Cradling the Chrysalis (The United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy Series) - Softcover

MacCallum Sullivan, Mary; Goldenberg, Harriett

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1782201491 ISBN 13: 9781782201496

Publisher: Routledge, 2015

Synopsis

This book addresses the ethical and philosophical basis for the teaching/learning involved in becoming a psychotherapist. How can training prepare prospective psychotherapists, counsellors, and counselling psychologists for a task whose practitioners cannot even agree as to whether it is an art or a science, an impersonal clinical interaction or a profoundly humane, even 'spiritual' encounter? The authors believe they share with their students a passion about the possibilities inherent in this particular kind of conversation. Such a meeting demands a fully personal engagement and a profoundly ethical attitude towards the relationship with the Other; it is also potentially an important beginning in 'repairing the world'. The book explores the relative importance and emphasis of the structure, content and process of psychotherapy training. Its thesis is that the teaching/learning takes place in the quality of the reciprocal meeting between the teacher and the learner.

About this title

About the Author:

Mary Goldenberg MacCallum Sullivan

Review:

'This is one of the very few books I have ever found that takes seriously the experience of training in psychotherapy and argues (and demonstrates) that it is something to reflect on. The authors talk to each other about theory and practice, ethics and experience. I came to really enjoy this strategy and found myself thinking and almost commenting out loud in a way that I seldom do when following the "straightforward" explication of theory. What is particularly heartening about this book is the way in which the authors allow us into their dilemmas rather than simply explaining the right way to do something. Mary MacCallum Sullivan and Harriett Goldenberg remind us that the essence of psychotherapy is the search for meaning inherent in that which we see, rather than a practice that diagnoses and imposes meaning on a phenomenon.'- Professor Martin Milton, Professor of Counselling Psychology, Director of Counselling Psychology programmes, Regent's School of Psychotherapy and Psychology'Within this thought-provoking volume, these two highly experienced and accomplished psychotherapists and trainers engage with the fundamentals of what psychotherapy is and the spirit in which it is practised. This discussion is all the more apposite given that it is conducted whilst acknowledging the pressing challenges psychotherapy currently faces: the need to be evidence based and the pressure to manualise training, to name but two. In many ways, this book represents a muchneeded endeavour to reclaim the heart and soul of psychotherapy. This is essential reading for all psychotherapists, regardless of experience or modality, who care about the future of their profession.'- Lars Carson, UKCP-registered integrative psychotherapist in independent practice

About this edition

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 1782201491
• ISBN 13: 9781782201496
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 166