Reviews & guides
Essays and online-therapy service guides from the Karnacology archive.
Affordable Online Therapy: Costs, Who It Fits & How to Start
Compare affordable online therapy services, real costs, insurance tips, and when it works best. Find low-cost counseling that fits your budget and needs.
Read the essay Best Online Psychiatry Services: Legit, Costs & Reddit Picks
Compare top online psychiatry services for medication management and therapy. Learn about costs, legitimacy, and what Reddit users say before you choose.
Read the essay Best Online Therapy That Takes Insurance: Platforms & Guide
Find the best online therapy that takes insurance. Compare platforms, costs, and coverage. Learn who it's for, mistakes to avoid, and how to start.
Read the essay Best Therapy for Anxiety & Depression: Types, Costs, Fit
Compare evidence-based therapies for anxiety and depression. Learn who benefits, real costs, common mistakes, and how to find the right therapist.
Read the essay Best Therapy for Anxiety: Which Approach Fits You?
Compare top anxiety therapies (CBT, ACT, exposure) by effectiveness, cost, and personal fit. Learn who benefits most, common mistakes, and how to start.
Read the essay BetterHelp Alternatives: 7 Smarter Picks for 2024
Compare top BetterHelp alternatives for 2024. See who each fits, real costs, and common mistakes. Find affordable online therapy that matches your needs.
Read the essay BetterHelp vs Talkspace: Which Online Therapy Fits You?
Compare BetterHelp and Talkspace costs, therapy formats, insurance coverage, and ideal users. Find out which platform matches your mental health needs.
Read the essay Brightside Online Psychiatry Reviews: Costs, Legitimacy & Who It Fits
Unbiased Brightside Health review covering real costs, medication prescribing, scam concerns, and who should (and shouldn't) use it. Read before you sign u.
Read the essay Couples Therapy vs Marriage Counseling: Key Differences
Compare couples therapy vs marriage counseling: who each helps, costs, common mistakes, and when to choose one. Get clarity for your relationship.
Read the essay Is BetterHelp Worth It? Cost, Pros & Who It’s For (2024)
BetterHelp worth it? We analyze costs ($60-$90/week), who it helps, common mistakes, and alternatives. Read real user insights and research before you sign.
Read the essay Is Couples Therapy Worth It? Who It Helps, Costs & When to Skip
Discover when couples therapy is worth the investment, typical costs, success rates, and who should avoid it. A realistic, no-hype guide.
Read the essay Is Online Therapy Worth It? A Cost-Benefit Guide
Compare costs, effectiveness, and real user experiences to decide if online therapy fits your needs. Includes reddit insights, insurance tips, and a decisi.
Read the essay Online Psychiatrist vs In-Person: Which Is Right for You?
Compare online vs in-person psychiatrists: costs, effectiveness, who it's best for, and common mistakes. Make an informed choice for your mental health.
Read the essay Online Therapy vs In Person: Costs, Effectiveness & Who It’s For
Compare online therapy vs in person therapy on cost, effectiveness, and fit. Learn who benefits most, common mistakes, and how to choose wisely.
Read the essay Online Therapy Prices: Real Costs & Who It Fits
Compare online therapy prices, see who it works for, and avoid overpaying. Get cost breakdowns, insurance tips, and affordable alternatives.
Read the essay Rewiring the Human Brain to Train it for Obedience and Violence: The Psychological Reality of Military Training, by David Gee
The First Ambush: Hijacking the Human Brain ‘Unbeknown to me at the time, the army’s training and/or indoctrination would come to shape my life, my decisi
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The Therapy Womb, by Michael Eigen
Psychoanalytic Beauty and the Unborn Self I remember the first one-on-one session I had with a patient when I began training. I felt I could breathe in an
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Psychoanalysis, the NHS, and Mental Health Work Today, by Alison Vaspe
Is there a way of promoting or instituting better integrated services? This March will see the publication of a timely and significant book illustrating t
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Attachment Theory: Working Towards Learned Security, by Rhona M. Fear
The Importance of differentiating between ‘Learned Security’ and ‘Earned Security’ After almost three decades working as a psychoanalytic psychotherapist,
Read the essay Sports on the Couch, by Ricardo A. Rubinstein
How the Psychological and the Somatic Interact and Play Off Each Other This book explores how we think about and understand sport from the perspective of
Read the essay What To Do If the Mind Does Not Develop, by Roberto Bertolini
A Psychoanalytic Study of Pervasive Developmental Disorders What To Do If the Mind Does Not Develop is a psychoanalytic study of pervasive developmental d
Read the essay Permission to Narrate: Explorations in Group Analysis, Psychoanalysis, Culture, by Martin Weegmann
The Origins of Permission to Narrate I’d just finished The World Within the Group (2014) and had several lines of research and chapter drafts that did not
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The Power of Inner Pictures, by Thomas Kretschmar and Martin Tzschaschel
How Imagination Can Maintain Physical and Mental Health Many would not believe it, but you can accomplish a great deal with inner pictures. The power of t
Read the essay Children of Refugees: Torture, Human Rights, and Psychological Consequences, by Aida Alayarian
Addressing the Gap Between the Psychological Needs of Children and the Services Provided An Afghan refugee girl holds her younger sister In a world where
Read the essay The Political Self: Understanding the Social Context for Mental Illness, by Rod Tweedy
How Society Shapes Who We Are The Political Self explores how our social and economic contexts profoundly affect our mental health and well-being, and how
Read the essay The Future of Psychoanalysis, by Peter Zagermann
The Debate about the Training Analyst System The Future of Psychoanalysis is a call to action with the aim of reaching a fundamental discussion within our
Read the essay Teaching the World to Sleep, by David R. Lee
Psychological and Behavioural Assessment and Treatment Strategies for People with Sleeping Problems and Insomnia Teaching the World to Sleep was written o
Read the essay Portraits of the Insane: Theodore Gericault and the Subject of Psychotherapy, by Robert Snell
Entering the Analytic Frame: Psychoanalysis as Romantic Science Following the talk I gave at the Freud Museum on October 6 to celebrate the publication of
Read the essay Critical Flicker Fusion: Psychoanalysis at the Movies, by William Fried
Publishing a Book About Psychoanalysis and Movies I have been a psychoanalyst for about 45 years, and a writer all of my life. Conducted seriously, both p
Read the essay Using Mentalizing in practice
Why Mentalization is a gift for anyone working with Trauma and Neglect The interest in mentalization as a concept has been steadily on the rise over the l
Read the essay Psychoanalysis, Identity and the Internet, by Andrea Marzi
Explorations into Cyberspace Every day on the internet we look for information, play videogames, chat, work, or buy something. But what exactly is the nat
Read the essay Psychoanalysis in South Africa, by Joan Raphael
How Psychoanalysis is Taking Root in South Africa The history of psychoanalysis in South Africa is a story of tenaciousness. It began after Wulf Sachs emi
Read the essay Mabel Dodge Luhan, A. A. Brill, and the Psychoanalytic Adventure in America, by Patricia R. Everett
Corresponding Lives: Mabel Dodge Luhan’s letters to A.A. Brill, the first American psychoanalyst Mabel Dodge Sterne in Taos (c. 1918) and A. A. Brill (c.
