[CANCELED] Gestalt Therapy with Asian Americans: Guidelines & Special Considerations

Update 3/13/20: This workshop has been canceled by the organizers due to public health concerns. Please check back for updates when it is rescheduled.

*Please note: This workshop is for clinicians and mental health providers.

Join Sil Si-Wei Chen, LCSW-R, for a highly practical and engaging workshop that will supercharge you with knowledge and skills indispensable for providing quality therapy to your Asian-American clients. Through ample case examples and multimedia presentation, we will learn about important Asian values, worldview, and communication style that inform our Asian-American clients’ way of being and relating and help us re-conceptualize their presenting issues. We will also delve into specific, recurring therapeutic themes and discuss how to work with them in skillful, culturally-responsive ways to avoid potential pitfalls resulting from interventions informed by unexamined Gestalt concepts or individualistic values.

This workshop is intended for both Gestalt therapists and therapists of all other theoretical orientations. If you currently work with Asian Americans or are interested in expanding into this growing clientele, this workshop will help you feel more informed and confident sitting across from your Asian American clients.

Participants will:

• Learn the three important dimensions of multicultural counseling competencies.
• Understand the important Gestalt philosophical foundations and guiding principles that inform our attitudes as Gestalt therapists and provide the ground for our work with clients from different cultures.
• Learn the major differences between individualist and collectivist cultures and Asian culture’s particular flavor of collectivism, including the foundational values and worldview guiding how individuals within Asian culture relate to self and others and navigate the world.
• Understand how unexamined Gestalt concepts and individualistic values might negatively influence our work with Asian-American clients.
• Learn four key concepts from the field of Intercultural Communication that will help elucidate fundamental differences in communication styles and interpersonal contact between individualist and collectivist cultures.
• Become informed about typical issues faced by Asian Americans, including concerns specifically related to their bicultural identities and values, and the detriments of racism, internalized racism, and the “model minority” myth.
• Learn the various factors that need to be considered when assessing an Asian-American client’s identification with their Asian heritage.
• Learn five common therapeutic issues that frequently emerge in our work with Asian-American clients and how to work with these issues in skillful, culturally-responsive ways.

Additional info:

• Saturday, March 21, 2020
• 10am – 4pm (with 1-hour break)
• Workshop Fee: $150
• 5 CE Hours for LMSW, LCSW, LMHC, LCAT and Licensed Psychoanalysts

About Sil

Sil Si-Wei Chen, MA, LCSW-R is a psychotherapist and emotional wellness coach who maintains an LGBTQ-affirmative and culturally-responsive psychotherapy private practice in Williamsburg, Brooklyn and provides emotional wellness coaching nationally and internationally. To find out more about Sil and her practice, please visit silchentherapy.com.