Lover, Exorcist, Critic: Understanding Depth Psychotherapy

Lover, Exorcist, Critic explores the history, evolution, and methods of depth psychotherapy, using three social role analogies (Lovers, Exorcists, and Critics) to explain how psychoanalysts create a warm, accepting environment, receive, process, and deliver back projections, and analyze, confront, and educate patients about self- and other-destructive patterns. The book describes the psychotherapy processes of three fictional patients, including Carlos, Gilda, and Penn, who struggled with severe symptoms that made the process difficult to contain. Dr. Karbelnig demonstrates the failures alongside the successes of psychoanalytic processes and why they remain an effective way to reduce pain, grow, and live a more authentic life.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 268 pages
Publication date: 12 September 2023
Publisher: Phoenix Publishing House

Since the advent of psychoanalysis, profound paradigm shifts have occurred in philosophy, science, mathematics, and the arts. How we exchange information, how we interact on the global stage, and how we conceive of ourselves as citizens have also evolved. And yet, depth psychotherapy remains locked within its nineteenth-century image, poorly understood by those not intimately involved in its processes.

Lover, Exorcist, Critic delves deeply into the field's history, examining the cultural and historical context from which it emerged and explaining how it evolved into a more vitalising methodology. Alan Michael Karbelnig exposes the inner workings of depth psychotherapy using the innovative perspective of three distinct social role analogies. As lovers, psychoanalysts create a warm, accepting environment; as exorcists, they receive, process, and deliver back projections; and as critics, they analyse, confront, and educate patients about self- and other-destructive patterns. These methods come to life in the rich descriptions of how psychoanalytic processes progressed with three fictional patients. Carlos, who suffered neglect and abuse during his childhood in East Los Angeles, struggled with the emotional intensity of depth psychotherapy and took months-long breaks when he felt too vulnerable. Gilda, a Greek-American woman sexually abused in her adolescence and traumatised by a physical attack in adulthood, grappled with periods of suicidal depression and episodic psychogenic fugue states. These severe symptoms made the psychotherapy process, at various times, difficult to contain. The final patient, Penn, an orthopaedic surgeon struggling with anxiety and over-achievement which left him exhausted, demonstrates the benefit gained by a person undergoing depth psychotherapy.

Depth psychotherapy is a powerful tool for healing and growth, but it requires a commitment to the process and a willingness to confront the deepest fears and desires of the patient. It is a journey that can be challenging and rewarding, leading to greater self-awareness, emotional resilience, and a deeper understanding of oneself and others. By exploring the history, theory, and practice of depth psychotherapy, Lover, Exorcist, Critic provides a valuable resource for those seeking to understand and explore this transformative approach to mental health.

Weight: 450g
Dimension: 152 x 229 x 18 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781800131965