The goals of the experience – Educational Gestalt Training Program, first of all, are orientated towards the specifics of the Gestalt theory and Gestalt therapy, however it also include other psychological theories with their specifics. The members of the training groups are motivated and supported through a “personal experience” or more exactly, they are in the position to go through their personal process of growth and development through the Gestalt theory. Through the individual experience, students are learning the basic Gestalt topics (contact, contact boundaries, awareness, horizontal relationship, dialog, phenomenology, organism self-regulation) they acknowledge and understand their own psychological and social field of living and the way they are functioning in that same field.
The first phase – basic module, is a phase where the group of students is not yet homogenized. The group is building and developing the group culture; they build trust between each other and in the relation with the trainer; they develop group psychodynamics; they set personal group rules; they are learning the meaning of the “round”; they become fearless to talk about themselves in front of the group; they have individual work where they are sharing their own experience with others; they are learning how to give and receive “feedback”, how to respect and accept the differences of each member of the group; and they develop deep understanding of the horizontal relationship and the dialogue. Very important in this period is that all of the members in the group should experience and understand the moral, ethical and human component of their future profession – Gestalt therapist. This process of learning is facilitated by creative techniques of experimentation, spontaneity, dialogue, and support from the Gestalt trainer for whole group and for every student separately. In this phase, students are introduced with the Gestalt theory by lecturing, reading, and researching the Gestalt literature. The students are supported to try, experiment, follow and read about Gestalt psychotherapy since it is crucial for the entrance into the second phase of the education.
The second phase – advanced module gives priority to the “individual work on self” as well, therefore students are into the role of a therapist, they work with their colleagues, they use many Gestalt techniques and creative approaches, and they are learning the therapeutic process by talking and discussing about it after each individual work. Furthermore, they are supervised for their therapeutic works with real clients, they learn how to make a case study, they receive support from the group in order to develop their own personal style of working, they are training the role of a group leader, and they implement the Gestalt theory into Gestalt diagnostics. The most important thing in this phase is that each student should learn and experience the process of developing and building relation between the therapist and the client.