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Click Here to Purchase: On and Off the Couch: Memoir of a Psychoanalyst by Beverly Kolsky from IPBooks.net

“This really is the full motivation for my having written the memoir. I want people to know what the process is like; not only what the process is like but what the feelings are that don’t really make you think of psychoanalysis as a way of changing your life. We’re just living and hoping that things will change without really taking account of the fact that we could be living better lives and in a better way. I began to think of the ways of the world and the wickedness in it. There’s so many things that we do to keep us going – me and my aphrodisiacs, and I think other people doing other things just to divert them from the misery and unhappiness that they feel.  I don’t know how often that’s looked at or discussed, so I hope the book does open that up a little bit.” 

Episode Description: We begin with Beverly’s description of her early years of feeling lost and the consequent self-destructive patterns she replayed. Years of sensation-seeking led her to become “exhausted, limp, tarnished, and each time, more profoundly lost.” She “landed on an analyst’s couch in Little Venice, a section of London. I was paying for someone to recognize me. She did.” Beverly shares her analytic journey with us and how vital her discovery of ‘kindness’ was, first from the outside and then from within. We discuss the early death of her father, her mother’s depression and the devotion of her older brother.  She closes with “Like life, psychoanalysis is a continuing process. It doesn’t stop…issues crop up, new feelings arise…we better understand what those feelings are telling us, and how to make use of them in an environment we have been able to choose for ourselves. And so it goes…”

Our Guest:  Beverly Kolsky, MSW has worked as a psychotherapist for more than forty years both in America and in England.  She trained as a psychoanalyst with the New York Institute for Psychoanalytic Self Psychology also and received training in London where she worked under the auspices of the Tavistock Clinic and the Institute of Marital Studies. Her work has been published in two journals:  Mind Consiliums and Voices: Art and Science of Psychotherapy. She had two psychoanalytic experiences in two countries with analysts of two different orientations. Her motivation for writing the book as a memoir was to let others in the community know the transformative and enduring power of psychoanalysis. She was in private practice in Englewood, N.J. and now lives, mostly retired, in the northern Adirondacks.

Recommended Readings:

Jung, C.G. 1963. Memories, Dreams, Reflections. London: Collins and Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Kohut, H. 1984.  How Does Analysis Cure? Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Kolsky, B. 2015  Mind Consiliums 15(10), (1-10).  Empathy and Secrecy: Discovering Suicide as a Form of Addiction.”

Kolsky, B. 2019  “The Ghost in You: Psychotherapy and Grief” (Voices: The Art and Science of Psychotherapy.) Paperback The American Academy of Psychotherapists.

Kolsky, B. 2019  Voices: Journal of the American Academy of Psychotherapists. Vol 55 No 2 “To Be or Not To Be: A Patient’s Search for the Lost Mother.” 

Kuchuck, S. 2021. London: Confer Books. The Relational Revolution in Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy. Confer Books.

 Malan, D, 1979.  England. Butterworth & Co Ltd. Individual Psychotherapy and the Science of Psychodynamics.

Taylor, K. 2002. U.S. Kevin Taylor M.D. Seduction of Suicide: Understanding and Recovering From Addiction to Suicide.

A podcast of an interview with Beverly Kolsky about her book: On and Off the Couch: Memoir of a Psychoanalyst published by IPBooks will be available October 5th.  The interview will be conducted by Harvey Schwartz.

Praise for On and Off the Couch: Memoir of a Psychoanalyst by Beverly Kolsky:  

When neither residence on an idyllic Greek island nor all-consuming romance can cure the restlessness of an empty self, Kolsky finds her way to the journey within, and she takes us along for the ride. This undaunted accounting from analysand to analyst is a testament to the enduring power of psychoanalysis to heal, and to the essential humanity we bring to the endeavor, whether on or off the couch.

—Ashley Warner, LCSW, BCD-P, author, The Year After: A Memoir

Kolsky’s memoir is one woman’s odyssey illustrating the best uses of psychoanalysis. Beginning in the conflicted regions of youth, it culminates in a snowy and contented walk in the woods in a maturity framed by psychoanalysis’ insights.
—Rosemary Steinbaum, Founding Trustee, The Philip Roth Personal Library, Newark, NJ

Here is a book that gracefully unravels the complex field of psychoanalysis. In Kolsky’s stirring memoir, she smoothly intertwines her own experience of being psychoanalyzed with her later experience as a professional psychoanalyst. With perspectives from both on and off the couch, we are led to a deeper understanding of how the practice works and why it helps.
—Caperton Tissot, author, History Between the Lines and other publications.

Pure Gold!  Kolsky offers a profound universal remedy that highlights the vital force of psychoanalysis and brilliantly opens the gateway to the intricate world of inner reality.  In today’s complex world, On and Off the Couch: memoir of a psychoanalyst gives a profound universal remedy that highlights the vital force of introspection in order to establish the equilibrium necessary to keep one afloat on the river of life.
—Nuzhat Nada, Instructor Human Development/Psychology

In this intimate memoir, Beverly Kolsky takes us through an intriguing journey. The ghosts of her past, her losses and adventures, are unlocked through her own psychoanalysis. Empathic attunement to her patients guides her work as a psychoanalyst. We are enriched by the insights of this sensitive narrative.
—Penny Rosen, MSW, LCSW, BCD-P

In this jewel of a narrative of self-discovery, Beverly Kolsky takes us on a probing journey exploring the sweep of the psychoanalytic process in transforming her own life as well as her patients’. Those trying to decide whether psychoanalysis is for them will gain an appreciation of its power while those who have benefitted from it will be inspired anew. The book is beautifully layered with evocative images of people, places, and moments in time in New York, London, and Greece and the nodal events in Kolsky’s arc in becoming the person she was meant to be.
—Edward Ross, LCSW, BCD-P. N.Y. Institute for Psychoanalytic Self Psychology, Faculty and Training Analyst, Lighthouse Guild International, Director Behavioral Health

Part memoir, part window into a hidden world, On and Off the Couch: Memoir of a Psychoanalyst is a moving, beautifully written work. The author helps us understand how she, a child of the Sixties, became the woman she is today. And in a series of luminous and evocative portraits she shows us how patients suffering from a broad range of maladies can be helped to gain insight into themselves and thus lead happier and more fulfilling lives.
—Constance Rosenblum, author of Boulevard of Dreams: Heady Times, Heartbreak, and Hope Along the Grand Concourse in the Bronx.

 On and Off the Couch illuminates the complex process of psychoanalysis, its goals, challenges, and benefits as the author tells of her personal experience on both sides of the process. Using clear and easily understandable language, Kolsky also clarifies the differences between other forms of psychotherapy and counselling.  Readers who have been practitioners of psychotherapy, those who have experienced therapy, as well as those who are students in the field of mental health, will find this an interesting, informative and engaging book.
—Ginny B. Schwartz , Former Director of Counselling Services, St. Lawrence University