Love's Executioner: And Other Tales of Psychotherapy

I first read Love's Executioner a few years ago and was so taken with it, I've recommended it dozens of times. Recently, I listened to the audio version Love's Executioner: & Other Tales of...

very interesting book, for therapists or anyone else who wants to have an interesting and dramatic read

Indeed, the term "fat lady" can be offensive if taken personally. However, viewing the book through the lens of a therapist's mind and acknowledging that therapists are human too, one may gain insights from it. A therapist must embrace their own humanity, biases, and imperfections to effectively assist a patient. This book could aid in fostering understanding, even when character traits vary.

An informative and thought-provoking review of the progress of 10 psychotherapy patients. Fascinating. At least for someone who finds people and their motivations and the reasons behind the development of their quirks and personalities to be interesting. This book is all the more intriguing for being written by a qualified and experienced psychiatrist. One who is also a skilled writer. His honesty about his own foibles and feelings further draw in the reader, offering security in the reliability of the assessments presented. There is the flavor of mystery in each chapter as the reader is drawn in and carried along on the adventure of unraveling the explanation of each patient’s presenting complaint, as well as seeking insight into the patient’s style of interacting or resistance or refusal to participate in therapy. Plus the writer’s efforts to customize his approach to each patient in order to connect and achieve therapeutic ends. Surely these insights are applicable in more pragmatic terms to interactions with people in daily life. The introduction may be a bit dry, at least for the non- therapist, so the reader should stick with it to the beginning of the first chapter to give this terrific book a fair chance.

The writing kept me curious. The words carry the energy of learning but also you become absorbed with the characters. It s as if you are following a film as the description is quite amazing.

Along with a mountain of other texts, this book was required reading in my first psychotherapy course. I was enrolled in a PhD program in clinical psychology, with a relatively strict orientation towards cognitive behavioral therapy. One of my concerns was that I would have to assume a persona, a guy in a labcoat with a clipboard. The most powerful impact Yalom's book had on me as a young therapy student was the understanding that who I am as a person both would and should impact who I am as a therapist. I felt liberated. Yes, I needed to have a philosophical/theoretical foundation to the work I would do with clients, but who I was would influence the work that I did. I experienced the "narcissism" that so appalled some reviewers as breathtaking honesty. We are all of us human. Any therapist who reports being free of all unacceptable responses to clients, of never having a thought or engaging in an exchange that was more a function of one's own history and struggles is either deluded or a liar. Should doing therapy with clients be a substitute for addressing all of one's own foibles? Absolutely not, nor does Yalom suggest as much. However, a therapist who experiences clients as "less than," people from whom we can learn nothing, fills me with far more dread than a therapist who acknowledges an ignoble response to a client or the fact that s/he is also imperfect and capable of prejudice. None of us who is honest can say that we have each and every one of these reactions and prejudices perfectly catalogued or perfectly conquered. Life is about growth. I don't think we're supposed to stop doing that until we enter the Great Dirt Nap. As for those upset by some of his revelations, (e.g., to the "fat lady," his internal sexual response to female clients) I have two questions: 1) Prior to achieving sublime self-actualization wherein I no longer have such inappropriate responses, just what *should* I do about them? Pretend they aren't there? Engage in self-flagellation like a medieval monk? Well, a wise person knows where these approaches lead; 2) Do you really think that the 20 or so pages of each vignette actually encompasses every important aspect of the therapy, or is Yalom attempting to address some very limited themes and issues? It has been about 18 years since I first read Yalom's book and let me say that I do not conduct therapy as Dr. Yalom does. First, I am not Irvin Yalom, nor have I ever tried to be Irvin Yalom. Secondly, the ugly reality of the field of psychotherapy today is that unless one exclusively services the very wealthy (something I am not willing to do--behold one of my own unconquered prejudices), we are very limited as to the time we can spend with our clients. I still consider myself to be a cognitive-behavioral therapist, an orientation of which Yalom is not a big fan. I also have some disagreements with Yalom regarding the value of diagnosis and other matters. But in addition to the early liberation I described above, Yalom's wonderful book has helped me to be less doctrinaire, more flexible, willing to embrace alternate approaches and more client-focused, more accepting of my own imperfections and understanding the absolute necessity of addressing them. I think I'm a damned good therapist, and I thank Yalom and this book for setting me on the road. When starting work with an intern, I typically give them a copy of this book. As a goodbye, I give a copy of Yalom's The Gift of Therapy: An Open Letter to a New Generation of Therapists and Their Patients . The latter is an excellent selection of brief lessons in conducting psychotherapy and is also highly recommended. I can't guarantee that every psychotherapist-in-training or practicing psychotherapist who reads them will have a transforming experience, but I would hope that at minimum one would pick up an idea or two that will positively impact your practice in the future.

