Your Life in Drama – Starts in March

Dramatherapy is an exciting, life changing way to explore yourself through improvisation. It’s physical, emotional and often very dramatic. Rachel Perry has used it to help people create change in their lives for over 20 years. This March you get a chance to find the magic for yourself over 3 weekends of using drama to explore personal themes and expression. The final day to book onto this Bristol based course is on Valentine’s Day – Feb 14th.

Rachel originally trained as a dancer and choreographer. “I went into community theatre and then into the fringe stuff. I worked with a lot of young people and travelled around. It was a very healing journey for me. As one director said to me, “Do what you do off stage only make it bigger, that’s what acting is about”.

What is the essence of dramatherapy?

“Spontaneity is key to dramatherapy”, she explains. ”It’s all about the present moment and finding emotional expression through working directly with and through the body, by doing this we bypass our cognitive processes and defence mechanisms”. 

“Many adults are out of touch with their creative ability to play and interact with other people. They think they will feel foolish, exposed or be embarrassed, but, they discover it can be fun and they feel very liberated. It’s in that new found freedom and self-expression that deep transformation can happen”.

How does it work?

“People often choose dramatherapy because it’s not about the mind but about action. Dramatherapy works with the body in imaginative and intuitive ways. This can access and erase long forgotten feelings and old patterns and reveal new connections and new experiences for participants. The story we are telling often doesn’t matter if you can feel the connection. Having other people in the group witness this is very important. Witnessing acts as a mirror to the unconscious and allows people to experience powerful shifts if they resonate with what they see”. 

How do people feel safe in the middle of spontaneous improvisation?

“Distance is central to dramatherapy. It’s important to create a place where you can connect to things whilst not being overwhelmed or too detached where you can become disengaged in the process.” 

Dramatherapy creates a container in which people feel safe. I needed that myself. I didn’t have any boundaries as a child. Drama helped me to find out what my own container was. And it also let me learn that I could push against the boundaries to positive affect. That was my journey.  

Who does dramatherapy?

I’ve had headmasters, policemen, psychiatrists and shamen, lots of actors and teachers, carers; anyone interested in the creative process. It offers a personal journey as well as tools for work so it is never wasted. It reaches areas that other therapies often don’t get to very quickly – it can be very direct”. 

How is it applied?

The course can be a springboard to vocational training or a CPD course for health or social workers who want additional skills. To become a Dramatherapist an MA is required. Group and play workers find this very useful, they gain a great toolkit. People are surprised by how quick and effectively it gets to the root of something that nothing else has touched. No two dramatherapists work the same way. As you grow so does your approach.

What happens in a dramatherapy session?

“The group will start with some warm up exercise and then a theme may emerge. It might be one person is having a problem or it might be a group decision as to what happens next.”  This could be a role-play, working with masks or sculpting or improvisation. 

“In a way all you need is an empty space and for someone to be in that space with you and something can happen. When you realise most people are in the same boat and looking for similar things, then having that group trust and support around you in a contained (safe) environment allows a certain magic to happen”. 

From March to May in 2016 Rachel will launch a new course, introducing drama as a healing medium, over three intensive weekends in Bristol.

MARCH 12th-13th – The Developmental Model (EPR)

APRIL 9th-10th –Sesame method/Mask

MAY 7th-8th – The Theatre Model/Ritual

A condensed, experiential program for anyone interested in dramatherapy – either professionally or for personal development. For more information:

dramatherapy.org.uk