STAVROPOL REGIONAL PSYCHOANALYTICAL ASSOCIATION

REPORT ON EVENT

«CHRISTMAS-TIDE MEETINGS - 2000»

Dear Friends and Colleagues

When everyone just started coming round – some after celebrating New Year, some – after celebrating New Century, while some, never listening to the media – after celebrating the beginning of a New Millennium, when the smell of the holiday was still there, together with the scent of tangerines and New Year trees, when the Organising Committee was, actually worn out, we left our families, our warm and cosy flats to find ourselves in a large cold room, with some other people, many of whom we had never met before, in order to open the 6th Festival of Practical Psychology and Psychotherapy «Christmas-Tide Meetings-2000». And, even though afterwards there were many ideas expressed on how to make it better, it looked like nobody regretted coming there. So, Sviatky did take place! This happened again, and here is what was going on there.

The 6th Festival of Practical Psychology and Psychotherapy «Christmas-Tide Meetings-2000» was held on January 8 – 10 in the City of Pyatigorsk, at the Sanatorium «Lesnaya Polyana ». This time there were 73 persons participating, and they came from both different places of our country, as well as from abroad. The geographical coverage of the Festival was much larger, even if compared to the previous year’s Festival. The Programme included 15 workshops, 1 group supervision, 4 round-table discussions on urgent issues related to the development of the professional community, 2 large groups, 1 community meeting, 2 hours of professional group presentations. Finally, the Jury awarded certificates and prizes in 11 nominations.

A bit of history first.
In the June of 1999 the Organising Committee, including Alexey Koryoukin (Leader), Ekaterina Loskutova (Project Manager), Sergey Peshkov (Programme Manager), and Anastasia Goncharova (Accountant), started its work.
For one month the Committee worked on the description of the project «Christmas-Tide Meetings-2000» and preparing grant application to the Southern Regional Resource Centre. This was not an easy, if interesting and very important work. This was the first experience of describing the concept of the Festival on paper. During that work we were checking our individual ideas concerning the aims and objectives of the Festival, thus shaping our common view.
We have to say that the words «first experience», «this was the first time», «for the first time» will be here below more than once. And all the members of the Committee, as well as the participants, who could compare, noted that «Sviatky-2000» was really different from the previous five Festivals. And even though that time we did not succeed in getting the grant, yet that work on composing the application, numerous discussions and arguments, as well as detailed planning – all these allowed us to bring the Festival on a whole new level. The Festival grew older.
However, growing older, this never lost its three basic values: support and expansion of professional contacts, experience exchange, and festive atmosphere.
And, besides, every participant enjoyed equal opportunity to:

1. Have a look at others
After the application for the contest was finished and submitted we started sending out invitations. And this is something that makes us proud – the participantsб because this time the number of those was not usual, both geographically and professionally. We are grateful to all those who helped us bring together such nice people, and, of course, we are happy to express our gratitude to the regional secretaries: Elena Zubtsova (Zheleznovodsk), Svetlana Vitoshinskaya (Kislovodsk), Yury Pyatygin (Krasnodar), Natalia Chuyko (Pyatigorsk), Vladimir Khatlamadzhyan (Rostov-on-Don), and special thanks are extended to Andrey Sklizkov (St. Petersburg). For the first time the Organising Committee of Sviatky had regional representatives. Let’s hope this will turn into good traditional practice.

Here, at Sviatky we had colleagues from Voronezh, Krasnodar, Novgorod, St. Petersburg, Norway, Germany, Moscow, Samara, Vladikavkaz, Caucasus Mineral Waters, etc.
It is nice that people, once coming to Sviatky, want to come back, to plunge into this festive milieu. This time there were many interesting people. It seemed that in the three days, even if you did not sleep at all, you would never have enough time to talk to everyone. But it was so nice meeting old friends as well!
In 2000 our colleagues from St. Petersburg came to the Festival for the fifth time, and they are not just colleagues, but our good friends: Andrey Sklizkov (Chairperson of St. Petersburg psychoanalytical group, member of working group of psychoanalytical federation (Russia), member of SRPA) and Vladimir Tsapov (member of Board of St. Petersburg psychoanalytical group, member of working group of psychoanalytical federation (Russia), member of SRPA, candidate of IPA).
One of the successes this time was that we managed to involve more than half of SRPA members, including most valuable specialists – members of supervising committee.
We hope that the colleagues whom we met for the first time this year will become our partners and friends, and we will meet them more than once at the Festival.

Yes, there is one very good thing about Sviatky – there are many various contacts. People come from different cities and even countries; there are men and women representing different professions: psychotherapists, psychiatrists, psychologists – practicing and theoretical ones, coaches (mostly those who conduct trainings, not those who train sportspeople), and sometimes there are even professional counselor, house-wives, artists, programmers, etc. Together are coming people who represent various schools and streamlines within psychology and psychotherapy: psychoanalytically oriented, gestalt-therapists, art-therapists, representatives of existential therapy, NLP-specialists, organiasational counselors followers of interactive teaching. People from different generations and different level of knowledge meet each other: students and Candidates of sciences, just rookies and well-known professionals. And each participant makes their own contribution into creating this unique atmosphere, which always there at Christmas-Tide Meetings, and which there this particular time – the atmosphere of festivity.

