Video Review
Dr. Erickson and Three Cases of Trauma
Reviewed By: John Lentz, D. Min
Estimated Reading Time: 1 minute, 24 seconds
This is a review of one of the many videos from The Erickson Video Collection.
“I have watched this hour-long video several times now and each time I gleaned more learnings. I am only beginning to grasp the wisdom of Erickson’s understanding of trauma. But despite its complexity, Jeff Zeig makes it much easier to understand with his insightful commentary.
Erickson’s multilevel storytelling was not only for the students’ understanding of trauma but also for their personal benefit. I also experienced meanings that touched me personally as well as helped me to understand better how to deal with clients’ trauma.
I especially liked watching how Erickson addresses issues in such a way that the other students do not know that a particular student is being helped until they realize he is also helping them. The time and effort Erickson spent in communicating not only his professional knowledge but also reaching out to help each individual is a reflection of who he was as a man. His generosity and caring is more than evident. No wonder people from all over the world loved and appreciated him.
Another advantage of this video is that you can also download the transcript so you can learn both cognitively and emotionally. It is a wonderful gem. I intend to teach what I have learned to my students because I believe that this video offers timeless truths, and it can be used to assist people dealing with all kinds of trauma. I highly recommend it.”
The entire Erickson Video Collection can be viewed here.
This video review has been extracted from Volume 40, Issue No. 3 of The Milton H. Erickson Foundation Newsletter.
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by Jeffrey K Zeig
Rating of 3
Type: Hardcover
Over 2000 professionals from all over the world gathered in Phoenix in December 1980 for the extraordinary International Congress honoring a master therapist - Milton H. Erickson. In this volume of the Proceedings of tthis Congress, colleagues and students of ERickson demonstrate the far-reaching influence of his work and futher our understanding of his precise, often confusing, extremely effective techniques.
The full extent of ERickson's tremendous impact not just on the practice of hypnotherapy, but also on the development of ffamily therapy and paradoxical psychotherapy, as well as on technquies in medicine, dentistry, and psychotherapy, is just beginning to be recognized. Many of the contributors to this volume have taken Erickson's message -- "Each person is a unique individual. Hence psychotherapy should be formulated to meet the individual's needs, rather than tailoring the person to fit the Procrustean bed of a hypothetical theory of human behavior" -- and used it as the basis of innovative approaches to the treatment of disturbed human behavior.
Most of the contributors had extensive personal contact with Erickson. The chapters about Erickson as a person, as well as many of those on Erickson as a therapist, are sprinkled with warm, often humorous anecdotes which vividly reveal his unique outlook on life and therapy.
In addition to keynote addresses by Jay Haley and Carl Whitaker, this volume includes extensive sections on Ericksonian Psychotherapy, Hypnotic Induction, Ericksonian Language, Erickson's Influence on the Work of the Mental Research Institute, Erickson and Family Therapy, Case Studies, Approaches in Medicine and with Children and Adolescents, Pain Control, and Transcultural Issues.
For anyone intererested in innovative, effective approaches to psychotherapy, this eminently readable volume offers an abundance of riches -- personal glimpses, clinical material, and insights into the thinking of this unorthodox master therapist.
The Master Class with Jeffrey K. Zeig, PhD
by Jeffrey K. Zeig
Type: Hardcover
Milton Erickson was my mentor intermittently for more than six years; he was also an inspiration in creating the Master Class. At his essence, Erickson was experiential. He was the most radically experiential therapist to ever practice. Creating transformative experiences is a component in many schools of therapy, including rational emotive behavior therapy and cognitive behavior therapy, but for Erickson being experiential was not merely a component; it was most of his therapeutic work. Hypnosis is essentially an experiential technique. The subtext of hypnosis is this: “By living this experience, you can be different.” Hypnosis is not a means of providing information.
This book is an opportunity to study single-session therapies that are based in experiential methods. The learning from these methods is primarily stimulated by the client living the change, not by intellectual understanding of how to change. The participants declare what they are going to do differently and the sessions are designed to create experiences that foster the accomplishment of stated goals. Participants have solved complex problems and have made significant life changes. They have overcome writer’s block and then completed a book; they are happier in their jobs and relationships; they rebalance work and life; and they surmount childhood trauma.
The transcripts contained here offer opportunities to sit in on live interactions between therapist and client. An extraordinary adjunct to the transcripts are the participants’ — all stellar professionals themselves — notes on the sessions. They are able to articulate their understandings and impressions in such powerful ways that upon reading their perspectives I also took away something new.
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by James F. Masterson
Type: Softcover
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