Dick Price - Biography - Gestalt Practice

Gestalt Practice

In 1964, Fritz Perls, the psychiatrist who developed Gestalt therapy, arrived at Esalen. During Perls' time at Esalen, Price became one of his primary students. He was also influenced by the work of Wilhelm Reich, who had been Perls' analyst. Price worked with Perls for approximately four years, from 1966 to 1970. During this period Price experienced a second brief manic break, arising from the unresolved trauma of his commitment. Perls declared this episode fully resolved and then told Price that it was time for him to start teaching Gestalt on his own.

During the time that Price ran Esalen, he educated himself widely in Western psychology and Eastern religions, including Buddhism and Taoism. He drew from the work of many teachers who came to Esalen over the years. Gestalt Practice provided a humane approach that pulled together all these strands of ancient and modern knowledge into a coherent technique, similar to shamanistic methods of healing. This practice allowed Price to work with other people as real people, not as objects that needed to be “fixed” in some way. Throughout the 1970s and early 1980s, Price continued practicing, modifying, and teaching Gestalt at Esalen, until his death in a hiking accident on November 25, 1985, when he was struck by a falling boulder. The method of Gestalt Practice that Dick Price developed remains one of his most important achievements.