* How is it that someone who has a problem is able to resolve it through conversation with another?* By the author of several classics in psychoanalysis* Written for patients and analysts alike In this essential new volume, Neville Symington, a highly respected psychoanalyst and author, considers why someone who has a problem is able to resolve it through conversation. The disciplines of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy are based upon the assumption that it is possible to resolve one's troubles in this manner. Combining his own substantial experience in psychoanalysis with rigorous academic research, Symington reminds us that psychoanalysis constitutes "not just an intellectual effort but an emotional transformation" facilitated through healing conversation.As a psychoanalyst, he seeks to illuminate the complexity and the sometimes painful ambiguity of human experience. He aims to avoid oversimplification, quick judgment, or reliance on established meta-narratives. The book therefore maintains a dialectical approach to its subject, continuing to raise questions and motivate further investigation.Written in an engaging style drawing on cultural, literary, and clinical sources, Symington moves from the broad themes of emotion, communication, and representation to the depth of clinical case studies. Though written specifically with psychoanalysts in mind, A Healing Conversation is a work that will appeal to many, not only those with an interest in this field.

The demand for psychotherapy and counseling is greater than ever. More and more people are enrolling on psychotherapy and counseling courses; the number of different associations in this industry has doubled and everyone knows someone who is in therapy or at least thinking about it. So are standards of practice being sacrificed while we are trying to keep up with the demand? Are the right people training to be psychotherapists? Have you got the right psychotherapist? "This little book is written for patients. It is a challenge to action. Do not be satisfied with a malingering treatment. Gird your loins and challenge your psychotherapist and be prepared to go to a new one. It is worth going to trouble to find the right person. Psychotherapy is a long and expensive process so ensure that you make it effective. It is your responsibility to find the right person. This book is a guide to help you in that search." -- From the Introduction

A rare and unusual consideration of the spiritual dimensions of sanity from a psychoanalytic perspective, this transcription of a series of seven lectures delivered at the Tavistock Clinic capture the spontaneity and immediacy of the interplay between one of the world's most eminent psychoanalysts and an audience of his peers. The author of the est

In this book, Neville Symington approaches the well-trodden subject of narcissism, offers us fresh insights from his long clinical experience with patients suffering from this disorder, and sketches some highlights in the history of the concept of narcissism.

This book is about a psychotherapist in the making, so both the strengths and errors of the psychotherapist are laid bare for the reader to scrutinize. It discusses psychotherapy in relation to such areas as modes of cure, conscience.

Psychoanalysis, with Freud as its founder, has vehemently denied the value of religious belief. In this radical book, re-issued with a new preface by the author and a foreword by Jon Stokes, Neville Symington makes the case that both traditional religion and psychoanalysis are failing because they exist apart and do not incorporate each other's values. The controversial conclusion of this fascinating study is that psychoanalysis is a spirituality-in-the-world, or a mature religion, and inseparable from acts of virtue.

The Growth of Mind is the product of a series of ten lectures by Neville Symington. It offers an understanding of the mind and its capacity to discover truth, establishing this as the foundation stone for our judgment and critique of the human world. Although the book's field of exploration lies in psychological processes met in the consulting-room, grounded in the general principles of psycho-analysis, the book's mode of enquiry is to elucidate a knowledge of individual people. Exploring the mind's active role in understanding, the book suggests that the act of understanding has a transformative function, and that to be a person is to be a part of a community. It suggests that the super-ego is a sign of some undeveloped function within the personality. If the ego and all its functions are fully evolved, then the super-ego will only be minimally present in the personality. Symington posits that the unconscious represents an agglomerative mass in an undifferentiated and indistinguishable state, rather than a realm of distinguishable thoughts or feelings that are not currently present to consciousness. The book attempts to understand better what this unconscious state is like and how we can think about it, underpinned by the belief that the better we understand it, the more its structure changes. The Growth of Mind is aimed at professionals and researchers who have a basic understanding of the mind and its mode of operating. It will help readers become aware of this knowledge, strengthening it in the process and allowing it to become a foundational source of inspiration.

In this book, Neville Symington approaches the well-trodden subject of narcissism, offers us fresh insights from his long clinical experience with patients suffering from this disorder, and sketches some highlights in the history of the concept of narcissism.

