Explorations in Transactional Analysis: The Meech Lake Papers - Softcover

William F. Cornell; MA

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0894890077 ISBN 13: 9780894890079

Publisher: TA Press, 2008

Synopsis

Explorations in Transactional Analysis brings together many of Bill Cornell's articles on transactional analysis. Written over 20 years, these papers reflect his ongoing exploration of the interfaces among transactional analysis, the body-centered therapies, and contemporary psychoanalysis. Much of Bill's writing exemplifies the potential and enrichment brought to our work in human relations through the use of one theoretical model to challenge and enhance another. An extensive section devoted to working with the body in psychotherapy brings together a selection of papers and book chapters available for the first time in a single volume. Often written to raise questions more than provide answers, many of these papers are written in an unusually personal voice.

About this title

About the Author

William F. Cornell, M.A., Teaching and Supervising Transactional Analyst (psychotherapy), studied behavioral psychology at Reed College in Portland, Oregon, and phenomenological psychology at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, PA. Following his graduate studies, he trained in transactional analysis and body-centered psychotherapy. Bill has published numerous journal articles and book chapters, many exploring the interface between transactional analysis, body-centered and psychoanalytic modalities. He is editor of the ITAA Script newsletter and coeditor of the Transactional Analysis Journal. He is the editor of The Healer s Bent: Solitude and Dialogue in the Clinical Encounter (The Analytic Press), a collection of the psychoanalytic writings of James McLaughlin, for which Bill wrote the introduction, and coeditor with Helena Hargaden and a contributing author for From Transactions to Relations: The Emergence of Relational Paradigms in Transactional Analysis (Haddon Press). Bill is also the author of Explorations in Transactional Analysis and the forthcoming The Impassioned Body. Bill maintains an independent private practice of therapy, consultation, and training in Pittsburgh and leads frequent training groups in Europe.

Review

At last we have some of Cornell s fine writings gathered in one place. Whether the topic is transference/countertransference, emotion, the body, or ethics, his perspective illuminates. Few books on psychotherapy are as original as this one. --George Downing, Ph.D.,Psychiatric Teaching Faculty, Salpêtrière Hospital, Paris

Bill Cornell s collection of writings raises insightful questions and criticisms of transactional analysis theory and practice. He focuses on the centrality of a relational and body-centered psychotherapy while integrating contemporary psychoanalytic concepts. This book is a must-read for all serious psychotherapists. --Richard G. Erskine, Ph.D., Institute for Integrative Psychotherapy, New York

This intimate collection of lovingly crafted and scholarly papers by Bill Cornell is most certainly destined to become a classic in the field of transactional analysis. All the more impressive is the fact that the author long recognized as one of the preeminent authorities on not only transactional analysis but also body-centered psychotherapies never loses track of either the pivotal role played by the body in the therapeutic encounter or the central importance to healing of both top-down and bottom-up processing of information and energy (the first the province of transactional analysis, the second the province of the body therapies). Ever the integrator (of mind and body, head and heart, theory and practice, the old and the new), Cornell as both writer and clinician possesses that rare gift of being able to hold the tension created by the delicate balance that exists between respecting that which is known unequivocally and honoring that which can never be fully known, adroitly avoiding the temptation to jump to premature closure in order to ease the anxiety of uncertainty. In his never-ending quest to understand ever more deeply and ever more richly the therapeutic dance in which both client and therapist participate in their attempts to find each other, Cornell dares gently to challenge established beliefs in order to venture, unfettered by dogma, into uncharted waters so that he can discover his own. An original thinker, a brilliant writer, and an extraordinarily heartfelt and wise clinician, Cornell invites the reader to join him in his explorations of the breathtakingly intricate and complex processes that get played out transactionally between client and therapist as they negotiate their way through the hard places that will inevitably arise at the intimate edge of their authentic engagement. He offers the reader a ringside seat alongside of him as he shares his reflections on various aspects of the therapeutic encounter, soulful reflections that are at once moving, compassionate, personal, and revealing. In describing two of his most important mentors (Mort Johan and Jim McLaughlin), Cornell notes with generous admiration their capacity for ruthless self-scrutiny, relentless curiosity, rebellious creativity, and piercing intelligence. As far as I can tell, every single one of these descriptors could just as appropriately be applied to Bill himself, who, in this magnificent chef-d oeuvre representing the culmination of well over twenty years of intensive immersion in the field of transactional analysis, has managed, indeed, to accomplish the goal he had set out to accomplish, namely, to make sure that transactional analysis does not ossify. With volumes like this, the field can only evolve to ever-higher levels of integration, complexity, and refinement over the course of the years to come. Who would have thought that I, a classical psychoanalyst by training, would have found myself so engaged and, yes, dazzled! --Martha Stark, M.D., Clinical Instructor in Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School

Bill Cornell s collection of writings raises insightful questions and criticisms of transactional analysis theory and practice. He focuses on the centrality of a relational and body-centered psychotherapy while integrating contemporary psychoanalytic concepts. This book is a must-read for all serious psychotherapists. --Richard G. Erskine, Ph.D., Institute for Integrative Psychotherapy, New York

This intimate collection of lovingly crafted and scholarly papers by Bill Cornell is most certainly destined to become a classic in the field of transactional analysis. All the more impressive is the fact that the author long recognized as one of the preeminent authorities on not only transactional analysis but also body-centered psychotherapies never loses track of either the pivotal role played by the body in the therapeutic encounter or the central importance to healing of both top-down and bottom-up processing of information and energy (the first the province of transactional analysis, the second the province of the body therapies). Ever the integrator (of mind and body, head and heart, theory and practice, the old and the new), Cornell as both writer and clinician possesses that rare gift of being able to hold the tension created by the delicate balance that exists between respecting that which is known unequivocally and honoring that which can never be fully known, adroitly avoiding the temptation to jump to premature closure in order to ease the anxiety of uncertainty. In his never-ending quest to understand ever more deeply and ever more richly the therapeutic dance in which both client and therapist participate in their attempts to find each other, Cornell dares gently to challenge established beliefs in order to venture, unfettered by dogma, into uncharted waters so that he can discover his own. An original thinker, a brilliant writer, and an extraordinarily heartfelt and wise clinician, Cornell invites the reader to join him in his explorations of the breathtakingly intricate and complex processes that get played out transactionally between client and therapist as they negotiate their way through the hard places that will inevitably arise at the intimate edge of their authentic engagement. He offers the reader a ringside seat alongside of him as he shares his reflections on various aspects of the therapeutic encounter, soulful reflections that are at once moving, compassionate, personal, and revealing. In describing two of his most important mentors (Mort Johan and Jim McLaughlin), Cornell notes with generous admiration their capacity for ruthless self-scrutiny, relentless curiosity, rebellious creativity, and piercing intelligence. As far as I can tell, every single one of these descriptors could just as appropriately be applied to Bill himself, who, in this magnificent chef-d oeuvre representing the culmination of well over twenty years of intensive immersion in the field of transactional analysis, has managed, indeed, to accomplish the goal he had set out to accomplish, namely, to make sure that transactional analysis does not ossify. With volumes like this, the field can only evolve to ever-higher levels of integration, complexity, and refinement over the course of the years to come. Who would have thought that I, a classical psychoanalyst by training, would have found myself so engaged and, yes, dazzled! --Martha Stark, M.D., Clinical Instructor in Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School

Edition details

• Publisher: TA Press
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0894890077
• ISBN 13: 9780894890079
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 328
• Illustrator: Tim Fabian