Read the essay Karen Izod
(Advanced Reinforcement Section, 2nd Echelon, June 1944) You cried at the 50th anniversary. It had been a long wait for the defences of a logistics man to
Read the essay Brett Kahr and PETER RUDNYTSKY
Professor Peter Rudnytsky, the distinguished psychoanalytical historian and author, and Honorary Member of the American Psychoanalytic Association, has pub
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MENTAL FIGHT CLUB
Mental Fight Club (MFC) was founded by Sarah Wheeler in Southwark in 2003, as a creative force for change led by service users. The group has been running
Read the essay Meltzer in Venice, by Maria Elena Petrilli, Hugo Marquez, and Mauro Rossetti
Adolescent sexuality, aesthetic conflict, and the importance of case discussions Meltzer in Venice: Seminars with the Racker Group of Venice demonstrates
Read the essay Unrepressed Unconscious, Implicit Memory, and Clinical Work, by Giuseppe Craparo and Clara Mucci
The psychological and neurobiological characteristics of the ‘unrepressed unconscious’ and the role of the right hemisphere What do we mean by “unrepresse
Read the essay Under the Totem: In Search of a Path, by Michael Eigen
The further we go, the more there is to go Totem conveys spirit, a sense of the sacred. Freud attempted to get under the totem and explore psychic forces
Read the essay An Evolutionary Leap: Colin Wilson on Psychology, by Colin Stanley
The author, philosopher, and existential psychologist Colin Wilson (1931-2013) Colin Wilson was born on June 26, 1931 in Leicester—the first child of Arth
Read the essay The Other Side of Silence, by Pauline Schokman
A story about the stories we tell ourselves The Other Side of Silence is a novel about many things; intergenerational trauma, unresolved grief, the way in
Read the essay Sexual Abuse and the Sexual Offender: Common Man or Monster?, by Barry Maletzky
Challenging the Myths Surrounding Sexual Abuse and Sexual Offenders There are few crimes which evoke more horror and loathing than sexual abuse, especiall
Read the essay Brexit, Boris, and Betrayal: How Boarding School Syndrome continues to shape Political Debate, by Nick Duffell
Divided by education, by design, by normalised duplicity, should the UK be surprised to find itself in deep trouble? The shocking events, misinformation,
Read the essay The Cross-Cultural Kaleidoscope: A Systems Approach to Coaching, by Jenny Plaister
How Intercultural Understanding Enriches the Coaching Relationship My book, The Cross-Cultural Kaleidoscope, was written over a period of four years, in a
Read the essay The Wisdom of Lived Experience, by Maxine K. Anderson
How the ongoing dialogue between the left and right hemispheres constitutes our mental reality My book The Wisdom of Lived Experience explores various asp
Read the essay Better Late than Never: The Reparative Therapeutic Relationship in Regression to Dependence, by Lorraine Price
Regressing to move forwards My search for healing began many years ago, when I was experiencing unhappiness and extreme anxiety with panic attacks. I ente
Read the essay Breathing as a Tool for Self-Regulation and Self
Living in the Breath: Breathing as a tool for professionals in health care, interpersonal work, teaching and guidance When introducing people to the breat
Read the essay False Bodies, True Selves: Moving Beyond Appearance
The Objectified Body as a Transitional Object in Anorexia and Body Dysmorphic Disorders False Bodies, True Selves: Moving Beyond Appearance-Focused Identi
Read the essay Making Room for Madness in Mental Health, by Marcus Evans
The Psychoanalytic Understanding of Psychotic Communication In her foreword of my book, Edna O’Shaughnessy says ‘that the psychoanalytic method does not k
Read the essay The Scientific Status of Psychoanalysis, by Pushpa Misra
Testing Freud: Evidence and Confirmation It was 1986 and I was taking a course with Henry Kyburg, Jr at the University of Rochester where I was enrolled t
Read the essay A Forgotten Freudian: The Passion of Karl Stern, by Daniel Burston
The Pillar of Fire: Psychoanalysis and Religion Ever since my undergraduate days, I’ve been interested in the relationship between psychoanalysis and reli
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True Tales of Organisational Life, by Barbara
Crafting Stories: Allowing Form and Meaning to Emerge In 2009 when I was invited to become the facilitator of Schwartz Rounds at the Royal Free Hospital i
Read the essay The Language of Distress: Understanding a Child’s Behaviour, by A.H. Brafman
Translating the Language of Squiggles As is well known, each specialist approaches his patients concentrating on his particular field of work. If his inve
Read the essay Had: Child abuse and the erosion of trust, by Ian Mucklejohn
The Tragedy of Crookham Court School In 1969 Ian Mucklejohn went as a supply teacher to Crookham Court School, a private boys’ school in Berkshire, where
Read the essay Into the Darkest Places: Early Relational Trauma and Borderline States of Mind, by Marcus West
How early traumatic experiences, and our primitive responses to them, become embedded in our personalities We live in fascinating times, where recent adva
Read the essay Racist States of Mind, by Narendra Keval
Rationalism and Racism: how modern racism has its roots in the Enlightenment The aim of my new book, Racist States of Mind: Understanding the Perversion o
Read the essay Ethics of Evil: Psychoanalytic Investigations, by Ronald C. Naso and Jon Mills
Moralizing Evil Are we headed toward human extinction? All inhabited continents are engaged in military conflict, and there is no foreseeable end in sight
Read the essay Married Life and its Vicissitudes: A Therapeutic Approach, by Arturo Varchevker
How therapy can transform marital miscommunication into constructive communication Marital therapy has developed significantly in the last few decades and
Read the essay Freud and War, by Marlène Belilos
Thoughts for the Times on War and Death War is obviously still a core issue for us today – just as it was for Freud, as Eugenie Lemoine-Luccioni observes
Read the essay Fighting Melancholia: What Don Quixote Teaches Us, by Françoise Davoine
