This paper examines the transformation of the conscious in terms of the ouroboros, through a case study. It is difficult to understand psychotherapy as an ouroboros image that has ‘everything it needs.’ The client in the case study had a one-sided ego conscious that maintained a state of innocence. Alternatively, he avoided making commitments within the framework of his daily life. During psychotherapy, the client’s empty way of being was truly realized and became a rift in his conscious that bounced back to him. As a result, his ego conscious was torn apart and reorganized. The new conscious that the client gained saw through his ego conscious and brought about its death. This conscious was abstract and negative, and was seen as the movement of recognition. Thus, he had killed his one-sided ego conscious and created himself as a movement to recognize.

We describe the practice of once-monthly group sandplay in daycare for elderly patients with severe dementia. This study examined the dynamics of interpersonal relationships within a group that are reflected in the clashes of sandplay expressions. In nine sessions, 14 of 16 participants took part in group sandplay in some way. Encouraged by the sandplay expression by patients with more severe dementia and staff, all participants gradually became more comfortable and were able to express themselves freely. We describe three characteristic cases. The participants tended to feel the differences between themselves and others and they addressed this through group sandplay. The stimulation of their “I” senses through sandplay and the interactive interaction with others may have given the participants therapeutic effects and vitality to survive while holding onto their fragile selves. This study shows how to intervene and the problems of the observer when introducing group sandplay for elderly patients with dementia.

This study reports on the process of sandplay therapy for a 10-year-old boy (A) with recurrent alopecia. A enacted a world of pre-adolescent boyish battles during sandplay therapy. The chaotic world was organized using expressions in which friend and foe and good and evil were inverted, cycled and stopped. Three gods eventually emerged and a new order was created. Initially, A’s parents understood him to be over-adjusted and brilliant. However, during counseling and in the examination room, A presented as slow-paced and with no control over his behavior. He also scored “below average” on the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Fourth Edition (WISC-IV). Thus, there was a gap between his parents’ image of him and reality. In a parallel parent-child interview, we consulted with the parents about setting up an environment and level of involvement that would suit A’s unique characteristics. A’s parents’ understanding of his characteristics improved; moreover, his hair loss gradually improved as well. A reported that, “The stress is gone.” Thus, sandplay therapy, which can allow psychological themes to be worked on at an unconscious level, not only expressed A’s hair loss conflict, but also supported his growth.

This paper reports a psychotherapy process for a female client in her 40s who overdosed, hurt herself, and complained of suicidal ideation. She valued being needed by others, and she was more likely to be in a master-servant relationship. Her main complaint of suicidal ideation might have been caused by breaking a relationship and failing her self-value. Her images led her to understand a process to move forward. She described that she had experienced her death in dreams, in which a dyadic relationship had worsened by intrusion of a third person. In the landscape montage technique, there were changes in the frame of river and mountains, as well as in the stones: i) the closed lines of the landscape became open, suggesting that the relationship mitigated the self-defense and exposed her vulnerable self; and ii) the expression of heat energy had been brought out of the burning stone, implicit in the extinguished flame.

This study investigated the relationships of social anxiety and autistic traits with forms of self. Fifty-two undergraduate and postgraduate students (27 males and 25 females) aged between 18 and 24 years were surveyed using questionnaires (Autophobic Tendency Scale, Autism-Spectrum Quotient: AQ) and the Landscape Montage Technique (LMT), and several traits were analyzed. The results showed that the greater the social anxiety, the more likely the items were to be related to each other, and the less likely the items were to be colorless. Conversely, the higher the autistic traits, the more likely the items were to be colorless. Greater social anxiety also made it less likely for participants to refer to hesitation, anxiety and pressure in the construction process in their post-drawing narratives.

In this paper, initiation of adolescence is examined through the psychotherapeutic process for an adolescent girl in an adaptation class. After she left the club, she worried about people saying bad things about her. She could not go out and refused to attend class. She was nervous at the start of the therapy, but she became more open through communication with the therapist. She began to vacillate between adapting to herself or adapting to her surroundings. Finally, she selected a way of being that adapted herself. She underwent a psychological process to release herself by abandoning her vision of what she had wanted to be, using her relationship with the therapist as an inner framework. This was the initiation of adolescence, the way for her to find herself, which she needed for her future.