Psychodrama Basics

30:11

Psychodrama Basics

by Dr. Tian Dayton

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talks

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Meditation

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Everyone

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Psychodrama is an embodied method of psychotherapy that brings thoughts, feelings, relationships, and life experiences into action. Rather than talking about ourselves from a distance, we can step into a role, change perspective, encounter another part of ourselves, or experience a relationship in a new way. In this introduction, Tian Dayton PhD, TEP explores the foundations of psychodrama, sociometry, and group therapy, including spontaneity, creativity, role, relationship, and the power of the group. She also introduces trauma-informed role work, where pacing, choice, safety, and nervous-system regulation are essential to helping people have new experiences without becoming overwhelmed.

Parts Dialogue Practice Inner Child Healing Trauma Informed Creativity Trauma Sensitive

Meet your Teacher

Dr. Tian Dayton

New York, NY, USA

Meet your Teacher

Dr. Tian Dayton

New York, NY, USA

Transcript

Raynaud at At his core was a social scientist. He was somebody who wanted to change the world. And he created a three-pronged system, Psychodrama, Sociometry, And group psychotherapy. Moreno's known as the father of group therapy. Which I think is a very interesting not known enough fact about him. He was the first person to treat people in groups. In a world of Freud. In a world where. It was thought that you had to be one-to-one in order to deliver therapy. This meant that he believed that in a group, Each person becomes a therapeutic agent of the other. Interesting thing for any group therapist to know about. I always think, As I am a group therapist, That people come to group to see each other. So I don't worry so much about their seeing me. As creating an atmosphere where they can bond. And you'll see in the things we do today. The things that, The vehicles I've created, Floor checks mainly. Are designed to get people to connect with each other and to heal each other. So that is, If that's all you take away today. I think it's worth the day. Psychodrama is a role-based method. That's your other takeaway for the day. Everything in psychodrama is embodying a role. Psychodrama itself allows us to embody a role from the past, Present, Or future. It's like, It's. It's like a video game in which you enter. You time travel as these avatars who enter different time zones. That's what psychodrama lets us do. We can move into the past and embody a scene from the past, We can move into the future and embody a wish for or a feared scene in the future, Or we can do scenes in the present. I think that's another thing that people don't fully understand about psychodrama, Is that at its core, It is all about learning how to use roles for healing. Embody roles. Personal roles, Intrapersonal roles. Kind of like IFS. Roles that are interior. Or interpersonal roles, Roles from what we call your social atom. Sociometry. Is here and now oriented. So psychodrama is the role-based method. That is past, Present, And future. Sociometry is present-oriented. And it is the group therapy, Group dynamic part of it. The merino's triadic system. Sociometry deals with the here and now. Dynamics within the group, Positive, Negative, Neutral. Questions so far. So I don't think we're being negative all the time. In and out of group. In and out of group. During group. During group. It's not a closed group. People- Every one group, Do you close the doors and keep them closed? Oh, Yeah. Yeah. Not everybody does. But I'm saying, You know. . . Right, It's a rolling admission. It's a rolling admission, Exactly. So, How does that figure in to what you're talking about? You know, It actually. . . I think psychodrama is great for that, And sociometry, Because Psychodrama, Don't worry about people being the protagonist. Because when I started, Which is now a long time ago. You know, 35 years ago. At least as a psychodramatist. Working in treatment centers. There is a very powerful emphasis on your piece of work. And a very powerful emphasis on catharsis of ab reaction. And there still is in some places. Don't worry about all that. Good psychodrama, We don't push for a catharsis necessarily, If there is one. That is good, That is part of the theoretical base of psychodrama. And we don't worry about everybody doing their piece of work. Because in a good group, Everybody's working all the time. You know all that, As group therapists. Sitting in the room for some people is more challenging than somebody else getting on stage and being a protagonist. So don't worry about pushing people to do work. You work in every role with psychodrama, Which means, As there is a rolling admission, Let people be where they are, Right? If they walk into the group and they're new and they see what's on stage and they go, I want to be the protagonist tonight, Say, Great, Be the protagonist. I mean, If you assess that that's appropriate. And. . . If they're in group for months and they just don't ever want to be the protagonist. But they can find other ways to be part of it. I don't mean that they're only glued to their chair, But I mean that they can play a role, That they can double sometimes. Let them We follow the lead of the protagonist in psychodrama. Sometimes with experiential therapy, There is a goal and there is an agenda. That is not psychodrama. Psychodrama, We follow the lead of the protagonist. And from a trauma perspective, This is the safest way to do it. Because if you really stay sensitive to where the protagonist is and not going farther than they are ready to go. They will present you with what they're ready to work on. Whereas if you push them, That is when I think you run the risk of retraumatization. I don't set up scenes. I don't see trauma as event-focused. I mean, It can be event-focused, But I would not set up an event scene. The psychorama can be too