The Therapist as Therapon: A Healing Sancho Panzo The success of Cervantes’ classic novel Don Quixote – reputed to be the second bestselling book after th
Read the essay The Hands of Gravity and Chance, by Thomas H. Ogden
Take a Chance, Read a Novel The Hands of Gravity and Chance is about the interior life of the members of a family, as well as the interior life of the fam
Read the essay How Marcel Proust taught me how to detect a sadomasochistic game, by Hendrika C. Freud
Perversion serves a Purpose Helene, an intelligent hardworking woman in her mid forties, mother of three, twice divorced, seeks treatment. She considers h
Read the essay The Therapy Process from Inside Out and Outside In, by John C. Espy
Psychoanalysis is a psychic pilgrimage that reveals the depths of our loves and our depravities I thought long and hard about what to write for Karnacolog
Read the essay Perversions and Paraphilias: Sergio Benvenuto asks what the concept of “perversion” means today
Sexuality, Ethics, Psychoanalysis Many deny that perversions exist. Even despite the fact that today’s dominant psychiatry has re-baptized them as paraphi
Read the essay Mentalizing in Arts Therapy, by Marianne Verfaille
Forging a link between arts therapies and mentalization-based treatment When clients work with nonverbal means such as art, movement or music in a way tha
Read the essay Madness Dispersed or Disseminated: A re
Madness in a Maddening World Psychosis can be seen as the sign or symptom of disturbances within our present cultural situation in the world. For a signif
Read the essay David Bowie: Alienation and Stardom, by Rod Tweedy
Schizophrenia, Spaceboys, and the Spiders from Mars The death of David Bowie has revived both intense media interest in his work and astonishing creative
Read the essay Christopher Bollas
Christopher Bollas on the Enigma of Schizophrenia Christopher Bollas is a member of the British Psychoanalytical Society, the Los Angeles Institute and So
Read the essay The Snake in the Clinic: Psychotherapy’s Role in Medicine and Healing, by Guy Dargert
Symptom as symbol: the metaphors of the soul’s true story Many psychotherapists and general medical practitioners subscribe to the popular understanding t
Read the essay Desy Safan
Music to Painting: My Encounters with Pierre Boulez I was only 19 years old when I first met Pierre Boulez. I was singing in the choir of the University o
Read the essay ABOUT
Karnacology Karnacology provides knowledge and ideas for mental health professionals who practice talking therapies or any form of talking treatment in wo
Read the essay Rod Tweedy
Iain McGilchrist, Ang Lee and the Revolution of Perception Ang Lee’s remarkable film adaptation of Life of Pi (2012) is a revelation both of the nature of
Read the essay Ismond Rosen
Pioneer in the synthesis of art and science ‘Civilization’ by Ismond Rosen Ismond Rosen (1924–1996) artist, psychoanalyst, and psychiatrist, created a va
Read the essay Janet Sayers
Barbara Hepworth, Adrian Stokes, and Melanie Klein Barbara Hepworth was keen on carving. So was her close friend, Adrian Stokes, who, unlike Hepworth, was
Read the essay Tessa Christie
Tessa Christie’s art explores the relationships between memory and space, structure and content, and the outer and inner worlds “They are about memory. In
Read the essay ART/THERAPY
Celebrating the creativity of the therapeutic process and the therapeutic nature of art The transformative power of the human imagination is central to th
Read the essay Harry Karnac
HARRY KARNAC (1919-2014): ‘The Prince of Psychological Bookselling’ by Professor Brett Kahr On Friday, 4th April, 2014, at approximately 2.00 a.m., Harry
Read the essay ERNST FALZEDER and BRETT KAHR
INTERVIEW WITH Dr. ERNST FALZEDER by Professor Brett Kahr To mark the publication of Psychoanalytic Filiations: Mapping the Psychoanalytic Movement, Karn
Read the essay RICHARD HILL from Mindsight TV interviews Brent Potter
Fascinating interview with Brent Potter discussing R.D. Laing, Iain McGilchrist, trauma, the American mind, and how to embrace the Unknown. In a wonderful
Read the essay Adam Phillips
Adam Phillips/RSA Interview: Psychoanalysis: Is it Worth It? Adam Phillips, one of Britain’s most renowned psychoanalysts and literary figures, joined RSA
Read the essay PROJECTS
Mental Fight Club (MFC) was founded by Sarah Wheeler in Southwark in 2003, as a creative force for change led by service users. The group has been running
Read the essay Iain McGilchrist: Interview
Iain McGilchrist explores the key themes of his book ‘The Master and His Emissary’ The Master and his Emissary is perhaps the most influential and signifi
Read the essay Hillman: Mythology and Therapy
James Hillman explains why we need to reconnect with our ‘outer’ soul and stop psychology from becoming a trivialised and banal industry James Hillman stu
Read the essay Lacan: Seminar recording (1972)
This footage is from an extremely rare recording of Lacan giving a lecture at Louvain University on 13th Octover 1972. As Sheerly Avni notes, the film is n
Read the essay Clark: RELIGION and SPIRITUALITY
Understanding Religion and Spirituality in Clinical Practice is a volume in the clinical practice monograph series from the Society of Analytical Psycholog
Read the essay Bogart : DREAMWORK
Greg Bogart’s book Dreamwork and Self-Healing: Unfolding the Symbols of the Unconscious is a rich and detailed contribution to the study of dreamwork from
Read the essay A View from the Attic: Karen Izod on Place and Memory
The Intersection of the Timeless Moment Clandon Park is one of those landmark places on my doorstep that is part of the fabric of living, as I do, on the
Read the essay Meg Harris Williams
Art and aesthetic conflict ‘Couple by Candlelight’ by Meg Harris Williams These days the arts are no longer seen merely as neurotic material to be interp
Read the essay BRETT KAHR and ILONKA VENIER ALEXANDER
Professor Brett Kahr interviews Ilonka Venier Alexander, the granddaughter of Sigmund Freud’s pupil Franz Alexander, exclusively for Karnacology Franz Gab
Read the essay Peter Philippson on Gestalt Therapy
Karnac Books: What made you write this book? Peter Philippson: I have been developing an understanding of psychotherapy and the Gestalt approach over more
Read the essay GOODYEAR: Coaching People with A.S.
