If you think about this, you will realize that each of us lives in some group environment - family, school, workplace and other organized group activities. This is the environment in which we have grown and have evolved as human beings.

Groups help people learn about themselves and improve their relationships with the others. Group therapy is a place where you come together with the others to share their problems or concerns and get useful feedback from both the therapist and all group members. No matter how difficult is to accept this in the beginning and to answer the question “how would the blind man lead a blind man?”, experience shows that if the group is doing well, all doubts disappear and the group becomes a common place for mutual study and mutual support.

As in the individual therapy (interesting but little known fact is that the Danish term for it is psykoterapi), group therapy can also benefit patients with many different problems. Most often, it is directed to the feelings of isolation and loneliness, problematic relationships with parents and authorities, friends and intimate partners, depression and anxiety, stress and trauma, addiction and other behavioral problems. Group therapy helps people make meaningful changes in their behavior, first with the presence of the group and then to take the changes with them outside the group, in the real life conditions.

Group therapy is useful in many directions; it can give to all participants: improvement of the relations with the others, improving skills for effective communication, help in the understanding of your own feelings arising in communication, reducing the out-of-control behavior, developing adaptive behaviors, awareness of your own strengths and increasing the confidence, understanding the consequences of negative behavior.

The first important task of the therapist is to explain and provide to all members of the group that the discussions are confidential, that the time is evenly distributed amongst all group members, that the active participation is important for the outcome, and that the participants are expected to be respectful and friendly to all.

The therapist accepts the responsibility for every member of the group and the group as a whole. A typical session lasts 75-90 minutes.

Members of the group work together expressing their problems, feelings and ideas as freely as possible. They create different relationships with each other, observe themselves and the others, give and receive verbal and nonverbal feedback. This way in the group they understand how they create new relations and they see the consequences of their behavior.

Group therapy is a microcosm of the wider social world in which members of the group disclose their experiences and needs to the other people; establish relationships with new people while watching them doing the same; learn the difference between socially inadequate and socially appropriate behavior; develop a sense of security.

It is not strange to feel nervous when you first join the group. Soon you will start developing feelings of interest and confidence. Many patients report that group therapy provides relaxation because it allows them talk with the others who have the same problems.

Author's Bio: 

I made this article, just to underline the importance of group therapies. Without doubt, they are the best way to overcome problems and find someone to share with.