Dissertation - World Federation of Music Therapy

4. Psychotherapy as humane care – relating psychotherapy to ethics: psychological
problems are based on life experiences and conflicts, and psychotherapy must
address them in an atmosphere of safety and respect (e.g. humanistic
psychotherapy).
5. Psychotherapy as personal development – relating psychotherapy to teleology:
psychological problems are related to blocked developmental potentials, and
psychotherapy is an aid to further self-realization (e.g. experiential
psychotherapy).
6. Psychotherapy as pastoral care – relating psychotherapy to philosophy:
psychological problems are considered existential issues, and psychotherapy is an
exploration of meaning in order to clarify the ways of life and the client’s
responsibility (e.g. existential psychotherapy).
7. Psychotherapy as a quasi-religious experience – relating psychotherapy to
religion: Psychological problems are related to a crisis in values or beliefs, and
psychotherapy creates and integrates the client in a new, group based value system
(e.g. Alcoholic Anonymous).
With conceptual metaphors like “guide” (for therapist), “traveller” (for client) and
“journey” (for the music-listening period) BMGIM relates primarily to the fifth and
sixth root metaphors of table 3.5.
3.4.1 Imagery and metaphor
Imagery based psychotherapy is often presented as an ‘alternative’ to verbal
psychotherapy, the last type addressing secondary processes of insight and
understanding. However, the therapeutic dialogue in imagery-based therapy is still
based on language and verbal communication. Thus it is necessary to clarify the
nature and function of the ‘special language’ required, both during imagery work
(verbal reports from the client and verbal interventions from the therapist) and in
verbal processing. With the exception of Ansdell’s important paper (Ansdell 1997) I
have not found any discussion of this aspect of ‘the language problem’ in the music
therapy literature, probably because it addresses the question of imagery and language
as representational systems. My understanding of this is inspired by Horowitz (1983),
who developed a model of three modes of representation: enactive, image and lexical
(Figure 3.1).
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