Bill Goodyear’s book offers hope to people with Asperger’s Syndrome the first book to take a coaching approach scandal of diagnosis without treatment a
Read the essay Leader: WHAT IS MADNESS?
What is Madness? Despite the best efforts of the mental health charities mental illness still has a very bad press in this country. This is particularly t
Read the essay INTO TA—Personal reflections, by Bill Cornell
The Evolution of Transactional Analysis The evolution of Into TA: A Comprehensive Textbook proved to be quite an adventure. The roots of this book were in
Read the essay Treating People with Psychosis in Institutions: A Psychoanalytic Perspective, by Belinda Mackie
How to Understand Institutions that Care for Patients There are many paths that offer an understanding of the experience of people with psychosis, and num
Read the essay Jung and Shiva: Encounters with a subterranean God, by Smita Rajput Kamble
The Mind in the Cave and the Cave in the Mind “Everything in the unconscious seeks outward manifestation and the personality too desires to evolve out of
Read the essay Darian Leader
Darian Leader on the Marketing of Depression Darian Leader is a British psychoanalyst and author who studied philosophy in Cambridge and then history of s
Read the essay Being With and Saying Goodbye: A Reflection, by Andrew F. West
Healing Between the Lines: How doing and being go hand-in-hand My book (I feel inclined to say “my first book”), Being With and Saying Goodbye, has just b
Read the essay Being With and Saying Goodbye: A Reflection, by Andrew West
Healing Between the Lines: How doing and being go hand-in-hand My book (I feel inclined to say “my first book”), Being With and Saying Goodbye, has just b
Read the essay Disability Psychotherapy: An Innovative Approach to Trauma
A Psychoanalytically-informed approach to helping and supporting people with disabilities This book represents a life-times work with people with learning
Read the essay Psychiatric Rehabilitation: A Psychoanalytic Approach to Recovery, by Dr Raman Kapur MBE
Therapeutic atmospheres can be created anywhere One flew into the cuckoo’s nest—but how do we help them get out? We are all familiar with the usual images
Read the essay Wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas and a happy and peaceful New Year
Why Peace is Not Just for Christmas, by Rod Tweedy Last year saw the centenary of the Christmas Truce of World War One – the remarkable event in which sol
Read the essay Illuminati ritual abuse and mind control: a true story, by Wendy Hoffman
How Mind Control Programming is Accomplished and How it Works White Witch in a Black Robe: A True Story of Criminal Mind Control brings to light an underc
Read the essay Moment of Clarity: Carl Jung and Alcoholics Anonymous, by Ian McCabe
Is Alcoholism Primarily a Spiritual Illness? The 12 Steps as a Spiritual Journey of Individuation As part of my research journey for my book, Carl Jung an
Read the essay Why Dignity Matters, by Susan S. Levine
Write or Wrong: What Patients Tell Me About Dignity and Psychoanalytic Treatment “The talking cure.” These words were first uttered by Bertha Pappenheim,
Read the essay Couple Dynamics, by Aleksandra Novakovic
Psychoanalytic perspectives in work with the individuals, the couple, and the group This book presents psychoanalytic thinking about the phenomenon of the
Read the essay Filming Bion’s ‘A Memoir of the Future’, by Meg Harris Williams
The Becoming Room This book, whose writing spans 33 years, records a series of experiments in dramatizing Bion’s A Memoir of the Future. The main project
Read the essay ‘The lonely, isolated, unwanted, mocked, and misunderstood’: Some comments on Asperger’s disorder, by Robin Holloway
Refining the Spectrum: We Need Better Diagnostic Distinctions for Children with AS Lonely, isolated, unwanted, mocked, shunned, rejected, denigrated, desp
Read the essay The Topological Transformation of Freud’s Theory, by Jean
The Future of Psychoanalysis Today in the Babelisation and disorder of the psychoanalytic movement, the Lacanian theory constitutes the open reformulation
Read the essay The Motive for Metaphor: Brief Essays on Poetry and Psychoanalysis, by Henry M. Seiden
How the poetic and psychoanalytic processes illuminate each other The Motive for Metaphor can be thought of as a small anthology: each chapter a kind of m
Read the essay Therapy with Infants: Treating a Traumatised Child, by Inger Thormann and Inger Poulsen
Everything That is Left Unsaid Ties up Energy Therapy with Infants outlines a form of psychotherapy aimed at infants and young children who have experienc
Read the essay Counselling children and young people in private practice: A practical guide, by Rebecca Kirkbride
Parents are increasingly turning to private practitioners for therapy for their children Therapeutic work with children, young people and their families i
Read the essay The Psychomatrix: A Deeper Understanding of Our Relationship with Pain, by Doreen M. Francis
It is not the pain we suffer, but our relationship to it that makes life complicated My book The Psychomatrix began with just a shadow of an idea that had
Read the essay The Oedipus Complex: Solutions or Resolutions?, by Rhona M. Fear
How our attachment experiences determine our response to unresolved oedipal issues I always think it is fascinating to discover what makes a particular au
Read the essay Love and Therapy: In Relationship, by Divine Charura and Stephen Paul
You are Good Enough In modern culture love has a prominent position. Television dramas, songs and novels as well as popular magazines all focus on love in
Read the essay Militarizing Minds: Media Violence and the Military, by Lt. Col. Dave Grossman
