WHAT IS THE HEIMLER METHOD OF SOCIAL FUNCTIONING?

The HEIMLER METHOD (OF HUMAN SOCIAL FUNCTIONING) is based on the principle that frustration is the potential to human flourishing. This approach was first developed by Prof. Dr. Eugene Heimler in the 1950s, when he worked with the unemployed in England and discovered that not only does the past influence the present, but present actions determine what we choose to remember from the past.

The approach is both action- and reality-orientated. Interviews are based on a disciplined psycho-social feedback system, which is particularly designed to help those who seek a new direction and meaning in their lives determine what future course of action is most suitable. A core belief is that a person’s weaknesses are actually the source of his or her strengths. The Heimler Method helps people who are unemployed or stagnating in a ‘bad’ job to make the most of their abilities, however latent, through the positive use of their inner resources and past experience. Success or failure to function within our private lives and in society depends upon the balance between satisfaction, defined as the ability to use one’s potential, and frustration, defined as one’s inability to use that potential. Too little frustration can be as damaging as too much: to function normally we constantly transform frustration into satisfaction. In other words, success is one’s ability to transform the unacceptable – to oneself and to society – into the acceptable.

In the process of facilitation, emphasis is placed on the importance for the individual of making his own decisions. Here he or she is helped by the Heimler Scale of Social Functioning©, which enables people to understand their life situation and to act accordingly.