Core Competencies of Relational Psychoanalysis A Guide to Practice, Study and Research

"Roy Barsness and his co-authors have undertaken the difficult task of presenting a text of Core Competencies in Relational Psychoanalysis to guide younger and more experienced therapists to an integration of theory and practice. The authors outstanding success lies in their skilled address of the challenge in Relational Psychoanalysis to offer an approach that is flexibly attuned to the individuality of each patient/analyst dyad while practiced with a disciplined intent, form, and rhythm. The what and how to do is presented in seven competencies with a coda on love - all becoming enlivened for the reader by clinical narratives. A difficult task well mastered."-Joseph D. Lichtenberg, M.D., Director Emeritus of The Institute of Contemporary Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis, author of Craft & Spirit, Editor-in-Chief of thePsychoanalytic Inquiry Book Series. "While reading this book, I felt like I had entered the mind of the relational analyst. Both the carefully constructed mindset and the overall honoring of the work comes through in every chapter. As a director of the Masters in Counseling program at The Family Institute at Northwestern University, I am always looking for texts that convey both the passion and the skill associated with analytic work to be an inspiration to my students. I have found it."-Francesca Giordano, Ph.D., Program Director, Clinical Professor, The Counseling Program, The Family Institute at Northwestern University. "Originally a reaction against the constricting orthodoxy and authoritarianism of an entrenched psychoanalytic establishment, relational psychoanalysis has evolved into a sophisticated and comprehensive paradigm representing the leading edge of psychoanalytic thought.This masterful volume, with contributions by luminaries of the relational movement, elucidates the core assumptions and competencies of relational psychoanalysis.Simultaneously sweeping in scope and scholarly in detail, it is essential reading for students and experienced clinicians alike."-Jonathan Shedler, Ph.D., University of Colorado School of Medicine