Ego states are not meant to be theoretical concepts; they are phenomenological realities (Berne, 1961). The more “real” ego states become to the client and the therapist, the more clinically effective they are. It is therapeutically useful to consider the symptoms, dysfunctional behaviors, and/or hallucinations of our clients as though we were watching a play put on by their Child and Parent ego states to show us what happened to them.
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