The demand for psychotherapy and counselling is greater than ever. More and more people are enrolling on psychotherapy and counselling courses; the number of different associations in this industry has doubled and everyone knows someone who is in therapy or at least thinking about it. So are standards of practice being sacrificed while we are tryin

Where does the creative act come from? No one knows. All the rash of literature in recent times from artists, scientists and theologians on the subject of consciousness finds its origin in this puzzle.Creating what has happened to one into an art form has one effect: it dissolves the barrier between the present and the past. The past is constantly stimulated into life by present experiencesparticularly when listening to someone else relating their experiences. It brings me then into a close sharing of experience with the other. Analytic theories are substitutes for these personal experiences.So these poems are a few casual glimpses when the spirit has risen to the challenge. They are not a big offering but they mean a lot to me. The most important of these is the long poem IN-GRATITUDE which comes first.

The papers in this book have been written over a period of fifteen years, and focus in the similarity between psychoanalysis and religion. The author argues that psychoanalysis can be seen as a scientific religion with Freud as the leader of the movement. He examines the various stages of the journey made by a religious leader from "blindness" to "founding an institution" and finds counterparts in the development of psychoanalysis while drawing examples from Buddhism, Christianity and Islam. He invites the reader on a journey with him - to examine the human mind, our society, the process of psychoanalysis, science and philosophy. He successfully uses examples from the consulting room to illuminate his arguments. The author's honest accounts of the search for answers relevant to all of us encourage the reader to think further and deeper than he or she had intended. 'The psychoanalyst examines scientifically the emotional pattern in himself and the other.

Author of many respected psychoanalytic works including Narcissism: A New Theory, Emotion and Spirit, Making of a Psychotherapist and Spirit of Sanity, the distinguished psychoanalyst Neville Symington's latest book expands, refines and deepens what has become an ever more impressive, far-reaching and absorbing inquiry into the nature of madness and sanity. It is Symington's central contention that the core psychopathology of our times can be identified and designated as narcissism, although self-centredness, egoism or solipsism might serve equally well. Critical of psychiatry's mere symptomatology, and of much psychotherapeutic practice as superficial and sterile, the present volume probes compellingly into the narcissistic pattern in an effort to delineate its structure in all its complexity and thereby gain a measure of perspective and distance from this most intractable of psychic states.

What Neville Symington is attempting to do in this book is to trace the pathway along which he has travelled to become a person. This has run side by side with trying to become an analyst. The author has made landmark discoveries when reading philosophy, sociology, history, and literature. Learning to paint, learning to fly a plane, and also the study of art and of aviation theory have opened up new vistas. This account is only a sketch. The completed picture will never materialize. It is therefore autobiographical but only in a partial sense. It is always emphasized that one's own personal experience of being psychoanalysed is by far the most significant part of a psychoanalyst's education.

An engaging book that charts the turbulent journey from childhood to adulthood of a well-known psychoanalyst. "Our human task is to be lived by Life. Life as a transcendent principle. It seems to me that a reliable test of whether we have lived worthwhile lives is this: is the world a better place for my having lived in it?" Neville Symington has written a dozen books about psychoanalysis but this one is different from all the others. It is an emotional autobiography that starts with his own birth and gives a character sketch of his mother and father and his upbringing in Portugal, with a two year period in Canada, and takes the reader through to the age of 45 by which time he was a qualified psychoanalyst, married with two sons and, at the time, living in London. This sounds like the story of a peaceful journey from childhood through to his chosen career in adulthood. However, the author takes the reader through the period of his earlier career in the Church in a parish in the East End of London and the turbulent period of change that led him to take leave of this first career, seek psychoanalysis and finally to become a psychoanalyst himself. This is an engaging book that charts the emotional storms and the ups and downs that beset the life's journey of a well-known psychoanalyst.

"Where does the creative act come from? No one knows. All the rash of literature in recent times from artists, scientists and theologians on the subject of consciousness finds its origin in this puzzle.Creating what has happened to one into an art form has one effect: it dissolves the barrier between the present and the past. The past is constantly stimulated into life by present experiences particularly when listening to someone else relating their experiences. It brings me then into a close sharing of experience with the other. Analytic theories are substitutes for these personal experiences.So these poems are a few casual glimpses when the spirit has risen to the challenge. They are not a big offering but they mean a lot to me. The most important of these is the long poem IN-GRATITUDE which comes first. It is the creation of some enormously important conversations I had with my mother shortly before she died."--Neville Symington, from the Introduction

What Neville Symington is attempting to do in this book is to trace the pathway along which he has travelled to become a person. This has run side by side with trying to become an analyst. The author has made landmark discoveries when reading philosophy, sociology, history, and literature. Learning to paint, learning to fly a plane, and also the study of art and of aviation theory have opened up new vistas. This account is only a sketch. The completed picture will never materialize. It is therefore autobiographical but only in a partial sense. It is always emphasized that one's own personal experience of being psychoanalysed is by far the most significant part of a psychoanalyst's education.

