Meltzer, Bert and Porat, Rina
IMAGES OF WAR AND IMAGES OF PEACE
Journal of Sandplay Therapy, Volume 7, Number 2, 1998
KEY WORDS: sandplay therapy, war, violence, peace, images, clinical example, trauma, collective events, restoration of equilibrium, loss, Israel, healing transformation, collective, social-political, image, integration, collective pain.
ABSTRACT: Through a variety of sandplay case studies in this article, the “living experience” of children dealing with war in Israel is exposed. With chronic war, emotional security comes for personal strength. Sandplay processes, which reveal war and peace themes in these cases, show the enacting of the wounding, exposing repressed material and the recovery. Extensive material is presented to describe the context of images in the psyche, which aids in understanding the therapeutic impact of sandplay for these cases. The suggestion is made that objective, subjective and the unconscious of the collective heal. Personal healing within in the psyche affects the collective transformation and healing.