2. Show oneself
There are lots of various opportunities to claim oneself at Sviatky. For instance, you can conduct a workshop or hold a round-table discussion on any topic; you can attend the Community Meeting or share your ideas and feelings at the Large Group. That was every year before. However, this year they stood even more chances to “show oneself”.
For the first time there was an event called “presentation”, which was time and venue allocated to those who wanted to tell their colleagues about their professional organisation or their own project. There were ten persons who took that opportunity, while the process of presentation proved mutually interesting.
Another novelty introduced this year was staff. Every evening the leaders of the Sviatky events and the Organising Committee came together to discuss the day, both professionally and organisationally, as well as to correct some plans for the future. This was interesting; yet, such meetings were held at the expense of the traditional evening programme and informal interaction, of course. So, we decided to recommend to the Organising Committee not to include staff in to the programme, because professional discussion is a chance for everyone to have or to conduct supervision, be that individual or group.
Christmas Tide Meetings-2000 “yielded” really great fruit, when we speak of round-tables, and those were more than just interesting: «Structure of professional psychotherapeutic community», «Psychology, psychotherapy, psychiatry – a common field», «Teaching psychotherapy», «Legal issues related to psychology-psychotherapy».

The following work-shops were presented at Christmas Tide Meetings-2000
* N. Chuyko, Е Zubtsova «Extreme psychology: experiencing death. Stress debriefing in critical incidents».
* S. Peshkov Group supervision
* N. Shevela «Family, Love».
* А. Zax «International dances».
* А. Sklizkov «Search for male identity»
* S. Haugsgjerd Theoretical report
* Е. Loskutova «Total improvisation».
* G. Moskotinina «Art-training»
* А. Koryoukin «Cargo 2000»
* G. Bylim «basics of effective contact»
* S. Haugsgjerd Clinical case presentation & discussion
* S. Sergienko, I. Sidorenko «Journey to previous lives»
* О. Barsukova «Little Son came to his Father …»
* М. Isaeva «Swamp for idiots»
* О. Savina «Submarine»

You can see from here, that the leaders of workshops put a hard choice before the Jury. By the way, the Jury included Sergey Ivanov, Alexander Oberemko, Denis Sevrygin, Andrey Sklizkov (you will see these names below, and the context will be adequate, too; you will know why, if you participated in Sviatky before). Yet, the Jury managed the task, and we are really to them for this brave deed. The following certificates were awarded at the final ceremony
* Best workshop - G. Moskotinina «Art-training», Stavropol, SRPA
* Best round-table discussion – Irina Zviagintseva «Legal issues related to psychology-psychotherapy», Stavropol, SRPA
* Best debut – Antya Zax “International dances”, Potsdam
* Healthiest person – Ekaterina Pechurichko, Krasnodar
* Christmas-Tide Scumbag - Jury: Sergey Ivanov (Stavropol, SRPA), Alexander Oberemko (Stavropol, SRPA), Denis Sevrygin (Stavropol, SRPA), Andrey Sklizkov (St. Petersburg)
* Best joke – Ekaterina Loskutova, Stavropol, SRPA
* Sex-Symbols – Marina Isaeva, Ivan Korolevsky, Stavropol, SRPA
* Christmas-Tide Team – employees of Centre of Mental Health, KIslovodsk
* Christmas-Tide Lamer – Ekaterina Mikheeva, Pyatigorsk
* Christmas-Tide Client - Marina Isaeva, Stavropol, SRPA

The traditional auction, which is held to elect the richest person, displayed a lot that well deserved the competition – batik by Galina Moskotinina «Four Narcisses”. The participants witnessed a true drama, performed by two participants of the event – A. Sklizkov and J. Bustos. The masterpiece left Russia …
* Richest person – Jorge Bustos, Oslo, Norwegian Psychiatric Association

3. Have fun together
And the end of Sviatky, as usual was a party. And nobody wanted to leave, when the morning came, January 11th. Everyone had their own impressions concerning Christmas-Tide Meetings-2000 (which, by the way, may never reflect those of the Organising Committee). Yet, judging by the questionnaires filled by the participants, that was real fun, the Festival was really good! We are very grateful to all those who came to participate, and looking forward to meeting you right after the New Year.

The Organising Committee of Christmas-Tide Meetings-2000 would also like to thank

D.S. Kuzmin, Chairperson of Committee for Legislation and Local Self-Government, Stavropol Krai Parliament. You have helped us issue the informational booklet for the Festival, which contributed to the success of the event

Ministry of Education of Stavropol Krai, and personal thanks to N.I. Butenko. The financial support from the Ministry helped us resolve one of the most urgent issues – transportation for the participants from Stavropol.

NCSI MOSU and personal thanks to E, Shiyanov for the prizes. These perfect books made a great complement to the certificates.

Thanks to everyone who helped the Organising Committee
Konstantin Vdovydcheko for videotaping
Inna Peshkova for reviewing the booklet
Dmitry Yurchenko for translation provided to the foreign guests

Volunteers
S. Alfiorova
А. Gorsahkova
А. Zavyalik
М. Issaeva
I. Korolevsky
О. Savina
D. Sevryugin

Administrative group
Е Zubtsova
Е. MIkheeva
R. Spichukov
N. Chuyko