The Gestalt Therapy Institute of Los Angeles (GTILA) is a community of Gestalt therapists which was established in 1969 by Frederick S. Perls, M.D., James Simkin, Ph.D. and others for the purposes of promoting the development, application and competent practice of Gestalt Therapy. For over 30 years, GTILA also provided an ongoing "hands on" Gestalt therapy training program in Los Angeles for mental health professionals.
GTILA now functions as a membership organization whose mission is to advance and promote the exchange of information and expertise regarding the field of Gestalt therapy among its members, with the professional community, and with the community at large.
From Awareness, Dialogue, and Process, preface to the German edition, by Gary Yontef:
"Relational Gestalt Therapy considers the therapeutic relationship crucial and focuses on the causes of disruptions in the relationship and on the effects of these disruptions.
There has been an increasing recognition of the power of the relational aspects of therapeutic work in promoting growth, healing severe disturbances, but also for inhibiting growth and even harming patients. While contact is the basic unit of relationship, i.e., contacting establishes relationship, the relationship also shapes contact. The impact on the patient of the therapist's attitude, behavior, and meta-messages is just now beginning to get the attention it needs. There is now an established Gestalt therapy shame literature that calls attention to iatrogenic triggering and enhancement of shame in psychotherapy and in training.
Relational Gestalt therapy has moved to an attitude that includes more support, more emphasis on kindness and compassion in therapy, and that combines sustained empathic inquiry with crisp, clear, and relevant awareness focusing. It has moved beyond the confrontation, catharsis, and drama emphasis of the 1960's and 1970's. It has moved beyond the more camouflaged shaming by therapists who are insensitive to their shame-triggering attitudes and behaviors.
In Gestalt therapy theory the essential nature of self is relational. The self is defined as the interaction of person and environment; self is the "system of contacts necessary for adjustment in the difficult field...Self ...is not itself isolated from the environment; ...it belongs to both, environment and organism (Perls, Hefferline, and Goodman, p. 151)."
Christine Campbell
Richard Gadue
Sharon Law
Jeffrey Marsh
Amanda Rowan
Jan Ruckert
Michelle Seely Lang
Larry Starr Karlin
President: Christine Campbell
Treasurer: Sharon Law
Secretary: Richard Gadue