When therapists hear patients talk of feeling "imprisoned," "burning with rage," "trapped," or "unequipped," they are witnessing manifestations of the symbolic attitude, the hallmark of all depth psychology. Most clinicians naturally respond to and use metaphors, but they often fail to understand the full potential of metaphoric images. This volume, in addressing the transforming power of metaphor, demonstrates how clinicians can deepen the therapeutic encounter.

This book represents a bold attempt to address contemporary issues in both metaphor and psychotherapy research. On one hand, metaphor research is increasingly concerned not just with describing metaphors in discourse, but how they could be used more adroitly in purposive ‘real world’ contexts such as psychotherapy. On the other hand, while a growing number of mental health professionals believe that metaphors contribute in some way to the psychotherapy process, their ability and willingness to use metaphors might be compromised by a relative unfamiliarity with the various nuanced aspects of metaphor theory. The present analysis of metaphors in authentic psychotherapeutic talk brings these theoretical aspects to the forefront, and suggests how they can be applied to enhance the use of communication of metaphors in psychotherapy. It should be of interest to metaphor researchers, mental health professionals, and discourse analysts in general.

"Oxford Guide to Metaphors in CBT, Building Cognitive Bridges is a remarkable, memorable, and continually fascinating book, one that will be on my repeated reference list for years to come." Robert Leahy, Clinical Professor of Pscyhology in Psychiatry at Well-Comell University Medical College --

The authors look at how literary material can be incorporated into therapy, and show that the value of associativeness as a complex cognitive function is not merely decorative.

Drawing on her extensive experience in expressive arts therapy, Daria Halprin presents a unique approach to healing through movement and art. She describes the body as the container of one's entire life experience and movement as a language that expresses and reveals our deepest struggles and creative potentials. Interweaving artistic and psychological processes, she offers a philosophy and methodology that invites the reader to consider the transformational capacity of the arts. In this essential resource for anyone interested in the integration of psychotherapy and the arts, Halprin also presents case studies and a selection of exercises that she has evolved over her career and practised at the Tamalpa Institute for over twenty-five years.

The study of metaphor is now firmly established as a central topic within cognitive science and the humanities. This book explores the critical role that conceptual metaphors play in language, thought, cultural and expressive actions. It evaluates the arguments and evidence for and against conceptual metaphors across academic disciplines.

This book brings attention to the interface of psychotherapy and psychological theory with the somatic practices of bodywork and movement therapy. To offer a client only psychotherapy, or only bodywork may subtly or directly reinforce the body-mind split from which so many of us suffer; in some cases this will be a reinforcement of a dilemma central to the client's problems. Hartley views body psychotherapy and transpersonal psychotherapy as building bridges between the once separated processes of psyche, soma, and spirit. Today the emerging field of somatic psychology is also contributing to the expanded field of psychology a subtle differentiation of bodymind process, developed through almost a century and a half of research and practice in somatic therapy and education. Originally trained as a dancer, movement therapist and bodywork practitioner, Hartley continues to use movement and somatic process as an important foundation for her own work. Training in Dance Movement Therapy, the transpersonal psychotherapy of Psychosynthesis, and Process-Oriented Psychology have further deepened Hartley's awareness of the relationships between psyche, soma and spirit, and the need to respond to all levels of experience in therapeutic work.