Practicising psychotherapyemploying Gregory Batesons

epistemological modelsGiovanni Madonna

Istituto Italiano di Psicoterapia Relazionale, Naples, Italy

Abstract

Purpose The task is to report what with more details was exposed in one of the authors recentlypublished works, and consist in trying to develop a new approach to psychotherapy.

Design/methodology/approach The method of this research is to employ Gregory Batesonsepistemological models to acquire new ideas to think and practise psychotherapy.

Findings In the course of the work it was found that, in a Batesonian perspective, psychotherapycan be considered, at the same time, ethical and aesthetic: ethical because one type of the therapistsaction is founded on a conscious purpose; aesthetic because another type of the therapists action isspontaneous.

Research limitations/implications The practical implication of these reflections consist in theuse of the Batesonian method of double description in psychotherapy.

Originality/value The original value of the paper is that the ethical nature of Batesonianpsychotherapy imposes two different types of responsibility on the therapist: the first concerns theactions he takes based on the extrovert purpose and the second concerns his actions with regard tothe introvert purpose, which creates the conditions for the flow of spontaneous action.

Keywords Psychology, Cybernetics

Paper type Conceptual paper

As a psychotherapist and as a longstanding, profound admirer of Gregory Bateson,I have always wanted to have a psychotherapeutic model to refer to which can, withoutthe shadow of a doubt, be defined as Batesonian. Unfortunately, Bateson neverproduced such a model, or, to be more precise, he never intentionally formalised such amodel. Notwithstanding this fact, in the world of psychotherapy those who adhere tothe systemic-relational approach both in theory and in practice universallyrecognise Bateson as one of the founding fathers of this approach. Nevertheless, theenormous potential of the theoretical contribution made by Bateson has remained inlarge part unexploited. This contribution has either been considered as constitutingonly a vague reference point because it is too abstract and not specific butgeneric or it has been rendered banal by those practitioners who declared they wereemploying the Batesonian method but in actual fact were only employing a smallnumber of Batesons ideas, and, moreover, failed to link them to the framework ofBatesons thought. This is a situation which I have always judged to be an enormouswaste, an excellent opportunity thrown away. This is the stimulus which prompted mydecision a few years ago to devote my work to the difficult enterprise of elaborating aBatesonian model of psychotherapy. I have been supported in this project by the hopeof contributing to the task of making Gregory Batesons thought available topsychotherapy without sacrificing its complexity and its elegance. Naturally, I havenot tried to apply Batesons ideas to psychotherapy, despite the fact that Bateson did

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in fact practise psychotherapy occasionally and of course, had his own ideas on thematter. The task consisted in trying to acquire new ideas from the study of Batesonswork in order to help develop a new approach. A full report of the results of thisattempt at accomplishing this operation and of thereby laying the foundations for thedevelopment of a Batesonian model of psychotherapy may be found in one of myrecently published works (Madonna, 2003) which is founded on Batesons thought andwhich, in one sense, proposes a development of that thought.

The most significant fact about this systemic-relational approach to psychotherapyrealised through Gregory Batesons thought is that it is indeed fully and profoundlysystemic-relational in nature. In a Batesonian perspective, psychotherapy may beconsidered as being concurrently ethical and aesthetic: it is ethical because one type ofthe therapists action is founded on a conscious purpose; it is aesthetic because anothertype of the therapists action is spontaneous. The term spontaneous as used heredoes not refer to an instinctive action, one which is a priori with respect to anylearning, treatment, exercise or discipline, as is, instead, an action such as breathing.It refers, rather, to an educated or trained action, one which is subsequent tolearning, treatment, exercise and discipline, all of which may be lengthy processes.In other words, it refers to an action which derives from the therapists work which isbased on a conscious purpose which is of its very nature introverted namely actionnot aimed at bringing about a change in the external world but on the desire to bringabout change in oneself.

The former type of action is subjected to the primacy of the consciousness whichchecks if and to what degree the goal has been achieved, or if the realisation of the goalis near and how far away one is from its realisation. As stated previously, the actioninvolved is a goal-oriented one. As Bateson (1979, p. 207) has taught us, when humanbeings divide the universe of mental processes up into parts, then this latter type ofaction emerges: Purpose appears as the universe is dissected. This enables attentionto be focussed on the initial stages of a piece of the process, and, by adopting a linearstandpoint aided by the internal structure of the linguistic sequences, consider theseinitial stages as constituting the origin, the cause of a given event which follows.Bateson (1972, p. 445) defines the separate parts of the universe of mental processes asarcs of circuits. Imagine a circle, whose start and end points are unknown, bydefinition. Imagine that you divide it into sections, that you isolate an arc from thecomplete circuit, a relatively small part. That is what consciousness does: it isolates theparts of a whole in which potentially any part might be beginning and end.Consciousness intervenes on an arc of circuit to organise action and direct it to a goal; itmight not, however, concurrently perform the act of subdividing, that is, with regard toour presuppositions. Consequently, we may consciously have excellent or poor goalswithout having the slightest inkling as to how we decided on those goals. The fact thatthe operation carried out by consciousness in considering the beginning of an arc of acircuit as the cause of the event following it is possible naturally also implies that ouractions may be the cause of a subsequent event: suffice it to consider the arc of acircuit which has such an action as its beginning; it also implies that an action maytherefore be adopted to achieve a certain goal, which is appropriately situated at theend of the arc of the circuit in question. Since, goal-oriented action is related to an arc ofthe circuit, to a separate piece of the world of mental processing, it too must necessarilybe discontinuous, that is, discrete. An action of this type is geared to achieving a result

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which does not yet exist in the present state of affairs. It is therefore orientated to thefuture. It can be narrated (described) because it may be made the object of a descriptionby the agent himself or by an external observer, who therefore make of it the territoryof one of their maps[1]. Goal-oriented action can, moreover, be narrated (described)employing the canons of ethics, which, on the basis of classificatory thought, includethem in (or exclude them from) the categories of good and evil, right and wrong, correctand incorrect, useful and useless; and this may take place both with respect to the past(for example, by means of an evaluation), and with respect to the future (for instance,by means of a plan).

