Drawing the Ideal Self: Personal Construct Psychology

Drawing the Ideal Self

By Heather Moran

Volume 42, June 2010

Drawing the Ideal Self is a technique for a self characterisation, exploring a person‘s construction of self and their personal aspirations. It is a joint process which uses a combination of drawing and writing, working through a process gradually and with attention to the client‘s personal constructs at every step. The therapist does the writing parts to the client‘s dictation.

Drawing the Ideal Self was originally developed through work with children but it has been used successfully with adults and with people with mild learning difficulties.

The technique has been adapted for exploring a situation (e.g. the kind of school a child feels would be ideal for him or her). It has also been used in supervision related to a professional role (e.g. the kind of psychologist I would like to be) and for team development days when a team is defining itself and setting its aims (e.g. the kind of mental health team we would ideally like to be). It is easily adapted for different purposes so it is suitable for psychologists, therapists, counsellors, teachers, occupational psychologists, life coaches and sports coaches. It has proved particularly helpful in working with people with Asperger‘s Syndrome/ Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) because it does not rely upon commonality and with disheartened clients who have tried all sort of therapies previously.

The technique begins by exploring the person‘s idea of  ̳the kind of person I do not want to be like‘. This sets the scene and allows the ideal self to be drawn in contrast to it. There are a number of domains to the exploration - personal characteristics, home and working/school life, friendships and fears. It also explores the client‘s idea of personal history and future prospects.

The technique involves the creation of a picture that includes drawn and written information. The two pictures (non-ideal and ideal) are used to create a scale so the client can rate themselves along the construct at various points in time. The key parts to this are a NOW rating (―Where do you think you are most of the time?‖), and IDEAL rating (―Ideally, where do you want to be on this scale?‖ and a SETTLE FOR rating (―How close to your IDEAL rating do you have to get for you to feel comfortable?‖). The difference between these points gives an indication of self- esteem. Other ratings can be made on the same scale, exploring the client‘s constructions of how they are construed by other people (e.g. ―Where would your mother place you on this scale?‖), and across time (e.g. ―Where were you two years ago? Where would you like to be in six months time?‖)

The final step is to explore things the client thinks are relevant tasks to facilitate his or her development as a person. In my experience these are almost always relevant to the client‘s problems.

The technique is straightforward to learn if you already know some PCP and can be completed in one or more sessions. There is a website where you can obtain detailed instructions www.drawingtheidealself.co.uk . I suggest that you try it on yourself, then on other willing people (family and friends) so that you get a feel for the validity of the technique. If you think it tells you something about you then it should work for a client too.