Ego Formation and Relaxation – An Introduction

^{Hosted by Simon Cavicchia}

Ego formation and maturation is a central thread in the research and literature of vertical development. Much of the literature and research has focused on the cognitive elements of ego development as a unit of analysis.

In this workshop Simon will offer a more holistic view of ego formation and ego relaxation encompassing thinking, feeling and willing centres of human experience. As a Gestalt therapist he has long trusted the central place our bodies, somatic experience and emotions occupy in forming, maintaining and potentially relaxing our egoic sense of self, expanding perspective and behavioural range.

Having a detailed map of ego formation can support focused interventions to support our individual ego relaxation and that of others. Simon will draw on depth psychology to describe ways in which ego as the form of “who we take ourselves to be” moment by moment develops in infancy and consider the ways in which ego structure shapes and clouds our direct experience, reactions and choices moment by moment.

The workshop will introduce a number of practices and orientations in support of the lifelong project that is ego relaxation.

In this workshop we will:

• Explore how basic egoic structures form in the personality, develop through infancy and reveal themselves in adult life.
• Explore different ways of knowing beyond the cognitive and their role in supporting orientation beyond ego.
• Explore experientially aspects of ego structure and the embodied and somatic experiences they give rise to.
• Explore the processes of identification and dis-identification.
• Explore the role of embodiment and embodied inquiry in relation to understanding and relaxing ego and egoic identity.
• Experience and practice a series of embodied experiments and inquiries to experience, understand and support relaxation of egoic structures.

Simon Cavicchia practices as a Gestalt Psychotherapist, Executive Coach, Supervisor and Leadership Development Consultant. He is on the Faculty of the Ashridge Masters in Executive Coaching in the UK. He has published a number of papers on aspects of the coaching relationship, executive coaching as leadership development, the experience of shame and vulnerability in coaching and organisational life and in 2018 with Maria Gilbert “The Theory and Practice of Relational Coaching – Complexity, Paradox and Integration” published by Routledge.

DATES:  14 and 21 January 2022

TIME: 0900 - 1300 UK

COST:  £280 + VAT