I am interested in many things. I like to take pictures, so I bought a digital, single-lens reflex camera because I wanted to also be able to "tweak" my pictures in Photoshop.

That ties into another interest; I like computer graphics and I used to enjoy web publishing still do a bit but don't have time for it as much as I used to.

I like playing guitar, and so I have a Fender Stratocaster standing next to the computer at home and an amplifier that is way too powerful (it would literally blow me out of the room if I turn it up just a little bit).

I like growing plants, and I used to do more gardening than I do now.

Still, every time I look outside at the plants we do have, I am tempted to go out there and get my hands dirty again.

I also like working out, because I like the feel of my body when it's in shape.

It would take a lot of working out these days to accomplish that, and it's been cold, and it's been wet, and it feels so much better to just cuddle up under the quilts and watch movies.

That leads me to another interest. I love movies. I love watching them, and I like to follow the artistic side of creating them; so, I had a great time watching the Academy Awards on Sunday night.

I am also interested in various professional pursuits. I like doing what I do for a living; I'm a psychotherapist, clinical psychologist, organisational consultant, and coach.

I am the President of the Gestalt Training Institute of Bermuda, and I'm pleased to see members of the community benefiting from the workshops we're doing each Tuesday evening at the Rock Island Coffee shop as well as to see the people joining up to participate in our various training initiatives for coaches, counsellors, and continuing education for the clergy.

All this leads to the issue of research. One might ask: "It does?"

It does because interest alone, even years of experience in practice alone in these times will not suffice. One must be engaged in evidence-based practice.

In a review of a new book on research edited by Linda Finlay and Ken Evans (Relational-centered Research for Psychotherapists: Exploring Meanings and Experience), I recently stated that, first, evidence-based practice in psychology includes clinical observation, qualitative research, systematic case study, single-case experimental designs to examine causal factors in outcome with regard to a single patient, process-outcome studies to examine mechanisms of change, effectiveness studies in natural settings, random controlled treatments, efficacy studies for drawing causal inferences in groups, and meta-analyses for observing patterns across multiple studies and for understanding effect sizes.

Second, I observed that practice-based evidence is most helpful in the overall concern for research, because it shows applications in practice of research findings.

Practice-based research can be produced by individual practitioners and by groups of therapists collaborating at the level of the clinic, and what they do can include clinical observation, qualitative research, systematic case study, and single-case experimental designs to examine causal factors in outcome with regard to a single patient-all without undue hardship.

Quasi-experimental outcomes studies are already underway at the level of the clinic, and many gestalt therapists in the United Kingdom are taking part in them.

The more involved studies that compare groups often require at least a partnership between the clinic and the university, but were they to evolve, they too could be considered practice-based in nature.

The Gestalt Training Institute of Bermuda is in the forefront of producing such research.

Two of its faculty were named co-chairs of the Research Task Force for the Association for the Advancement of Gestalt Therapy (AAGT), an international community, and the Task Force has been entertaining various initiatives that will eventually impact not only the quality of clinical and organisational services gestalt-oriented practitioners offer around the world, but also the ways in which such people are trained here in Bermuda.

A recent draft of a proposal to be considered by the AAGT reads in part as follows:

Proposal: That the AAGT actively support the generation of research focused on gestalt therapy so as to contribute to the research evidence for the practice of gestalt therapy.

In order to accomplish that general purpose, we propose that the AAGT establish a Research Support Fund, to which members might contribute, but also into which grant money might be deposited, and which would be administered by the Co-chairs of the Research Task Force in consultation with both the Research Task Force and the Board of the AAGT.

Also in order to get actual research going we propose that the AAGT Task Force be empowered to initiate specific research with short and long-term projects as follows and to see to their publication in reviewed journals:

A series of studies utilising the single-case research design that is accepted by Division 12 (The Society for Clinical Psychology) of the American Psychological Association as being a "logical equivalent" to random, controlled treatments.

These kinds of studies also qualify as practice-based evidence and allow individual gestalt therapists to generate data in keeping with the way gestalt therapy is actually practised.

Three clusters of three or four therapists each are envisioned in this design, with each cluster operating independently of the others while still centrally coordinated.

Thus, a cluster of therapist-researchers would be working in England, another in the USA and Bermuda, and another through interested colleagues in Russia.

Most recently another cluster is forming in France. These studies will be written up and submitted to peer-reviewed, highly credible professional journals, all with the intent of contributing to the established research evidence base for the practice of gestalt therapy and its applications in organisational consulting and coaching.

Now, this may not be the kind of interest that floats everyone's boat, but it sure gets me excited. In watching the Oscars on Sunday I began to think about all those artistic and dedicated people working so hard to create and produce cinematic projects of quality, and I could see how passionate they were about what they do.

That's the way I feel about what is taking shape here in Bermuda and its possible contribution globally to a professional community of therapists, organisational consultants, and coaches.