Toward a Spiritual Psychotherapy: Soul as a Dimension of Experience

(Paperback)

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Toward a Spiritual Psychotherapy collects a series of lectures presented by psychologist Hunter Beaumont over a 10-year period. Covering such themes as relationships, family, healing, grief, mourning, and death, the book features case stories that demonstrate clients' healing experiences. Practicing in Germany for the past 30 years, Hunter Beaumont has had the unique experience of working with World War II and Holocaust survivors and their descendants. Through this work he discovered that healing requires attending to the soul, a process he describes as an "inner 'felt sense' and common, everyday dimension of experience." Demonstrating how therapists can integrate this more spiritual approach into their practices, Beaumont highlights the particular successes of the innovative family constellations therapy. Developed by German psychologist Bert Hellinger and expanded by Beaumont and others, this therapy takes place in a group setting, with group members standing in for family members or others involved in the client's problem. A crucial part of Beaumont's spiritual psychotherapy practice, this method has helped many of his clients release and resolve profound tensions, and offers hope to readers recovering from trauma or PTSD, or simply trying to navigate life's difficulties.

Reviews

An exquisite gift, this book takes us straight into the heart of the poetry of experienceattachment, intimacy, and that most ineffable of all our life experiences: soul itself. I know I shall return to these essays again and again, as a psychotherapist and as a fellow seeker on the path, for their wisdom, their clarity, and the breathtaking humility of their vision.
Gordon Wheeler, PhD, president of the Esalen Institute and author of Beyond Individualism: Toward a New Understanding of Self, Relationship, and Experience

Hunter Beaumont is a compelling storyteller who engages our hearts and minds with his concept of soul. His book offers a view of how both spirituality and psychotherapy can contribute to healing the traumas in our livesa spiritual psychotherapy that is at once poetic and practical.
Jane Peterson, PhD, founder of the Human Systems Institute

Author Bio

A licensed psychologist in California and Germany, HUNTER BEAUMONT, PhD, is a member of the American Psychological Association (APA) and the German Psychological Association. He was also a member of the training faculty and president of the Gestalt Therapy Institute of Los Angeles. In 1993 he began a collaboration with Bert Hellinger, the German psychotherapist associated with the family constellations approach. He has continued to explore implications and new applications to psychotherapy and spiritual practice of the systemic approach.