shocking. I mean, What are the issues of trauma? There's sexual abuse, Physical abuse. Say some others, Please. Neglect. That is hard to work with, But I want to come back to it. Abandonment. Yep, Similar. Anything else that would be a scene? Yeah, Family death. These are good examples. Verbal abuse. Yeah. That's a good one to bring up too. So here's how I work with that kind of thing. I don't set the scene up because it can put somebody into a shock. I might. It might reveal itself on a social item or a timeline. They're very useful user-friendly tools. You will like these. Um. . . If there is a. . . Someone in the event. With a charge, You might say, I often get people to choose themselves also. Who could play yourself in this scene? Did you say, One question is, What do you want to say to yourself? Yeah, The question is, Did I say what you want to say to yourself? Yes, I did. And that happens when there's a role of self in the situation. And I try to do that all the time, Because the self is at the center of every situation. And it's, Frankly, It's a safety. Because you can talk to yourself, You can reverse roles with yourself. And you can have an entire drama just doing that. And it's really, Really a useful drama. And you have the backdrop of the scene that's evocative. But you don't have to enter the scene. Um, So this is role-based, That's what we're talking about. We're talking embodying the role. And we're talking about then paying attention to what arises in the body. While enrolled. With others. I like to do psychoderma very clean and clear and in the moment and not give role players much latitude. Which you'll see. I don't even give role plays latitude to make stuff up. It's because people enter what we call in psychodrama a psychodramatic trance state. It's deep, It's vulnerable, And it vibrates. And if you let role players make things up, They might say, But mom, You never acted like you loved me. And then the role player playing mom will start making things up and saying, Well, I didn't really. And that is not useful to the protagonist. At that point, I just say reverse roles. Because all the information is in the protagonist's head. And then I'll have that role player cue. Now in the role of the protagonist. But mom, You never said, Acted like you loved me. And the protagonist will answer back as their mother. Does that make sense? If you let the role players start to make stuff up, How could they possibly know? That's another thing, Along with the emphasis on every act of catharsis, The piece of work, Is letting role players make things up, That I see in the. . . That I used to see in the addictions field. And I've tried really hard to. Change because that's when you walk out with weird stuff in your head. You know? You think, As it falls away and becomes the as in psychodrama, Becomes very real. So the protagonist is in a vulnerable state, Taking in everything that's happening. And we want to make sure what they take in, It's like being open in surgery. You want that. That environment to be infection-free and have as few foreign bodies enter that wound as possible. Also, One of the things that I've seen in groups, Too, Is this is a way people slide around not doing their group, Their own work. They step into an auxiliary role and that's their way of judging or taking someone else's inventory or whatever, And that's the thing to be nipping the bud super, Super fast. Yes. And it can be very harmful for the protagonist. No kidding. No kidding. Or the other one is in the role of double. In Psychodrome, Will we do something called doubling? Yes. I just have one about kind of how you would prepare, Because I work with families as well. I will answer the doubling question, By the way. I work with families as well. So like how you would prepare a family to be in a room. Yes, We talked about that. Yeah. I just want to be sure that we kind of touch on that, Like the psychoeducation part of it. Like before, How we would prepare them to be there and to experience what they're going to experience. If we decide to do this kind of modality with a family. I'm. . . Work with a lot of spontaneity and little preparation. And I'm just telling you that's my style. I don't think it's good or bad, But I try not to lose warm-up through too much talking. And. I think the last thing I want to do is put somebody in their head. And oftentimes somebody will find themselves in a role with me and sort of think, How did I get here? But, Uh. . . I don't want to set up fear in people's minds. By giving them so much information. So I might ask permission. You can use a timeline. You can use a floor check. You can use a social atom in this way. Asked to do a social add-on of the family as they experience it. Because everybody is living in a different family. That is a life-altering for a family. And then they can share it, And they can sculpt it. That's an interesting thing to do. You could invite if the family is there. Able to, You can invite them to double for each other. If the family is able to, You can invite them to reverse roles. Psychodrome, I talked to you about the history. It's developed in Vienna. By JL Moreno. Moreno in 1935 came to America. Psychodrama is a method of action. He felt that way. Americans are more action-oriented. He had his ideas for developing psychodrama by watching children. Play in the parks and gardens of Vienna. He saw that they play out their complexes, That they reverse roles with each other, That they take on the roles of the people they're frustrated with. I'll be the mommy and you be the baby, And why are you. . . And then they reverse roles. I'm the baby and you. . . So watching children play, He had the thought that adults really are very large children and maybe could benefit from this kind of role-based play. Thinking. He also worked with. You know, Vienna was a hotbed of creativity, Right? Everything there was exploding. Montessori worked with children that they thought were ineducable, And she taught them to read by making letters in the sand. Moreno worked with prostitutes in