We’re teaching our kids not how to Remember, but how to Kill Introduction Why should we study killing? One might just as readily ask, Why study sex? The
Read the essay Anorexia: A Plea for Better Treatment, by Sophia Gore
That’s the catch when you stop eating — food starts to eat you Writing The Rustle of a Wing: Finding Hope Beyond Anorexia has been both a challenge and a
Read the essay Image, Sense, Infinities, and Everyday Life : Acts of Shared Faith, by Michael Eigen
‘On the seashore of endless worlds, children play’ I have been fascinated by images ever since I can remember. How embarrassing for my mother, proudly int
Read the essay Lynette Harborne
Psychotherapy and Spiritual Direction – Interview Lynette Harborne tells us all about the writing process of her book Psychotherapy and Spiritual Directio
Read the essay Freud: audio recording
Sigmund Freud on the BBC – 1938: On December 7, 1938, the BBC came to Freud’s Maresfield Gardens home in London to record a short message. By this time hi
Read the essay The Freud
‘Why War?’: The Freud-Einstein Letters To coincide with the launch of the Freud Museum’s landmark exhibition ‘Why War?‘ Karnacology is reprinting the lett
Read the essay Haney: REGULATION IN ACTION
It often comes as a surprise to many people, but in theory anybody can put a brass plaque on their door, an advertisement in the paper, and declare that th
Read the essay The therapy relationship: A special kind of friendship, by Richard Hallam
The Bedrock of Therapy is our Shared Humanity As professions that are now firmly entrenched in society, psychotherapy and counselling are relative newcome
Read the essay MEDEA: Myth and Unconscious Fantasy, by Esa Roos
‘The Dark Continent’: Myths of Femininity According to Freud (1933) the theory of the instincts is so to say our mythology. Instincts are mythical entitie
Read the essay Magic, Storytelling and Childhood: the origins of Rensal the Redbit, by Eugene J. Mahon
‘Once Upon An Analysis…’ The psychoanalytic voyage of discovery is probably impossible to capture in words. If every analysis is unique, the signature of
Read the essay Paul Marcus on how humour is a serious business, in both therapy and life
Laughing with Two Rabbis and an Imam During my research for writing my book How To Laugh Your Way Through Life. A Psychoanalyst’s Advice (Karnac, 2013), I
Read the essay The Vicissitudes of Totemism: Gérard Lucas explains how our changing view of totemism reflects our own cultural markings
One hundred years after Totem and Taboo Although it was the object of numerous publications by ethnologists from the mid-nineteenth century up to the Firs
Read the essay ‘Invisible Mending: A Novel’, by Guillermo Julio Montero
‘Always’ is a beautiful word This is a film made with the sentences and the plot of the novel Invisible Mending by Argentine psychoanalyst and novelist Gu
Read the essay A Nazi Legacy: The Transgenerational Inheritance of Trauma, by Vamık D. Volkan
Depositing, Transgenerational Transmission, Dissociation and Remembering through Action As a psychoanalyst, I have been actively involved in international
Read the essay The Enigma of Childhood: How our earliest relationships profoundly shape all our later ones, by Ronnie Solan
The Space of Shared Experience and the Art of Couplehood I would like to invite you to delve right in and explore the enigma of the art of couplehood and
Read the essay Analysing the Social Context of Individual Distress: Celebrating the Pioneering Work of David Smail
David Smail: Clinical Psychologist, Sociologist, Philosopher, and Political Critic As Karnac Books republish four key works by the pioneering clinical psy
Read the essay The Courage of Simplicity: Hanni Biran explores the central ideas in the work of W.R. Bion
Psychoanalytic thinking through three prisms: person, group, and society The chapters of this book were written throughout a period of many years. The ide
Read the essay Yoga and Autism: Making a Connection, by Nicole Schnackenberg
How yoga can promote embodiment, connection, sensory integration, and anxiety-reduction in children Recent figures estimate that approximately 1% of the p
Read the essay Integrative Gestalt Practice: Transforming our ways of working with people, by Mikael Sonne and Jan Tønnesvang
A new approach to understanding and working with complexity and wholeness in people’s lives Integrative Gestalt Practice (IGP) is a new framework and form
Read the essay Consuming Violence: forensic psychoanalyst John C. Espy on our fascination with serial killers
A Journey Through the Dark Boroughs of a Pedophilic Cannibal’s Mind Nathaniel Bar Jonah would regularly say, when questioned about the murder of the 10-ye
Read the essay How the experience of grief and loss shapes our world, by Vamık D. Volkan
Life after Loss: The Lessons of Grief I was born in Cyprus, a Mediterranean island, when it was a British colony. After completing my high school educatio
Read the essay What are the barriers and obstacles to adults learning? David Mathew explains the concept of ‘Fragile Learning’
Adult Education: The Anxiety of Influence and the Influence of Anxiety Fragile Learning: The Influence of Anxiety asks the reader to consider a wide varie
Read the essay The Journey: My Time with Cancer, by Patrick Casement
Patrick Casement’s moving account of being diagnosed with Burkitt’s lymphoma Preamble Ever since I came out of hospital (three years ago) I have several
Read the essay Cultivating a Metaphor: Smita Rajput Kamble unearths the secrets of therapeutic growth
Psychotherapy as Farming – The Story of Anna Hazare and the Healing of a Village If you google ‘Anna Hazare’ on www.bbc.co.uk , the most prominent picture
Read the essay Freud and the Buddha: Axel Hoffer on what Psychoanalysis and Buddhism can learn from each other
