ABSTRACT
During the Free Response stage members are invited to share their more immediate reactions to the material brought to the group and to explore their intuitive and emotional responses to it. The aim is to reconnect with feelings and bodily sensations and to acknowledge and begin to look at spontaneous thoughts and associations, and also at opinions and snap judgements. The Free Response stage is an invitation to play, to explore feelings and associations without too much attention being given to what they mean, at least initially. Reflective practice groups in the early stages have certainly commented that the Free Response stage does not feel free at all, in the sense of being easy or straightforward. Techniques which encourage group members to react to material associatively, as if it were a story in a book or a film, thinking of the people as characters and the events as a plot or unfolding narrative, can be very freeing.
