Sandplay a Way to Explore Subconscious Concerns

The blank-faced, 5-year-old boy stood before a dozen long shelves, some of which rested well above his blond head. He carefully considered the hundreds of objects available to him and finally plucked out a small vase and then went to a nearby sink to fill the vessel with water.

The boy placed the vase on one of two wooden trays containing clean slates of white sand. He returned to the shelves, needing help from an adult to reach the upper ones, and selected a ceramic bridge, followed by an hourglass, a windmill and a large, wooden elephant, positioning each in the sand.

Half an hour later, pictorial scenes complete with lighted candles occupied the two previously blank containers. For the boy, Michael, it had been a period of unfettered play. For the woman quietly observing in the downtown Lakeland office, it had been a therapy session.

Trudy Corry Rankin, a licensed mental health counselor, is certified to employ sandplay, a therapy aimed at exploring clients' subconscious concerns. Michael has been visiting Rankin since 2006, when his parents separated and he and his sister, Cindy, now 7, moved to Lakeland to live with their grandparents. (Their names have been disguised at their grandmother's request.)

Sandplay is, by Rankin's admission, a controversial form of therapy, enthusiastically employed by a core of practitioners and viewed skeptically by others. The method springs from the theories of the psychiatric pioneer Carl Jung, who emphasized the importance of subconscious ideas.

"Basically, it's sort of the question of whether the unconscious has any information to give us that helps us in life," said Rankin, a tall, gray-haired woman with a soothing manner. "Various healing rituals are part of the Native American tradition, part of religious traditions, but many people don't value rituals. So you have not valuing information from the unconscious … (and) the question of valuing intuition, valuing ritual."

The concept of sandplay is simple. The therapist provides adjacent rectangular containers, each a few inches deep and roughly 22 by 28 inches, one containing dry sand and the other damp sand. The client selects from small figures and places as many as he likes into the trays as the therapist observes without comment.

Rankin's office contains hundreds of "miniatures," as she calls them, on shelves covering two perpendicular walls. The Sandplay Therapists of America (STA), of which Rankin is a board member, suggests a mix of recognizable human figures (couples, individual adults, babies), elements of nature (animals, trees), symbolic objects (rainbows, flames) and religious or cultural icons (crucifixes, Buddhas).

Rankin, 59, has gradually built her collection since she began employing sandplay 17 years ago, finding them in antique stores, toy shops, McDonald's Happy Meals and elsewhere. Clients sometimes add objects of their own to Rankin's shelves. In addition to figurines, Rankin's objects include marbles, shells, candles, Popsicle sticks and more.

THE SUBCONSCIOUS

The origins of sandplay trace back to Jung, the Swiss psychiatrist who collaborated with Sigmund Freud in developing theories of psychoanalysis. Rankin said that Jung, after his break from Freud, began a nightly routine of creating miniature villages from found objects and connected the activity to his ideas about the way dreams reveal the subconscious.

Margaret Lowenfeld, a British child psychiatrist, provided figures and a sandbox for children in the waiting room of her office in the 1920s and noticed how the children created scenes she thought reflected their psychological states. In the 1950s, a Swiss therapist named Dora Kalff drew upon the ideas of Jung and Lowenfeld and her studies of Buddhism to develop sandplay as a non-verbal therapy.

The vast majority of STA members are women. Rankin suggested that's partly because women generally place more value on play and are more comfortable employing intuition.

The STA has certain training requirements for certification. In addition, Rankin attends international sandplay conferences and reads widely on the subject.

TAILORED FOR KIDS

Though she sometimes uses sandplay with adult clients, Rankin said the method is particularly suited to children, especially those who have endured emotional trauma. After the 9/11 attacks, Rankin and other therapists sent miniatures to New York City, where another therapist set up trays in libraries in schools for children to use.

"For me, it's the only thing I can offer when I work with a child," Rankin said. "I can't just sit and talk with a child because that's not a child's language. ... What I've found is that sandplay, for a child who's traumatized, loosens them up and makes them more free to put words to what they're experiencing."

For example, Rankin said one child was unwilling to say his father had been beating him but gave Rankin the message pictorially.

During a session, Rankin sits to the side with a form on which she records each object the client uses in each tray. She also takes photos of each tray after the session and keeps a visual log in the client's file.

Rankin said sandplay therapists largely refrain from offering interpretations to the client, though she might ask a few probing questions after a tray has been completed. She also asks if the tray has a title or theme.

After a client's sandplay sessions end, Rankin waits a few months before reviewing the photos with the client or the parents. She said she thinks the process of creating the scenes has therapeutic value even if the trays don't lead to conscious insights.

OPENING UP

Michael and Cindy's grandmother, Linda, had never heard of sandplay before bringing the children to Rankin in late 2006. Linda said she sometimes eavesdrops on the children as they play, hoping to catch clues to their unspoken feelings about the family turmoil they have experienced, and she was receptive when Rankin suggested individual sandplay sessions.

"I was really pleased to know it wasn't just sitting and talking and trying to pick their brains," Linda said. "It was letting the kids play it out. What Trudy does when they use those little figures and how they arrange everything, with her knowledge in interpreting all that, has been invaluable for me to see where the children are."

Linda said the children eagerly awaited the sessions with Rankin. She said after a few months of sandplay Cindy decided she was ready to talk. Michael remains highly reserved and is less verbal than his older sister, but Linda said both have gained confidence from sandplay - as has she.

"It became more beneficial for me in the end than I feel even for the children because it gave me hope that things were being revealed and things in their hearts were changing," Linda said. "The insight for me was fabulous because it really helped me care for them better."

Rankin said Michael's first visits yielded crowded and chaotic scenes she said reflected a disorganized mind, and gradually his trays have become more ordered. At the recent session, Michael planted nine candles in the right tray, the one with damp sand, and seven in the left. With his scenes completed, Rankin helped him light all the candles.

"It is so empowering for a child to light a candle," Rankin said later. "It's so empowering to know they can control their world."

[ Gary White can be reached at gary.white@theledger.com or at 863-802-7518. ]