Vienna. Is one of his populations because everybody thought they can't be helped. See what you can do, Right? Well, That's not what Moreno found. And this was the birth of group therapy. He initially brought these women into the, A la Freud, He dragged eight couches into a room. Invited them all to lie down and share their fantasies. Because that is, After all, What Freud was doing. And he said, I soon realized their fantasies intermingled and there wasn't space for each one. It wasn't working. So the next time he gathered them, He brought cheers into the room. And they went from this position to this position and looked at each other. And that is the birth of group therapy, When we are looking at each other. And sharing experience, Strength, And hope. Exploring the sociometry, What is going on member to member within the group. Psycho, Back to psychodrama. There are five main elements in this rule-based method. The stage. This area we're standing on. I can't tell you how many different stages I've worked on over the years. Yucky ones, Nice ones, Ridiculous ones, Beautiful ones. Anything can be fine. This is the stage. Moreno is known for saying, This stage is enough. So respect the power of just putting yourself and the roles you encounter up on stage. So they can be seen and witnessed. Do less, Not more. Do less, Not more at every stage of your work. The stage also, We use space as part of psychodrama. Are they distant or close? Put them there. How are they on the stage? How are they standing? Where are they standing? Where are they in respect to each other? Where are you in relationship to them? All of this. We use as part of the therapy. And if you do it thoughtfully, You don't have to go much farther to create a therapeutic experience. That in itself is very, Very evocative. So that's the stage number one, Right? The director, The therapist. The protagonist, The person whose story we are doing. Auxiliary egos. Role players that the protagonist always chooses themselves. And. You know, Will you play my sister? Will you play my. . . Anger, Will you play my whatever? And then the people can say yes or no. So that's the auxiliary ego and the group, The audience. All of this is part of. The five basic elements of psychodrama. There are a few techniques in psychodrama. That are basic. There are several, But I'll tell you the ones I use the most that you will see throughout the day. One is doubling. Say Say Tian. Is playing a role, Right? Director might say. We're kind of stumbling, Right? Can you take a step behind yourself and double for what's going on inside of you that you're having trouble saying from this role, From the presenting role? Says, OK, What's doubling? It feels weird. And then the director might say, Just drop down into yourself. In the eye and tell us what's going on on the inside that's not being said from here. So then Tian might say, When I'm here talking to my mother, I hardly know what to say. Okay, Back to your chair, And then talk back as yourself. Or the group can double. The director might say, Tian, Are you. . . Open to some doubles from the group. And. I would say sure, Maybe. And then anybody from the group could spontaneously double. Roll reversal. The sine qua non of psychodrama, That without which you are not seeing true psychodrama. Role reversal is core to psychodrama. We internalize not just a role, We internalize the diet. I don't just internalize my mother, I internalize my relationship with my mother. It's much more useful. To a client to experience both sides of that role, Right? So if I'm TM playing that. I might say. Mom, You know. Why didn't you come to my something or another? And then the director might say, Reverse roles. So now it's. Tian's playing mom. Because Tian knows. What that relationship was about. So I play not a parody of mom, But mom. Well, I don't really remember what you're talking about. I know what you're talking about. Reverse rolls. I'm talking about, Do you see how it? The role acts as a stimulus for all that went on within the role. It's a very efficient way to do therapy. If you allow it to be. True. And not make things up. Because of the role itself. And you want to clean up the internalized relationship. That's what you want a new experience of. And there's a lot of talk these days about giving somebody a new experience. Moreno called that a reformed auxiliary. He didn't always use it, But whenever a protagonist wanted to experience a different kind of templated role, Say, Choose another father, Choose another mother who you wish you might have had, Or who you might have been able to have a different relationship with, And then do a role play with that. That's a very useful thing to remember when you do work. And I think there's an argument for including it. Much of the time. Any questions on this? So here's one example, Right? A different father or a father who. Has been transformed in some way. And then you talked earlier about the person having a conversation with themselves. From the outside role, From the mirror position. Right, You said, What do you want to say to yourself in this scene? What would be some other. . . What would be an example of how that would be corrective? First of all, From my point of view, It's all corrective. Okay. Just showing it as corrective. I think just experiencing it and moving through it is corrective. I see a reformed auxiliary ego as an extension of a corrective process that's already in play. Some auxiliaries just become nicer and the protagonist changes the way they're relating and it happens organically. Some choose a new role player. But it also might be corrective to just say, What do you want to say to yourself inside that social atom? I'm sorry to see you're so trapped. You know, Reverse roles. I feel trapped. So eventually that person might do a variety of things. They might say, Well, Stand up and talk to that system or why don't you take some steps out of that system and come out with me and we'll look at it together from out here. There would be a lot of ways. So could it be with the father, Just