Contents
Such familiar games with dolls are useful not only for children, but also for adults – primarily for their therapeutic properties. Elina Berseneva, a counseling psychologist and game practitioner, tells about the origins of puppet therapy, types of puppets and the experience of her clients.
Puppet therapy is a projective technique from art therapy, which is used to diagnose and correct the condition. Within its framework, in a playful way, you can try on the desired social role, realize its pros and cons, tune in to a positive result. No wonder our ancestors said: “He who did not play with dolls did not see happiness.”
A doll is a kind of psychological mirror that helps to see our true attitude towards ourselves, towards partners, towards the current life situation. It shows the client’s hidden problems, actualizes the emotions associated with this or that state, because through the doll a person creates an image of his own “I”.
With the help of dolls, you can clarify your attitude to money, to work, to try on the role of the mistress of your business. Or build relationships with children, deal with psychosomatic problems and cope with anxiety.
I see that the client’s doll has a bulky head and short arms. I ask: “A lot of thoughts? Do your hands keep up with them?
The surprised client confirms: “Recently they have not been on time, there is a blockage with projects at work, they don’t let me sleep, I don’t have enough strength …” And adds: “It’s time to change something.”
The girl pinches off extra pieces of stuffing and thus gets rid of disturbing thoughts.
Different dolls – different functions
The origins of puppet therapy are in the time when our great-great-grandmothers helped themselves and others with the help of puppets. Then the dolls were divided into ritual, protective and play. Some celebrated folk calendar holidays: Maslenitsa, Christmas time; others were expected to protect themselves from evil forces, and with the help of others they raised children.
One puppeteer from Vyatka told how they used to check a girl’s readiness for marriage. If the “man” doll she made turned out to be unsightly, it means that it’s too early for the craftswoman to get married: sit, dear, for now in the girls. That is, by the doll it was possible to determine the attitude of the girl to the current or prospective future partner.
In the Russian folk tradition, puppet images with speaking role-playing names are fixed – “Rich Man”, “Mammushka”, “Love Lovers” – they will help to understand specific issues that concern us. For example, a couple of Lovebirds shows the relationship between partners in dynamics.
As with the help of sand and drawing therapy, in working with dolls you can play tense situations in a couple, see the situation through the eyes of another, understand the desires and needs of each partner. But in puppet therapy, the figures are created by the client himself, and they are voluminous, endowed with breath.
Working with the doll also helps to identify negative parental inhibitions. In such cases, the client creates the figure of the eldest woman in the family – the “Kinder of the family” – and in the game can get scenario permission for good changes in life.
How effective can puppet therapy be?
Author’s dolls – “Mistress of her business”, “Grandma Ezhka” and “Ezhkin cat” – are created specifically to solve client requests at puppet training.
So, a girl at the “Successful Marriage” training focuses on spinning a doll and suddenly throws it on the table – “I can’t, I don’t want, I don’t like it.” At this point, her attitude towards marriage becomes clear, and we are working to eliminate the problems that prevent us from achieving our goal.
At the author’s training “Shadow Dance”, the Belarusian psychotherapist Igor Ilyukevich once told me about a doll called “Sickness”. With its help, you can symbolically let go of the departed, work through the grief of the loss of a loved one and heal the trauma of rejection.
As a result of this work, I helped one client to get rid of a severe love addiction, and another to heal the trauma of losing a child. The client soon became pregnant and gave birth to a healthy baby girl.
Customer feedback suggests that life is changing in the right direction, and positive results begin, on average, a month or two after puppet training. Everyone can feel the healing effect of this therapy – everyone has a chance to change their lives for the better. In any case, the doll we created will remind you that changes in life are the work of the person himself.
About the Developer
Elina Berseneva — psychologist-consultant, art teacher, game practitioner. See her for more details. .