First Posted on July 24, 2010 by alisonball

As a social worker in the 70′s I knew nothing about psychotherapy. The days when Freud might have been taught on social work courses had already gone. At Monash University in the late 70′s we were into the “Generic model of social work practice”… the “common base” of social work practice, whether we ended up working in organizations, the community or in some sort of “case-work” or counselling position. With this and with some learning in family therapy soon after graduation, I got an introduction to dynamic systems theory. That has been most helpful when it comes to thinking about how we got to be who we are and how and why we act the way we do in various situations. It is useful in thinking about our own internal psychic “dynamic system” which was largely formed by our experience in and with our family of origin – the family system in which we were raised – that was our only known world as infants. And it is useful for thinking about the influence of the community, organization or  society that we live or work in now- influences that either provide another “family” in which our learned patterns of behaviour are repeated- for better or worse- or that do in fact help us to have different experiences so we can grow and develop. My small knowledge of that theory continues to give intriguing insights and has helped, not only in my clinical work but also in dealing with the organizations with which I have been involved. Recently I again had cause to want to review my knowledge of dynamic systems theory, so read a great paper by Stephen Seligman. This was from Psychoanalytic Dialogues, 15 (2):285-319, 2005. It was called “Dynamic Systems Theories as a Metaframework for Psychoanalysis”. I liked many of Seligman’s concepts. He talks of “attractor states” that “are overall patterns that organize a system under particular conditions.” And he goes on to say that “These patterns may shift, but they do not shift easily. Once an attractor pattern is in place, a fair amount of energy is required to disrupt and reorganize the situation.” I think, people often come to see a psychotherapist when, for some reason, they have decided that the rigidity of their own internal operating system needs disruption so they can change; or, they come to find a safe place when for some reason, life has already severely disrupted their internal operating system.  Psychotherapy is a balancing act between allowing and/or tolerating much turbulence while maintaining a safe enough holding place for change to happen.