Abstract
This article examines issues related to conducting effective psychotherapy with creative patients. Contemporary psychological viewpoints regarding human creativity are surveyed. As well, the relationships among creativity, intelligence, and personality are explored. Three common patterns representative of creative individuals in psychotherapy are described via the research literature and clinical vignettes. These three patterns are: (1) the creating individual at odds with his/her environment, (2) thwarted creativity, and (3) creativity with severe psychopathology. The article suggests that a variety of therapy models and techniques have shown some effectiveness with creative patients. While not unimportant, these therapy variables may be less significant than therapist variables (e.g., style, personal attributes) in effecting positive therapy outcome with the creative. Psychotherapy might be viewed as a process in which the therapist and the creative patient fashion an understandable "self-metaphor," representative of the patient's dysfunctional status. Effective therapy, via techniques and process, reconstructs this dysfunctional self-metaphor or, in some cases, may construct an alternative, more adaptive self-metaphor. Clinical examples of this metaphor construction process are given.