NOTES FROM THE DIRECTOR
Join Our Community Play
Christine LaCerva, Director
Social Therapy Group
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The Brooklyn Social Therapy Group begins the new year with an exciting project -- the creation of a community play exploring the question, "Does the Community Need Therapy?" -- and everyone's invited to participate!
The play project grows out of a year-long conversation with people throughout Brooklyn who, when surveyed, told us emphatically that they believe emotional development is vital if our communities are to grow in the face of the social and economic complexities facing New Yorkers every day.
Jeff Fader, a community-theater playwright, director and actor for over 20 years, came to our public workshop called "Does The Community Need Therapy?" a few months ago. After the workshop, he called me to say he wanted to write a play by the same title to further the dialogue.
Jeff's works have been performed at Goddard Riverside Community Center, the West 87th Street Players, and World Theater Day, to name a few. He will be working with the Social Therapy Group on the challenging issues that participants in the workshop began to explore: What is community? Is it ideological, is it all inclusive? How would a community be in therapy? What is a community of communities? How do you build it?
The play will be improvisational with some structure -- with plenty of room for building community by participants from Brooklyn and all over town (anyone who attends will be considered an honorary Brooklynite and is more than welcome!).
Interested? Join us and be a part of it? Please come to our first meeting/rehearsal on Saturday, January 30 at 10am - noon at our office, 106 South Oxford Street in Fort Greene, Brooklyn. For further information or to RSVP please call Ryan Freeman at 718-797-3220 ext. 328 or email him at rfreeman@socialtherapygroup.com. |
How Can I Develop?
Ask Dr. Rafael Mendez, Social Therapist!
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Why might I have the tendency to present one version of myself to the outside world and hide a lot of my true self, even from the people that are closest to me? And how do I work towards overcoming this? -- Social Therapy Group client in Brooklyn
Through culture, we learn to use words and phrases that we believe we understand, yet we rarely take a good hard look at what we mean by them. What do you think you mean by your "true self"? The notion of "true selves" and "false selves" is a common, compelling beliefs. However, there are other ways of exploring your question that may be more helpful.
Developmentally speaking, we all have a repertoire of life performances. How we perform at work with colleagues is very different from how we perform with our closest friends, which may be entirely different from how one performs at home alone. No performance is our "true self." Rather than trying to be "true" to your "self," it might be emotionally growthful, gratifying and challenging if you worked on not hiding, which in our view means creating new performances that bring you closer to others. After all, you are what you create.
I'm 30 years old and still struggling to get my life together. I've had to move back in and live with my mother, which feels embarrassing. How can I date and meet people when I'm struggling and don't have my life together? How can I overcome people's judgments about that? What do I tell a girl when she asks? -- reader, The Community Therapist.
While life is full of challenges and setbacks -- and living with your mother might be considered one of those -- it seems to me that the judgments that you need to overcome are your own. If you are less judgmental of yourself, the judgments of others won't matter as much. Radically accepting who you are is fundamental not only to "getting your life together," but living it more fully. What you might tell a women you like and want to be close to is that you are living with your mother (for now) AND working on developing your life for the long run. In other words, be honest -- it will support your relationships, your emotional development and your life as lived.
In February we will publish our Valentine's Day issue. If you have questions about love and relationships that you would like to ask a social therapist, we invite you to submit your questions to The Community Therapist. The deadline for submitting questions is January 31. |
Performing Health
by Rose Roby
The Brooklyn Social Therapy Group will be sponsoring our next Wellness Day on Saturday, March 27, 2010. Here's what one participant had to say about our last Wellness Day.
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The Brooklyn Social Therapy Group sponsored a Wellness Day led by Dr. Hugh Polk, Ann Green and Christine LaCerva. I decided to attend because I have suffered, often in shame and silence, from health problems for many years.
Almost two years ago I was diagnosed with hyperthyroidism. I had a mixed response to the diagnosis. While it was frightening to have an illness where your thyroid and immune system are always at odds with each other, I was also glad to have a diagnosis.
For years, I've had terrible stomach problems that doctors always attributed to stress. In other words, my stomach was fine, it was my head that was messed up. I wanted to believe that the diagnosis of hyperthyroidism would render it nothing more than a problem in need of fixing. I would take medicine. But our bodies, whether they are healthy or sick, are not simple problems that can be "fixed" using medicine alone. If I was going to adjust to a life where my thyroid wasn't going to function properly, I needed an entirely different philosophical approach to my health.
Tomoyo Kawano, a movement therapist, led the group in motion and dancing exercises. She helped me socialize my shaking (a thyroid symptom) by asking the whole group to shake with me. Rather than make me feel self-conscious, this made me feel less alone and less freakish. I will always be grateful to Tomoyo and the group for being so giving to me.
We then moved on to the "Ask the Doctor" session which gave us the opportunity to discuss our illnesses with Dr. Joan Fleischman and to get her perspective free of the oppressive roles and rules that so often hamper doctor-patient relationships.
We concluded the day talking with Dr. Polk and Ann Green about emotional health and its impact on our physical health. This was a very moving session. The group challenged the assumption that our emotional responses to things like pain and aging were somehow "universal." I opened up about my fear that my health problems rendered me a weak person and that I needed to hide them in order to be perceived as strong. I still struggle with this, but I know I've felt less vulnerable about my health now that I've given up my "ownership" of it and let it be part of a collective building activity.
I found the Wellness Day a developmentally good time. I'd recommend this workshop to anybody who is trying to improve their physical and emotional health. |
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Brooklyn Residents Surveyed:
Does the Community Need Therapy?
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Brooklyn Social Therapy Group therapists surveyed Brooklyn residents about the mental health of their communities asking, "Does the community need therapy?" Their answer? A resounding YES!
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Dr. Hugh Polk (R) with two Brooklyn residents at the Brooklyn Flea on Lafayette Street.
Ann Green, (L) speaking with a
Fort Greene resident, also at the
Brooklyn Flea.
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Call For Proposals
Performing
the World 2010
Can Performance Change the World?
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The East Side Institute for Group and Short Term Psychotherapy and the All Stars Project, Inc. sponsor the sixth Performing the World conference to be held in New York City from Thursday, September 30 through Sunday, October 3, 2010. The theme of this year's conference is: "Can Performance Change the World?"
The vision for Performing the World 2010 is as a three-day "performance of conversation" with people from all over the world -- scholars and researchers; teachers, therapists, social workers and community organizers; doctors and other health workers; theatre and other performance artists; union activists and business leaders; economists and political activists -- on the subject of performance and the transformation of the individual, the community, and the world.
Conference organizers are asking performance activists and scholars to reflect on and address the political aspects of their performance work; at the same time, they invite social-change activists to reflect on and address the performance aspects of their political activities. They are looking for proposals -- for panels, workshops, performances, demonstrations, installations, etc. -- that address this overarching question.
For more information contact Madelyn Chapman at mchapman@eastsideinstitute.org or 212-941-9400, ext 385. To submit a proposal, click here. Proposals are due by March 1, 2010. |
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