Making sense of madness and the psychotherapy of madness from a person-centred, process-relational perspective

‘Scientists attempt to interconnect the data in a coherent way, free of internal contradictions. The resulting representation is known as a scientific model’ (Capra & Luisi, 2014). To this point, those who seek to... [ view full abstract ]

‘Scientists attempt to interconnect the data in a coherent way, free of internal contradictions. The resulting representation is known as a scientific model’ (Capra & Luisi, 2014). To this point, those who seek to comprehend the data of madness and the data of the psychotherapy of madness have failed to develop such a model. Significant incoherence is the order the day.

In tune with Capra, I maintain that a fundamental reason why such incoherence is the case is because our thinking is too rooted in the dualistic, bifurcatory worldview of Descartes and Newton. There is, though, in process of emergence ‘a new vision of reality based on awareness of the essential interrelatedness and interdependence of all phenomena--physical, biological, social, and cultural’, one that ‘transcends current disciplinary and conceptual boundaries and will be pursued by new institutions’ (Capra, 1982).
Various terms are employed to identify this new vision: Capra prefers holistic or systemic, while I favour process-relational or organismic--terms used to describe the philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead who has done much to specify the nature of this new vision.
My claim is that adoption of a process-relational philosophical perspective will pave the way to a coherent understanding of the nature of madness and of the psychotherapy of madness, involving as they do ‘physical, biological, social, and cultural’ phenomena.
In my workshop, through bodily movement, physical interaction and role play, PowerPoint presentation and discussion, I explicate key process-relational concepts and their use in making sense of the phenomena of madness and the psychotherapy of madness relative to clinical work of Person-Centred psychotherapist Garry Prouty, founder of ‘Pre-Therapy’.