Dr Glasser gave his first talk in Ireland on 1st June 1985, forty years ago this year. He had been invited by Arthur Dunne and, two years later, he returned to be present at the very first certification course in Ireland.
With his full approval, the “William Glasser Institute Ireland” was set up in 1987 (originally called the “Institute for Reality Therapy in Ireland”). As the Glasser organisation grew here, Dr. Glasser paid many visits to Ireland to speak at WGII conferences and several international events.
The video recording of Dr. Glasser’s very first talk in Ireland takes 1 hour 50 minutes.
WE CELEBRATE THIRTY YEARS OF CHOICE THEORY PSYCHOLOGY
In 1995, Dr. Glasser spoke at our National Conference held in Waterford that year. After his presentation, one of our members asked him about the name “Control Theory” which Dr. Glasser had been using up to that time. It was at that very moment that the founder of Reality Therapy decided to seek a different name to avoid giving the impression that his theory was about controlling others.
On the morning after the conference ended, Dr. Glasser was making a video recording about the “Staying Together” programme with his wife Carleen and two of his Irish colleagues from WGII. At the start of the recording, he introduced the term “Choice Theory®” for the very first time. That is how Choice Theory came to be born in Waterford at the WGII National Conference. Several months later, in Brisbane, Dr. Glasser announced the new name to his worldwide organisation. Later in 1998, when Dr. Glasser published the book “Choice Theory”, he subtitled it as a new psychology of personal freedom.
Dr. Glasser had a special bond with Ireland and mentions his Irish experience and some of his WGII colleagues in his books. It was fitting that the idea of replacing the Institute for Reality Therapy with what is now William Glasser International came from Ireland and the last ever International Conference that Dr. Glasser was able to attend was chaired by one of our members.
To date, WGII has given official RT/CT training to almost 5,000 people in Ireland with the result that one in every 1,500 Irish people have taken at least part of our training. Dr. Glasser himself was very proud of this statistic … and it continues to grow.