say they had an abuse, Verbally abusive father, And you. . . Play that out. To say, Well, What would you want your father to have said to you? Absolutely. Right? Exactly. And then role reverse that. Yes. And that might be with a new father. Choose a father you think you could have had a better rapport with. Psychodrama, In order to become a psychodramatist, You spend many years, Right? You have 780 hours, You have a five-hour test, You have two onsites. In order to become a trainer in psychodrama, You do that first. Another few hundred hours, Another five. . . Our test, Another two onsets, All of this kind of stuff. So when psychoderma started to become popular, Um. . . People were incorporating role-playing into their practices, As you are here to learn to do. You're not all planning on becoming psychodramatists and doing all this training. Here's where I come out on this, I humbly. Offer. Trauma is. . . With us since the 80s, Right? Before this, We weren't incorporating the idea of trauma into the mental health field. So we're still learning how best to do psychodrama with trauma. People are doing role play. Dick Schwartz incorporates role play into. IFFS. And he and I have talked about that and how to do that. Bessel does Al Pesso's role-play method. Al Pesso got it out of psychodrama. It's not necessarily psychodrama. Love that people use the word psychodrama because it points people to the psychodrama field and also the best opportunity for training and understanding what you're doing. My feeling is how the psychodrama field ought to position themselves, Me and us as psychodramatists. Is to train people to do the method in as simple a way as possible to break it down. So that you can incorporate it safely into your practices, So that you don't have to become a fully trained psychodramatist in order to do simple role plays. From two psychodramatists how to do a social atom and put it into action. She changed the name. She didn't use the word protagonist and she never used the word psychodrama. I think that's a disservice to the field of psychodrama. I appreciate that Bessel and Dick and others use the word psychodrama because it leads people back to our field. But Virginia called the protagonist a star. Saying everybody's a star of their own. But then nobody knows where to go for further training, Right? I was trained by Sharon Wegschreiter, Who Virginia trained. I worked with and for Sharon. For a few years before I ever heard the word psychodrama. And my husband found a pamphlet. I still don't know how I got this pamphlet. And he said, Tian, This is psychoandrama. That's what you do. You've got to check this out. And I said, Oh yeah, I had little children at the time. They're all in their mid forties now. I ignored it. A couple months later, Because I rarely went through my mail sufficiently, It rose up to the surface of the pile again. And he said, Tian, This is tomorrow. You should really check it out. And it's in New York. And my kids had play dates that day. That's why I found out about psychodrama. And when I went there, I was in heaven. These people were brilliant. They answered, Within a weekend, Every question I'd ever had. And I. Became a secretary. I mean, I followed Bob Sirocco and Zerka Moreno. They were my two primary trainers. And I learned from. Wonderful people how to do this method that I adore. I mean Bob trained with Moreno and Zyrka is Moreno's wife and co-developed psychodrama. So I know that I was trained in the classical method. I know how to do it straight up. Even psychodramatists now are being trained by trainers who trained by them. So it's getting watered down as it moves on. I personally want us to just learn the classical method and adapt it. I think that is the way to go for today. Which makes me want to read to you what I brought. Moreno is all about developing spontaneity and creativity. That is at the core of psychodrama. Spontaneity and creativity. If you understand that and if you work towards that. You will be doing, Making Moreno smile and Zyrka smile in heaven. And the reason we're meant to be spontaneous and creative is that he felt that was inversely proportional. Mental illness. That people with mental illnesses became rigid and spontaneity tend to bring forward health. Creativity, He feels, Is everybody's birthright and the energy we ought to be taking to our lives. This is a prophecy by the Hopi elders in 2000. It's titled, We Are The Ones We've Been Waiting For. You have been telling people that this is the 11th hour. Now you must go back and tell the people that this is the hour. And there are things to be considered. Where are you living? What are you doing? What are your relationships? Are you in right relation? Where is your water? Know your garden. It is time to speak your truth. Create your community. Be good to each other. And do not look outside yourself. For your leader. Then he clasped his hands together, Smiled, And said, This could be a good time. There is a river flowing now very fast. It is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid. They will try to hold on to the shore. They will feel they are being torn apart and will suffer greatly. Know the river has its destination. The elders say we must let go of the shore. Push off into the middle of the river. Keep our eyes open. And our heads above the clouds. The water. And I say, See who is there with you and celebrate. At this time in history. We are to take nothing personally. Least of all ourselves. For the moment that we do our spiritual growth and journey come to a halt. The time of the lone wolf is over. Gather yourselves. Banish the word struggle from your attitude and your vocabulary. All that we do now must be done in a sacred manner and in celebration. We are the ones we've been waiting for. That is so Moranian. Keep your, You know. Keep your eyes open and your head above water is all about spontaneity and living a conscious life. Zyrka Moreno felt and Moreno felt that we can change the world. One group at a time. So this is our sacred task. We're going to do it today, Together.