Map the states you shift between in an ordinary week
List the distinct versions of yourself that show up in different settings, and what each is good at.
Por que funciona
In the Watkins model, ordinary personality is a family of ego states, and at a given time one of them can become executive, meaning in charge. Emmerson's handbook gives a whole section to gaining personal awareness of your states, including ego state mapping, and names learning your states as one of the three goals of the therapy, so they can be used well: open to feeling at one time, assertive at another. A state you have never noticed as a state feels simply like "me"; seeing several side by side makes it possible to notice which one is in charge and whether it suits the moment.
Como fazer
- Pick four or five settings from your week: work, a family visit, time with close friends, being alone, a disagreement.
- For each, write how you tend to feel, think and sound there, and roughly how old you feel.
- Give each version a plain descriptive name (the organiser, the quiet one at family dinners, the joker).
- Next to each, note one thing that state is good at and one situation where it tends to take over when it does not fit.
Evidência
The idea that a person moves between several states across situations is the base of the Watkins theory (H. Watkins describes a "family of self" within one person). Emmerson's handbook includes ego state mapping and personal awareness of states as part of the method. The steps here are a simplified self-applied version, not the book's exact procedure, and no study has tested mapping on its own; a 2013 review in the field notes that, until recently, the method's standards of care rested mainly on phenomenological studies. (anecdotal)
This solo version is a reflection exercise. It works with the surface states you can already observe, not the deeper states the therapy reaches under hypnosis.
Fontes
- Watkins, J. G., & Watkins, H. H. (1997). Ego States: Theory and Therapy. W. W. Norton.
- Emmerson, G. (2007). Ego State Therapy (first published 2003). Crown House Publishing.
- Watkins, H. H. (1993). Ego-state therapy: An overview. American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis, 35(4), 232-240.
- Hageman, J. H., & Frederick, C. (2013). Phenomenological and evidence based research in ego state therapy: Recognized and unrecognized successes and future directions. American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis, 56(1), 66-85.
Erro comum
Treating the states as fixed labels or as separate people. In this model they are patterns within one person that shift with the situation, and the point of a map is to notice them, not to box yourself in.
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Mais práticas para Ego State Therapy: The Different Selves You Shift Between
- Hear "part of me" as two states that disagree
When you catch yourself saying "part of me wants to", name both states and what each one wants.
- Notice what cues a younger, older-feeling state
Track the situations that bring forward a state whose reaction feels much older than the moment, without trying to dig into it alone.
- Give two disagreeing states a chair each
Let each of two conflicting states speak from its own seat, so they can hear each other.
- Write letters between two of your states
Let one state write to another, then let the other write back.
- Negotiate a role for each state instead of silencing one
Look for an arrangement in which each conflicting state has a place, at the right time.
Conceitos relacionados
- Trabalho de Sombra
Encontrando as partes de si mesmo que você tem ignorado
- Sistema de Família Interna (IFS), na Prática
O modelo de partes, os mecanismos por trás dele e uma leitura honesta de uma base de evidência emergente
- Voice Dialogue: Meeting the Selves That Run Your Life
Hearing the pusher, the pleaser and the critic in their own voices, so they stop running you unnoticed
- Transactional Analysis: The Parent, Adult and Child in Every Conversation
Hearing which part of you is talking, which part of them is answering, and why some conversations always end the same way