Mexican relational existential-phenomenological therapy

Domain III · Humanistic, existential & experiential · Yaqui Andrés Martínez Robles · 2002 · Mexico

What it is

This is an existential-phenomenological and hermeneutic therapy developed in Mexico by Martínez Robles. He also trained in Gestalt therapy and has practised as a Gestalt and existential therapist in Mexico since 1996. He founded and directs the Círculo de Estudios en Terapia Existencial (CIREX),…

Format

• Format and length. The core is individual talk therapy. Martínez Robles also teaches and runs existential group therapy and Gestalt group therapy, an annual six-day residential workshop on death, dying and grief, and Holotropic Breathwork and psychedelic-integration work. Those are separate…

Who practises it, and how they are trained or regulated

• What it is. This is an existential-phenomenological and hermeneutic therapy developed in Mexico by Martínez Robles. He also trained in Gestalt therapy and has practised as a Gestalt and existential therapist in Mexico since 1996. He founded and directs the Círculo de Estudios en Terapia Existencial (CIREX), which has offered existential-therapy training in Mexico and Colombia since 2002. The Wiley World Handbook…
• It is better understood as a school and training tradition than as a manualised protocol. The 2015 book presents existential psychotherapy as a style of professional practice, a relational paradigm and a mainly philosophical framework. It offers this as one valid option, not the only model. Martínez Robles calls the school's position "mestizo". It combines English, German and French existential traditions with North…

Questions to explore with your client

• What drew you to it, and what are you hoping it will change?
• Does it involve intense or unusual breathing? Have you been told about the medical conditions for which that is not advised?
• Does it involve fasting, a special diet or 'detox'? Have you discussed this with your doctor?
• Is it a group, retreat or community? How do they respond if someone wants to leave or raises a concern?
• How do you and the practitioner understand what is happening, in spiritual or cultural terms? Is that a source of comfort, worry, or both?
• Who runs it, and what training or registration do they hold?
• What actually happens in a session or meeting, and how often?
• What does it cost, and is there pressure to commit to more?
• How do you feel afterwards, in the hours and days that follow?
• Does it fit with, or clash with, the work we do here?

What practitioners of it watch for

• Asking "why" in a blaming way. Stay with "what does it do". It is working when the client recognises the competing values in the pattern.
• In acute risk, horizontalization does not override safety prioritisation; see section 5. It is working when overlooked themes come forward.
• Exoticising the client, or imposing your own decolonial politics. It is working when the client corrects you more freely and uses their own words.
• Abrupt endings that skip the relational meaning of ending. It is working when the client can articulate their situation and stance in their own words.
• Using "not-knowing" to excuse lack of preparation. The source explicitly rejects this. It is working when you catch yourself steering earlier and more often.

When to involve someone else

• New or worsening physical symptoms, or advice to stop or change prescribed medication: involve the client's doctor or prescriber.
• Signs of coercion, isolation from family and friends, escalating costs or secrecy: discuss openly and consider safeguarding.
• A crisis or thoughts of suicide: follow your crisis protocol. In the US, call or text 988; in the UK and Ireland, Samaritans on 116 123.

Drawn automatically from the guide's own sections. Stay curious: neither endorse nor dismiss what the client values, and check anything that matters against the full guide and its sources. Not medical advice.