Among the many DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) particularities, social class is rarely mentioned, yet it is an essential aspect of who we are in every interaction, including as therapists, and who each client is when they come to therapy seeking relief from their suffering.

In this workshop, I want to explore this very radical notion both theoretically and experientially. I want to highlight both the beauty that we as human beings can bring to the world, and the destructiveness and environmental impact of our sense that the world is our artistic canvas to be remade at will.

This workshop opens the 75th-anniversary year of the New York Institute for Gestalt Therapy. It invites us to pause – not just to reflect on our history, but also to reawaken the very spirit that gave birth to it: the creative aesthetic of contacting, the surprise of the always-new, the call of wonder.

Buber’s critical concept of the “in-between” as the meeting place of the I and the Thou is an essential place from where everything reveals itself or becomes clear to our world of experiences.

We aim to share our work with Gestalt therapists who are confronting the shared realities of working in a field increasingly shaped by authoritarianism, systemic trauma, and collective overwhelm.

This presentation draws from interviews with Kitzler’s former NYIGT students, colleagues, and friends to paint a portrait of his impact on the teaching/learning community that is the New York Institute for Gestalt Therapy.