A Population of Selves

In this important book, Erving Polster - coauthor of the landmark work "Gestalt Therapy Integrated" - greatly expands the therapeutic utility of the concept of self. A Population of Selves offers therapists new ways of thinking about the self, as well as specific procedures to help patients realize a powerful and healthy sense of self: a goal at the very heart of the therapeutic process. In an innovative expansion of therapeutic theory, Polster shows how the human reflex to summarize and animate experiences serves as a natural springboard for the formation of selves. He enlarges the therapeutic aim of synthesizing alienated aspects of a person by offering a construct of heterogeneous characters within, each with its own place and voice. Every person is host to a population of selves: the infantile, the cunning, the rebellious, the tender. Using case examples from his own therapeutic practice, Polster illustrates eight major pathways for therapists to elicit new selves and to help their