In New Welfare, there are compassionate firms, and psychotherapy for the poor

Last April, the President of Federmeccanica, Fabio Storchi, came to Ville Ponti to present a platform for the renewal of the metalworkers’ contracts. Hearing the voice of an old-school entrepreneur (only in terms of age, mind you) say such words as “participation”, “integrative welfare”, “training” and “redistribution of generated wealth” was not exactly what people were expecting. In a couple of hours, Storchi put years of fierce trade union conflicts behind him to take the role of the philosopher announcing, after the great crash, the beginning of “a new period”.

Today, the fact that we hear about “compassionate firms” and “psychotherapy for the poor” beyond the picket fences of trade union negotiations means that a new time has come. Marta Zighetti, a psychotherapist at the Centre for Study and for Personal Psychotherapy (CSPP) calls it “a cultural revolution”. We are not talking about a utopian redistribution of wealth, but a concrete adoption of responsibility for people who need appropriate psychological therapies. “After the economic collapse in 2008, a lot of health cuts were made that further accentuated the social gap,” Zighetti explains. “For example, today, there are many people who suffer from post-traumatic disorders caused by stress, which are not recognised to be the cause of other illnesses that fill up emergency rooms at certain times of the year, creating considerable economic damage to the national health system. Failure to help these people is tantamount to negligence, especially in light of the fact that a lot can be done with EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing, ed.).”

The CSPP, which has operated for fifteen years in Varese and Busto Arsizio, has decided to be a leading player in this change, with some innovative proposals. The first is the involvement of firms that, with integrative welfare, can provide care for people who need psychotherapy sessions, relying on the team at the centre, where there are relational systemic psychotherapists, psychosomatic psychotherapists, psychotherapists who work with couples, sexologists, mindfulness trainers, experts in the Humanitude Method and yoga instructors. The second is the opportunity to participate, free of charge, in all courses, all activities and all special events of the association “Centro Studi della Persona”, by taking out an annual subscription, which costs €50. There are thirteen single-theme courses (from yoga to nutrition, from adoption to sex education for parents and teachers, just to mention a few), which are run by experts at the two CSPP premises: in Varese, at Via Limido 48, and in Busto Arsizio, at Via Lombardia 16.

“The new time invites us to be compassionate towards others,” Marta Zighetti concludes. “In this case, compassion is not just a pat on the back, but the ability to listen, to give appropriate answers and to provide regular therapy, even when the people cannot afford it. And with this, we provide families with training and participate in the ethical growth of the new citizen and in the creation of a new governing class.”