The Couch and the Cushion My book, Freud and the Buddha: the Couch and the Cushion, aims to explore what two traditions dedicated to the alleviation of hu
Read the essay Freud and the Buddha: Alex Hoffer on what Psychoanalysis and Buddhism can learn from each other
The Couch and the Cushion My book, Freud and the Buddha: the Couch and the Cushion, is a unique contribution to the subject of what two traditions dedicat
Read the essay Ronald Britton discusses his new book ‘Between Mind and Brain’
Models of the Mind, and Models in the Mind “In every writer on philosophy there is a concealed metaphysic, usually unconscious; even if his subject is met
Read the essay Arlene Kramer Richards and Lucille Spira consider the role of myths in the psychology of contemporary women
Myths of Mighty Women: Their Application in Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy It is the premise of our book Myths of Mighty Women, that the Oedipus myth which
Read the essay Analysis of the Incest Trauma, by Arnold W. Rachman and Susan A. Klett
Retrieval, Recovery, and Renewal “What have we done to you – poor child?”- Sigmund Freud (1897) There is an important irony in psychoanalysis that our bo
Read the essay Psychoanalysis Online: Jill Savege Scharff discusses the impact of technology on development, training, and therapy
Technology, teleanalysis and teletherapy How does technology impact the human mind? Developmental, neuroscientific research and clinical experience confir
Read the essay Love, Art, and Psychoanalysis: Janet Sayers explores ‘at-one
The Interpretation of the Other: An Analysis of Love ‘Oh, yes, I’ve been in love before alright but though violently not to a hundredth this degree. For I
Read the essay David Gee explores the mental health issues of youth recruitment on ‘Armed Forces Day’
PTSD, Suicide, Alcoholism, Child Recruitment, and Violence: Aspects of Mental Health in today’s British Armed Forces Although not all veterans are severel
Read the essay Kabbalah and Sigmund Freud: Joseph Berke uncovers The Hidden Freud
The Covert Freud and the Lights He Lit on Western Culture There were many Freuds: the scholar, the academic, the researcher, the neurologist, the founder
Read the essay Psychoanalyst and playwright Antonio Quinet discusses the origins of his play about Freud
Hilda and Freud: Collected Words Antonio Quinet in the performance of the play (Freud Museum, 2013) This is a play on Hilda Doolittle’s analysis with Fre
Read the essay Meg Harris Williams reveals the true story of Oedipus
Suffering into Truth: The Achievement of Oedipus Given that the story of Oedipus is foundational to psychoanalytic thinking it is surprising that there ha
Read the essay Leticia Franieck and Michael Günter: On Latency
On Latency: Individual Development, Narcissistic Impulse, Reminiscence, and Cultural Ideal In psychoanalytical terms latency is defined as a developmental
Read the essay W.M. Bernstein explains why it is impossible to reduce psychology to biology
Objective Subjectivity: A Basic Theory of Neuropsychoanalysis Freud’s ideas about the mind, evolution, and culture were revolutionary. Psychoanalytic theo
Read the essay Salomon Resnik on the Importance of Ludic Transference
Confessions of a psychoanalyst who has not forgotten how to play There I was, walking along the streets of Buenos Aires in the early 1950s, when I ran int
Read the essay Jacqueline Schaeffer re
The Universal Refusal: A Psychoanalytic Exploration of the Feminine Sphere and its Repudiation Faced with the difficulties and setbacks that he was encoun
Read the essay Nick Duffell puts the Establishment on the Couch
The Establishment on the Couch: Analysing the politics of blame, fear, apathy and denial Psychotherapy and politics As Britain nervily approaches an unpr
Read the essay KIDS COMPANY
CHILDREN’S REALITIES TODAY – THE STATISTICS. 3.5 million children in the UK are living in poverty (Barnados) Almost 1.5 million children in the UK experi
Read the essay Andrew Samuels considers how therapy can transform politics
A New Therapy for Politics? Andrew’s new book, A New Therapy for Politics?, will be published by Karnac. Here he trails some of the ideas that are develop
Read the essay Thomas T. Lawson: Jung and evolutionary science
The Evolution of Consciousness I would like to think of my book, Carl Jung: Darwin of the Mind, as offering a useful primer for the non-specialist who wis
Read the essay In the run
On Psychoanalysis and the Politics of Representation Thinking psychoanalytically about a phenomenon involves conceiving of it in a way that takes account
Read the essay Aviation psychologist Professor Robert Bor examines the mental health issues behind the recent Germanwings plane tragedy
The Eve of Destruction: Germanwings flight 4U 9525 and Pilot Suicide A popular but dated image of pilots probably derives from war movies showing scenes i
Read the essay David Buckley reflects on the interplay between religion and psychology
Where the Waters Meet: Convergence and Complementarity in Therapy and Theology In 1957 the art critic Carlton Lake (1915-2006) enjoyed a remarkably frank
Read the essay Wyn Bramley uncovers the unconscious processes that create or destroy relationships
Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered This book is addressed to anyone, lay or professional, who seeks to understand more of the shared unconscious processes
Read the essay Thomas Dalzell argues for a rapprochement between psychoanalysis and psychiatry in his compelling study of Freud’s Schreber
Freud’s Schreber: Between Psychiatry and Psychoanalysis This book is not another general exploration of Freud’s 1911 Schreber text or yet another account
Read the essay James Rose asks: can we be objective about subjectivity?
