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IPA - A Big Enough Container?

by Mickey Judkovics

What is a container? Big enough for what?? Let me answer by starting with some ideas on containers, containment, and "holding" environments. Simply put, containers hold something. In treatment of shock, William Emerson has come up with a "containment" model. In explaining his model, Emerson makes such statements as, "Containment means that a practitioner silently holds and empathizes with the shocking experiences of a client." There are five functions in his containment model, and two are quoted below, from the audiotape booklet "Shock, A Universal Malady - Prenatal and Perinatal Origins of Suffering," copyright 1999, by William Emerson.

"The first function that practitioners are responsible for is the formation of a receptive container for the shock material of clients. Practitioners do this by: being present, interested and compassionate; listening carefully; remembering what they hear; cataloguing the events that they remember; and letting the material Ôinto their hearts.' Forming a receptive container becomes an ongoing aspect of the treatment process."

"The third function of containment involves holding. This means that practitioners suspend judgment and advice giving, contemplate the material, remain open to insight and understanding and hold the material close to their hearts [italics MJ]. By contemplating the material and remaining open to insight and understanding, practitioners develop intuitions, or experience insights on nonlinear levels. Protectiveness is an important aspect of holding and means that insights and other contained material may be inappropriate for clients to have conscious access to and that verbal sharing of contained material by practitioners is irrelevant to healing. Sharing can be undertaken if the situation is appropriate and clients request it."

When I first encountered this model, my first response was, "Where is the client in this model? What does the client do? I don't get it."

At this year's convention, I talked to Lisa Gayle, who has trained with Emerson, and she explained, "The reason why this works is that it allows the client to expand and be healed."

"Ah," I said to myself, "now I understand." And then I connected it to a question I have been asking myself the last few years, "Why do I keep coming back to the IPA Convention? I don't like the physical facilities. I don't feel safe in the wide open space. The food has been lousy. It is always the same old people, etc., etc., etc."

Now I had the answer. The commitment of 70 people willing to work on themselves and willing to let others work on themselves formed for me a safe container, a sanctuary, a place of refuge, a place of asylum, a place to be "held" in the arms of acceptance and love. And in this place I could be healed, have been healed, and will continue to be healed. For this, I thank you all.

Editor's Note: In response to Mickey's feelings about "the food," I think most attendees would agree that the food at this convention was great! This article appeared in the Fall 2001 IPA Newsletter.

 
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