That's the title of a book I just read written by Willard Gaylin M.D. It is wonderful. It is helping me understand the therapeutic process. And by understanding better the process I am able to be a better participant in it.

It also makes me appreciate my T even more because I see that she has the understanding that makes this process work - and how our minds and emotions get off track from reality. We so often are responding to current situations by strong impressions we received as children. So our job along with help from our T is to gain knowledge of past influences.

But knowledge is not enough. From there we begin to see what defenses we developed to cope with past events. Some of those defenses are problematic in our current lives. When we are able to recognize that fact and try to change our response, many times we will feel depressed.

We become depressed because we're unsure who we are now and there was a certain comfort in the stability of our 'neurosis'. The T helps us to realize that although those coping mechanisms may have been appropriate in the past, they no longer serve that function and we must evolve in order to be healthy psychologically.

The therapist forms a therapeutic alliance with the client allowing for a corrective emotional experience.

Anyways, there is much much more in the book with lots of examples.