Mapping Psychic Reality: Triangulation, Communication, and Insight This book arose out of the convergence in my mind of two strands of thought. The first
Read the essay Bernie Neville and Tim Dalmau uncover the archetypal patterns in organizational culture
Olympus Inc. BERNIE NEVILLE: Sometimes you can say that a book changed your life. It happened to me in 1976 when I read James Hillman’s Revisioning Psycho
Read the essay Michael Eigen explores the links between ‘soul sickness’, madness, and mystical experience
Eigen in Seoul: Volume One – Madness and Murder Many years ago a man came up to me after a talk at the National Psychological Association for Psychoanalys
Read the essay ASK AN AUTHOR
Our authors include Iain McGilchrist, Michael Eigen, Oliver James, Brett Kahr, Camila Batmanghelidjh, Margot Waddell, John Michael Greer, Alison Miller, Me
Read the essay John Espy uncovers the psychological ‘signature’ of the serial killer
Going beneath the skin of the contemporary fascination with serial killers: the Allure of Power, Control, Dominance ‘I hadn’t started out per se to ‘study
Read the essay Sarah Benamer on why the narrative of trauma is ubiquitous in contemporary society
Trauma and Attachment The John Bowlby Memorial Conference Series is the culmination of a collective journey in which we, as John Bowlby Centre conference
Read the essay Paul Marcus explains the art of living the Good Life
Creating the ‘Good Life’ In my most recent book Creating Heaven on Earth: The Psychology of Experiencing Immortality in Everyday Life, I asked the questio
Read the essay Meg Harris Williams explains the origins of the Harris Meltzer Trust books
The Harris Meltzer Trust, by Meg Harris Williams Donald Meltzer, who died in 2004, wished that the educational work disseminated over the course of over 3
Read the essay Deirdre Johnson explores love as both a form of bondage and liberation
Love: Bondage or Liberation? The Meaning, Values, and Dangers of Falling in Love In the history of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy as we know, falling in
Read the essay John Marzillier discusses the origins of his highly acclaimed book, ‘The Gossamer Thread’
The Gossamer Thread: My Life as a Psychotherapist Years ago I started writing a novel in which a recently retired psychoanalyst is interviewed by a young
Read the essay A.H. Brafman explores the secret language of drawings
The Language of Drawings This book is the result of a long gestation period. Life had taught me that I was a good communicator, meaning that somehow peopl
Read the essay Bitcoin Gold Rush – Evangelists or Selfish Revolutionaries?
Supporters of the virtual currency boast of no controls and no victims – but do they just want to get rich quick? As financial regulations increase by the
Read the essay Marco Bacciagaluppi on meeting John Bowlby, evolutionary attachment mechanisms, and predatory patriarchal culture
Paradigms in Psychoanalysis At nearly 80, I thought it could be useful to share with readers my experience of nearly fifty years in the field of psychoana
Read the essay Eran J. Rolnik discusses Psychoanalysis and the Making of Modern Jewish Identity
Freud in Zion: Psychoanalysis and the Making of Modern Jewish Identity Few episodes in the history of psychoanalysis are as densely packed with trans-cult
Read the essay Donald Robertson explores the links between Psychotherapy and Philosophy
Psychotherapy and Philosophy What can philosophy tell us about therapy? There are many opportunities for dialogue between philosophers and psychotherapist
Read the essay Coline Covington asks: Why would there be so many paedophiles in Westminster?
Craving the love and devotion of their victims, it is not surprising that some culprits are politicians Home Secretary Theresa May, still trying to find s
Read the essay Jackie Gerrard explores the wisdom of not knowing: ‘the answer is there are no answers’
The Impossibility of Knowing: Dilemmas of a Psychotherapist Brett Kahr came to hear my paper on Absence (Chapter 8) given at the London Centre for Psychot
Read the essay Frozen Children: Rod Tweedy explores the pathology of contemporary Disney
Devitalisation, Ice-olation, and Zero Degrees Princesses: Disney’s FROZEN Frozen is the highest-grossing animated film of all time, and the fifth highest-
Read the essay Alan Mulhern analyses how a subtle, powerful healing intelligence permeates the psyche
Healing Intelligence: The Spirit in Psychotherapy – Working with Darkness and Light The origin of this book lay in a conference, while I was doing my trai
Read the essay Support Kids Company ‘Give the gift of Christmas’ campaign
As Camila Batmanghelidjh, the founder of Kids Company, explains: ‘We work with some of the most traumatised children and young people, the majority of who
Read the essay Tom Ormay’s theory of the fundamental social nature of all human beings
The Social Nature of Persons: One Person is No Person By presenting a series of interconnected studies, effort is made to approach timely questions regard
Read the essay Hendrika C. Freud on Marcel Proust, Masochism, and Matricide
The subject of the mother-son relationship had never been broached with such psychological insight as in Marcel Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past (1921).