LOVE'S EXECUTIONER offers the reader a rare look at psychotherapy through the eyes of an extraordinarily skilled and experienced psychotherapist. Dr. Yalom tells the stories of his encounters with his patients with unusual honesty and warmth. His willingness to acknowledge uncertainty, self-doubt, and not always generous feelings about his patients portrays psychotherapy as an intricate, but imperfect art. Shattering the illusion of the all-knowing psychotherapist does both therapists and patients a service by creating realistic expectations of this special kind of encounter between two human beings. Dr. Yalom brings to each of his stories the vibrancy of a finely crafted mystery, each with twists and turns and often endings that are as much of a surprise to his patients as to the therapist and his readers. His fascination with obsessive love sets the tone of his title story and also plays a prominent part in his historical novel WHEN NIETZSCHE WEPT. His superb storytelling both entertains and gently educates, providing his readers with a rare insight not only into psychotherapy, but into the human condition. Richard Moskovitz, M.D., author Carousel Music and Lost in the Mirror, 2nd Edition: An Inside Look at Borderline Personality Disorder .

For those of you with little time I'll get right to it - Yalom's a great writer, probably a good researcher and a lousy therapist - all by my sole opinion and the evidence of one book of reading by the guy, and his bibliography. The book is engaging, there are moments of brilliance that emerge in his work with patients (trust me these are patient folks ...) and even some interesting aspect of reading Yalom's revelations which account for the greatest part of the book. Simply put this is as another reviewer on Amazon's website put it, "an intellectual masturbatory confessional." This guy (Yalom) is on with himself. He is one of the most self-important characters I've ever come across in my reading. He has the typical "Graves Six Type" penchant for revelation, hedonism and the projection of caring about - and in this case even for - others. The reality is more like he's all about making sure he's okay with what's going on at every moment in his story. His patient's therapy is his chance to get paid for doing his own personal development. Two pieces of evidence for me: One his long diatribe on how "countertransference" is for the psychotherapist what "balance' is for the ballet dancer. His take on countertransference is the psychotherapist's inability to get out their own way in the therapy and their need to work on this - in Yalom's case at least at the expense (literally) of the patient. Two, is his constant internal revelations about how he's experiencing the patient's therapy, about his sense of pleasure or ease or satisfaction in doing therapy with this particular patient or another. This guy is off with himself!!! What a hedonistic fool ... in the classical sense of fool. However, there is a redeeming quality to this book and a reason to read it in my opinion. It is an excellent example of why more "traditional" forms of psychotherapy (the "fifty minute" hour type spread over twenty of so years ...) has fallen off, and it's not the "fault" of HMOs and PPOs despite what these professionals want to claim and their endless lament that the world's not fair (to them or to their patients - of course without their patients how would they entertain themselves and know they are okay in the world?) especially in the face of competition from "newer" human development technology. It is also, again in my opinion, an excellent primer in some of what NOT TO DO in helping others. What's described is how Yalom so often takes months of his patient's time getting to meaningful work with them, often taking months just to build a suitable level of rapport to do the work the patient requires and desires ... what they are paying him for specifically. He so often describes taking this time because he doesn't want to hurt the patient's feelings or have them think badly of him ... This guy's supposed to be a professional therapist, not only that but one of the best of the best ... and his concern is that he's too incompetent to get his result without hurting his patient's feelings or that they might not think well of him. What's worse is that this guy teaches and supervises other student therapists. The most egregious display of incompetence you can learn from here is how easy it could be for those so inclined to make this work of helping others into a form of working on themselves ... and endlessly so. I am of the opinion that although the healer is also human, and that this humanness is a powerful force in being of help to others, that the work done with others is NOT THE PLACE for doing one's own work ... whatever that might be. Finally, after making sure he's okay, having fun and that his patient's think well of him he begins the actual work with them often only getting to the "remedy" in the last few weeks of months of preparatory therapy. What I know from both professional experience and education is that this kind of transformational work can be accomplished often in the first session with a client. However, I must also say again that I am not a psychotherapist, not trained in psychotherapy ... and maybe this is ultimately what I learned most from Yalom - I don't need to be one nor do I want to be one ... if this is the result I could expect in being one, kind of like the purple cow of professions ... if Yalom's descriptions can indeed be held as the template of what psychotherapy is about and what psychotherapists are actully like in the privacy of their own thoughts. In the end there are other examples of "doing therapy" in literature that are much better examples of what can be accomplished by a highly trained individual who less concerned about what he's thinking and what his "patients" think of him than in moving their patients/clients lives forward. Just do a search under brief therapy or solution-oriented therapy and you'll get a list of suggestions there to begin. If your penchant is for "deep" therapy, which you believe requires months or years to get to there are also those therapists doing that kind of work without the need to hold the patient/client in place as a kind of manikin for themselves and their own work. I'd recommend "The Case of Nora" by Moshe Feldenkris as a great piece of therapy literature as an example of the kind of work that is possible with a client in the hands and mind of a master therapist.