Understanding Religion and Spirituality in Clinical Practice is a volume in the clinical practice monograph series from the Society of Analytical Psychology. This series is intended primarily for trainees on psychotherapy and psychodynamic counselling courses, and for those who are newly qualified. Here, the author considers the difficulties clinicians may encounter when patients talk about God or about their spiritual life, and how necessary it is for therapists to examine their own image of God and their own understanding of spirituality, so that they can distinguish these from those of their patients. She emphasizes how varied are people's images and understanding of what "God" stands for, and how in healthy development these will change over time. The book demonstrates, through numerous clinical vignettes, how clinicians can understand a patient's talking about religion or about God - hearing the voice of God, having a vision of God, or being convinced that God wants them to act in a particular way; or, equally, seeing the Devil.


Understanding the Self-Ego Relationship in Clinical Practice: TowardsIndividuation is a volume in the clinical practice monograph series from The Society of Analytical Psychology. This series is intended primarily for trainees on psychotherapy and psychodynamic counselling courses, and for those who are newly qualified. These compact editions will be invaluable to all who wish to learn the basics of major theories derived from the work of Freud and Jung, from an integrated viewpoint. The authors are Jungian analysts trained at the SAP, highly experienced in both theory and practice. The author argues for the profound importance of trusting the unconscious psyche in therapeutic work with adults. She considers various analytical meanings of the term "the self", with reference to a wide range of theorists, and various ways of thinking about the development of the ego. She uses primarily a Jungian model of the psyche from a developmental perspective, based on the assumption that the ego evolves in infancy and childhood out of a primary psychosomatic self.