Navigating Differences:
Authenticity, Self Expression and Restorative Practices in Groups
In today’s climate of cultural and social division, differences within groups can spark disconnection, tension, and misunderstanding. Yet, when approached with openness and reflection, these challenges can become powerful gateways to healing, connection, and growth.
Group work offers a vital space to transform conflict into curiosity and division into dialogue. As group leaders, we are called to hold complexity: encouraging authentic expression while honoring safety and boundaries. Through restorative practices and compassionate accountability, we create containers where members can explore hard truths, deepen relationships, and remain grounded in integrity and care.
Join us for the Eastern Group Psychotherapy Society 2025 Annual Conference where together we will deepen our understanding of how group process supports movement through fear, repair of relational ruptures, and greater tolerance for difference. We will explore how cultivating empathy, active listening, and emotional honesty creates space for people to feel seen, heard, and understood, building a framework for both personal insight and collective transformation.
Conference Program
Click to view the Conference Program, with workshop descriptions and conference details.
A Decolonial Approach to Psychoanalytically Informed Developmental Theory, Case Formulation and Treatment
Daniel Jose Gaztambide, PsyD
Most approaches to relational therapy depend on some theory of development to inform how clinicians think about the patient’s difficulties, guiding case formulation and treatment. This focus, however, sometimes chafes with recent thinking on the role of sociocultural and political factors in psychotherapy. This presentation will bridge this gap through a theory and research-grounded review of the decolonial psychoanalytic perspective, offering pragmatic tools for thinking about the relational/developmental and social/political as a matter of course.