Read the essay John Michael Greer explains why symptoms of approaching social change are often pathologized
The human psyche is not simply a cultural construct. Neither is the universe in which the individual and society alike are embedded. Both have their own re
Read the essay Annie Reiner explores Bion’s concept of “O”
Bion and Being: Passion and the Creative Mind The central focus of my new book, Bion And Being: Passion and the Creative Mind, is Wilfred Bion’s concept o
Read the essay David Rosenfeld explores the origins of symbols and the logic of thought through the study of autism
The Creation of the Self and Language I consider that the treatment of an autistic child is an opportunity to observe and investigate the origins of verba
Read the essay Arturo Varchevker explains why we are all migrants from birth to death
Migration and its vicissitudes The life cycle is an important framework that has been used and can be used by different theoretical perspectives and from
Read the essay Dianna Kenny argues that infant intersubjectivity is primordial, not developmental
Dianna Kenny, author of Bringing up Baby: the Psychoanalytic Infant Comes of Age, presents the evidence against the standard assumption that infants are ‘
Read the essay CABBY LAFFY: ‘We live in a highly sexualised culture, yet sexual issues are still shrouded in shame’
Sexual energy is potentially a free source of pleasure and ecstasy, with remarkable physical and emotional health benefits. In the UK, we seem much more li
Read the essay OLIVER JAMES: The England riots of August 2011
Looking back on the theories offered to explain the riots of 2011, there was too much attention paid to the issue of why they occurred at that particular m
Read the essay Gavin Newby describes the development of Neuropsychotherapy, a new and emerging discipline
Neuropsychotherapy: emerging from the shadows Within the broader world of psychology and clinical psychology, neuropsychology has had a reputation for bein
Read the essay Self
Brent Potter, author of Elements of Self Destruction, engages with the works of Wilfred Bion and Martin Heidegger to explore the sometimes horrifying manif
Read the essay Raul Moncayo explores the relationship between Zen and Lacanian psychoanalysis
The Signifier Pointing at the Moon: Psychoanalysis and Zen Buddhism I wrote this book to help clarify some misconceptions about Zen and psychoanalysis and
Read the essay Neuropsychotherapy: emerging from the shadows — Karnacology
Gavin Newby describes the development of neuropsychotherapy, a new and emerging discipline. Newby is an editor of and contributor to a ground-breaking book
Read the essay A demented beehive — Karnacology
Early in my career during the 1990s, I recall occasionally looking up from my discussion with a so-called chronically mentally ill patient to look around t
Read the essay A free source of pleasure and ecstasy — Karnacology
Sexual energy is potentially a free source of pleasure and ecstasy, with remarkable physical and emotional health benefits. In the UK, we seem much more li
Read the essay Mastering Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy
The possibility of failure is inherent in all learning and the further one has progressed in the process of learning, the greater the risk of failure can b
Read the essay About — Karnacology
Karnacology aims to facilitate contact and discussion amongst practising professionals in the mental health field, but also to provide services and ideas f
Read the essay The intersubjective infant — Karnacology
This implicit, embodied knowledge forms the basis of infant object relationships, which later become accessible in the transference of patients undergoing
Read the essay Philosophy and psychotherapy (Part 2): Stoicism — Karnacology
The growing popularity of cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT) and modern self-help literature has triggered renewed interest in the practical side of ancie
Read the essay What life brings
One of the warming aspects of tragic happenings is the well wishes of others. In the case of Hurricane Sandy, this includes notes and calls received from p
Read the essay The Creation of the Self and Language
I consider that the treatment of an autistic child is an opportunity to observe and investigate the origins of verbal symbols and the creation of language,
Read the essay The Signifier Pointing at the Moon: Psychoanalysis and Zen Buddhism
I wrote this book to help clarify some misconceptions about Zen and psychoanalysis and particularly to explore the relationship between Zen and Lacanian ps
Read the essay Dreamwork and Self-Healing
Greg Bogart's book Dreamwork and Self-Healing: Unfolding the Symbols of the Unconscious is a rich and detailed contribution to the study of dreamwork from
Read the essay Foreshocks of the mind — Karnacology
John Michael Greer, whose powerful new book explores the psychological and social consequences of the peak oil crisis (Not the Future We Ordered) reflects
Read the essay Marcel Proust: the making of a sadomasochist — Karnacology
Hendrika C. Freud, author of Men and Mothers: The Lifelong Struggle of Sons and Their Mothers, reflects on Marcel Proust's relationship with his mother, an
Read the essay Impediments to the marriage of two minds — Karnacology
Fiona Ross, author of Perversion: a Jungian Approach, presents the unthought and unanswered transferential questions posed when an analyst's unconscious en
Read the essay Migration and its vicissitudes — Karnacology
The life cycle is an important framework that has been used and can be used by different theoretical perspectives and from various disciplines. The concept
Read the essay The England riots of August 2011 — Karnacology
Looking back on the theories offered to explain the riots of 2011, there was too much attention paid to the issue of why they occurred at that particular m
Read the essay Psychotherapy and philosophy (Part 1) — Karnacology
What can philosophy tell us about therapy? There are many opportunities for dialogue between philosophers and psychotherapists. In the past, there’s been i
Read the essay Bion and Being: Passion and the Creative Mind
The central focus of my new book, Bion And Being: Passion and the Creative Mind, is Wilfred Bion’s concept of O. It is the most mysterious and controversia
Read the essay ‘Killing them off’: The patriarchal context of the Anders Breivik report — Karnacology
Peter Aylward reveals his conclusion on the Anders Breivik Psychiatric Report 2011-11-29. The psychoanalytic psychotherapist, author of Understanding Dunbl
Read the essay The sound of Sigmund Freud — Karnacology
This is the only known audio recording of Sigmund Freud, made by the BBC and broadcast in December, 1938. Freud was ill with throat cancer at the time. A t
Read the essay Thinking of Becoming a Counsellor?
I was prompted in part to write this book by a study in Counselling & Psychotherapy which discovered that more than eighty four percent of counsellors in t
Read the essay Healing Intelligence: The Spirit in Psychotherapy - Working with Darkness and Light
The origin of this book lay in a conference, while I was doing my training, in which some notable psychotherapists were giving an overview of the principle
Read the essay Psychotherapy and Spiritual Direction
Karnac Books: What made you write this book? Lynette Harborne: This book grew out of my experience as a psychotherapist, spiritual director, supervisor an
Read the essay The Social Nature of Persons: One Person is No Person
In the present work I intend to give the basic ideas to a theory of „nos”, and not an exhaustive presentation of the whole topic. The latter would be the t
Read the essay Gestalt Therapy: Roots and Branches
A major starting point for the development of Gestalt Therapy from psychoanalysis was a specific understanding of self arising from contact. To put it (rel
Read the essay Freud In Zion: Psychoanalysis and the Making of Modern Jewish Identity
Few episodes in the history of psychoanalysis are as densely packed with trans-cultural, ideological, institutional and ethical issues as the arrival of ps
Read the essay Paradigms in Psychoanalysis
At nearly 80, I thought it could be useful to share with readers my experience of nearly fifty years in the field of psychoanalytic psychotherapy. In addi
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