be kind
of …can be…just really eye opening and sometimes that is what they have
experienced is a lot and to do that is more than to just talk about it in third
person.”
“and I think what makes the best expressives are clarity and
like, pin point focus, blow up something like into where they can
examine it deeper.”
“ if a person’s experience is like a tapestry, doing an expressive
is like putting a spotlight on a piece of tapestry that you couldn’t
see before and that the pieces come together and that is like an
unfolding and illuminating is the same, I would use that same
metaphor, like thru expressive umm it’s possible to see things
that were not visible before.”
“I got information out of that expressive that I
couldn’t have gotten just out of group or individual
therapy. And it really allowed me to get closure from
an incident that happened a while ago but that
played a big role not only in my eating disorder but
in my life and I was able to glean out of it things that
I hadn’t even thought of.”
REFERENCES
Landy, R.J. (1994). Drama therapy: concepts, theories and practices.
Springfield: Charles C. Thomas Publishers.
May, R. (1975). The courage to create. New York: Norton & Company.
Moreno, J.L. (1980). The theater of spontaneity. New York: Beacon.
Van Der Kolk, B.A. (1996). Traumatic Stress: The effects of overwhelming
experience on mind, body and society. New York: Guilford Press.
Wiener, D. (1999). Beyond talk therapy: using movement and expressive
techniques in clinical practice. Washington, DC. American Psychological
Associates.