Listening to the Melody of the Mind

The Psychodynamic Psychotherapist

By (author) Rima Brauer, Gerald Faris

Publication date:

17 October 2008

Length of book:

170 pages

Publisher

Jason Aronson, Inc.

ISBN-13: 9780765706133

Psychotherapy has been described humorously as the art of practicing a science which doesn't exist. Brauer and Faris submit that the practice of psychodynamic psychotherapy draws on both art and science and should be conducted only by those who are properly trained with sufficient experience and steeped in the empirical literature based on solid research. Insightful and well-trained therapists should, therefore, draw heavily from the scientific disciplines of child development, medical science, biology, neuroscience, psychology, and sociology. To tap into the great body of research in such areas means the well-read psychotherapist must be able to assimilate contributions from a rather broad array of specialties. This is a daunting task and is not for the intellectually faint of heart. Listening to the Melody of the Mind attempts to provide a comprehensive exploration of the person who is the therapist.

Part 1 Preface
Part 2 Part I. Introduction
Chapter 3 1. Two Minds Establish a Psychotherapy
Chapter 4 2. How the Talking Cure Works
Chapter 5 3. When the Therapist Is Good Enough
Chapter 6 4. When the Therapist Isn't Good Enough
Chapter 7 5. Authenticity
Part 8 Part II. The Necessary Clinical Knowledge
Chapter 9 6. Adequate Theoretical/Conceptual Frameworks
Chapter 10 7. Multiple Points of View
Chapter 11 8. Supervised Experience in Diagnosing and Treating
Chapter 12 9. Spectrum Disorders—Schizophrenia, Mood Disorders
Chapter 13 10. Disorders of the Borderline Syndrome
Chapter 14 11. Coordinated Split Treatment
Part 15 Part III. The Nature of the Clinical Experience
Chapter 16 12. Patient-Therapist motivations for Psychotherapy
Chapter 17 13. Empathy and Therapeutic Tact
Chapter 18 14. How the Therapist's Mind Works
Chapter 19 15. Cognitive Style and the Therapeutic Alliance
Chapter 20 16. Addressing the Patient's Need to Fight
Chapter 21 17. The Place of Dreams in the Therapeutic Process
Chapter 22 18. Psychopharmacology and the Complexity of Psychodynamics
Part 23 Part IV. The Challenges of the Clinical Experience
Chapter 24 19. Countertransference and Rescue Fantasies
Chapter 25 20. Feelings
Chapter 26 21. Negative Therapeutic Reactions
Chapter 27 22. People Psychotherapy Probably Can't Help
Chapter 28 23. Rarely Encountered Disorders
Chapter 29 24. Non-empirical Psychotherapists
Part 30 Closing Comments

This book is not organized as a textbook, nor does it constitute a systematic course. But it does serve as a handbook that will guide the beginning psychotherapist with a firm hand and well-grounded footing. It treats the subject of becoming and being a psychotherapist with a down-to-earth pragmatism that will be of enormous help to those who are considering such a career, either for the first time or as a career change. For the senior clinician, reading this volume will act as a gratifying reminder of difficult battles won and lost in the career of professional psychotherapy. Brauer and Faris provide an antidote to the contemporary literature that is weighted more toward the evocative and process-oriented aspects of the work, a perspective which is much more difficult for the beginner to grasp and integrate. The authors thus illustrate the practical value of an approach that is denotative, specific, and concrete.