Abstract
This article explores how the concept of radical respect, crucial in Gestalt therapy, has changed over the years. Novel contemporary social situations challenge our organism/environment balance and call for new professional values. Today, clinical sufferings (i.e., desensitization, fragile sense of self, increase in impulsive behaviors) require that Gestalt therapists focus on the support of the ground experience rather than the figure. Examples of how to work on the ground are given, along with research results. The author then proposes a switch of paradigm in psychotherapy: to support the reciprocity and its dance in meaningful contacts. The aesthetic relational knowledge of the field is described as a new tool through which the therapist may draw upon her resonance in the field.