An action of the second type is not subjected to the primacy of consciousness. It canreceive information concerning the state of its workings. Consciousness, however, doesnot preside over the processing of thought concerning action and the concreterealisation of such action. Quite the contrary. The intervention of consciousness at thisstage would constitute an insurmountable obstacle to the very existence of action.This type of action abhors hesitation, for hesitancy would break it up, violating its verynature, for such action is continuous. It exists only while it is being carried out, secondby second, and it disappears the instant that one tries to place it in the past or in thefuture. It is therefore oriented exclusively to the present. It narrates itself. We mightstate that like a living organism, it is self-descriptive. Any attempt to narrate(describe) this type of action or to thereby render it the territory of a map in order tomake of it, for example, an object to be evaluated or planned, instantly locates it outsidethe present, (that is, it places such action in the past or in the future), turning it intosomething else. It cannot be narrated according to the canons of ethics, for since thelatter privileges an account of what is right, this would include it in (or exclude it from)positive and negative categories. This type of action is not one that is done but one thatis. It can be perceived by those involved, at the moment of their involvement; that is,the relationship with others and with the environment makes the action emerge. It maytherefore be perceived according to aesthetic modalities., in the sense that suchmodalities are founded on sensibility: By aesthetic, I mean responsive to the patternwhich connects (Bateson, 1979, p. 8).

The training of a psychotherapist should attribute great importance to both types ofactions and to the knowledge associated with each type: knowledge achieved throughconsciousness and knowledge achieved through sensibility. This latter form ofknowledge is usually given scant attention and often even considered a hindrance.Notwithstanding this fact, human beings have constant recourse to the art ofknowing the world and acting in it on the basis of their own sensibility, that is to theirinternal ecology of ideas. As Bateson (1991, p. 256) himself states:

If it be true that certain people are specially gifted in the art of acting upon complex systemswith homeostatic or ecological characteristics, and that these people do not operate byspelling out the interaction of all relevant variables, then these people must use some innerecology of ideas as an analogic model. (By ideas I mean thoughts, premises, affects,perceptions of self, etc.) But if this skill is, in some sense, really an art then it is possible thatthe inner ecology of ideas is a close synonym of what might also be called aestheticsensibility.

From the standpoint of complexity, adopting a Batesonian method in psychotherapyenables the therapist to exploit the different types of thought/action to the full.The method proposed by Bateson (1979, p. 86) of a double description or of a double or

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multiple confrontation is a very general method which consists in combininginformation of different sorts or from different sources [so as to obtain] somethingmore than addition. Adopting the method of a double description in psychotherapy,and in particular in psychotherapeutic diagnosis means one is combining the twomodes of knowledge and thereby achieving a deeper understanding of the clinicalsituation one is involved in. In the clinical domain, the method of a double descriptionis important not only with regard to making a diagnosis but also with regard totherapeutic treatment. The habit of identifying and proposing double or multipledescription in relation to segmentation and to the reading of the sequence of events is,in actual fact, another and important aspect of the deployment of this method.

With regard to the two types of action and the two modes of knowing considered in this paper, the ethical nature of Batesonian psychotherapy imposes twodifferent types of responsibility on the therapist: the first concerns the actions he takesbased on the extrovert purpose and the second concerns his actions with regard to theintrovert purpose, which creates the conditions for the flow of spontaneous action.Thus, with regard to the action based on the extrovert purpose, the psychotherapisthas the responsibility to hesitate, while with regard to spontaneous action based onthe introvert purpose, he has the responsibility to work in such a way as to becomecapable of not hesitating. In the first type of action hesitation is necessary in order toeliminate or reduce the risks of damaging the object the action is directed at, whereasin the second type of action not hesitating is necessary to avoid damaging the actionitself, or rather, to avoid endangering the very existence of the action itself sincehesitation would render that action impossible.

Note

1. The distinction between map and territory is dear to Gregory Bateson and refers to thelogical difference between the description and the object described. This distinction goesback to Korzybski (1941).

References

Bateson, G. (1972), Steps to an Ecology of Mind, Ballantine, New York, NY, first issue.

Bateson, G. (1979), Mind and Nature. A Necessary Unity, E.P. Dutton, New York, NY, first issue.

Bateson, G. (1991) in Donaldson, R.E. (Ed.), A Sacred Unity. Further Steps to an Ecology of Mind,HarperCollins, New York, NY, first issue.

Korzybski, A. (1941), Science and Sanity, Science P., New York, NY.

Madonna, G. (2003), La psicoterapia attraverso Bateson, Bollati Boringhieri, Torino.

Further reading

Bateson, G. and Bateson, M.C. (1988), Angels Fear. Towards an Epistemology of the Sacred,Bantam, New York, NY, first issue.

Corresponding authorGiovanni Madonna can be contacted at: giovanni.madonna@fastwebnet.it

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