Author of many respected psychoanalytic works including Narcissism: A New Theory, Emotion and Spirit, Making of a Psychotherapist and Spirit of Sanity, the distinguished psychoanalyst Neville Symington's latest book expands, refines and deepens what has become an ever more impressive, far-reaching and absorbing inquiry into the nature of madness and sanity. It is Symington's central contention that the core psychopathology of our times can be identified and designated as narcissism, although self-centredness, egoism or solipsism might serve equally well. Critical of psychiatry's mere symptomatology, and of much psychotherapeutic practice as superficial and sterile, the present volume probes compellingly into the narcissistic pattern in an effort to delineate its structure in all its complexity and thereby gain a measure of perspective and distance from this most intractable of psychic states.

In the first part of the book - 'Personal Qualities' - we are reminded that Psychotherapy means 'Healing the Soul', and that the healer has a moral responsibility for the state of his own mental health as well as the patient's. The second part - 'Professional Dilemmas' - discusses ethical values, and the author's conviction that moral amorphism has caught hold of the psychotherapy movement.

There have been many expositions of psychoanalysis, but none so deeply rooted in clinical practice - both as it affects the patient, and even more as it affects the analyst. Neville Symington lectured to mental health professionals seconded to the Tavistock Centre; this book is the result of these lectures.

Psychoanalysis seen through Bion's eyes is a radical departure from all conceptualizations which preceded him. In this major contribution to the series Makers of Modern Psychotherapy, Joan and Neville Symington concentrate on understanding Bion's concepts in relation to clincial practice. Howeever, although the book is written especially for the clinician who is trying to see the application of Bion's thinking to his or her own work with patients, it is also accessible to the educated reader who wishes to understand the main contours of Bion's thinking. Rather than following the chronological development of Bion's ideas, each chapter looks in depth at an important theme in his thinking and describes how this contributes to his revolutionary model of the mind.

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The Growth of Mind is the product of a series of ten lectures by Neville Symington. It offers an understanding of the mind and its capacity to discover truth, establishing this as the foundation stone for our judgment and critique of the human world. Although the book's field of exploration lies in psychological processes met in the consulting-room, grounded in the general principles of psycho-analysis, the book's mode of enquiry is to elucidate a knowledge of individual people. Exploring the mind's active role in understanding, the book suggests that the act of understanding has a transformative function, and that to be a person is to be a part of a community. It suggests that the super-ego is a sign of some undeveloped function within the personality. If the ego and all its functions are fully evolved, then the super-ego will only be minimally present in the personality. Symington posits that the unconscious represents an agglomerative mass in an undifferentiated and indistinguishable state, rather than a realm of distinguishable thoughts or feelings that are not currently present to consciousness. The book attempts to understand better what this unconscious state is like and how we can think about it, underpinned by the belief that the better we understand it, the more its structure changes. The Growth of Mind is aimed at professionals and researchers who have a basic understanding of the mind and its mode of operating. It will help readers become aware of this knowledge, strengthening it in the process and allowing it to become a foundational source of inspiration.

A rare and unusual consideration of the spiritual dimensions of sanity from a psychoanalytic perspective, this transcription of a series of seven lectures delivered at the Tavistock Clinic capture the spontaneity and immediacy of the interplay between one of the world's most eminent psychoanalysts and an audience of his peers. The author of the established psychoanalytic classics Emotion and Spirit, Narcissism: A New Theory; and The Analytic Experience here brings his characteristic insight and innovation to the question of how the traditional Freudian view of religious belief as neurotic or illusory can be reconciled with a way of taking up psychoanalytic work without abandoning the spiritual dimension to life.

Psychoanalysis, with Freud as its founder, has vehemently denied the value of religious belief. In this radical book, re-issued with a new preface by the author and a foreword by Jon Stokes, Neville Symington makes the case that both traditional religion and psychoanalysis are failing because they exist apart and do not incorporate each other's values. The controversial conclusion of this fascinating study is that psychoanalysis is a spirituality-in-the-world, or a mature religion, and inseparable from acts of virtue.