Gestalt prayer
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The so-called "Gestalt prayer" is a 56-word statement by psychotherapist Fritz Perls that is generally taken as a classic expression of the kind of individualism that took "do your own thing" as a slogan in the United States in the 1960s.
The key idea of the statement is the endorsement of a focus on living in response to one's own needs; it also expresses an idea about people who respectively can help fulfill another's needs in fulfilling their own: when they "find each other, it's beautiful."
Immediately following that optimistic note, the final six words are "If not, it can't be helped".
Text of "prayer"
- I do my thing and you do your thing.
- I am not in this world to live up to your expectations,
- And you are not in this world to live up to mine.
- You are you, and I am I,
- And if by chance we find each other, it's beautiful.
- If not, it can't be helped.
(Fritz Perls, 1969)