SIGN IN YOUR ACCOUNT TO HAVE ACCESS TO DIFFERENT FEATURES

CREATE AN ACCOUNT FORGOT YOUR PASSWORD?

FORGOT YOUR DETAILS?

AAH, WAIT, I REMEMBER NOW!

CREATE ACCOUNT

ALREADY HAVE AN ACCOUNT?

IAHIP

CALL: +353 (0)1 284 1665
  • Contact Us
  • Classifieds
    • Publications
    • Services
    • Training
    • All Ads
    • Submit Ad
  • News
    • IAHIP News
    • Blog
  • Members
    • AGM 2020 & 2019
    • Events Calendar
    • Professional Conduct
    • Continued Professional Development -CPD- For Accredited Psychotherapists
    • Accreditation
    • Re-accreditation
    • Supervision
    • Honorary Membership
    • Child and Adolescent
    • Garda Vetting
    • Resources
      • Members’ Resources
    • Payments
  • SIGN UP
  • LOGIN
  • Home
  • About
    • About IAHIP
    • Governing Body
    • Committees
      • Committees
      • Regional Development
    • Complaints
    • Constitutional Documents
      • Articles of Association
      • Bye-Laws of the Association
    • IAHIP in N.I.
    • Considering a career in psychotherapy?
  • Psychotherapy
    • About Psychotherapy
    • How Psychotherapy Can Help Me
    • Choosing a Psychotherapist
    • Useful Links
  • Join
    • Join IAHIP
    • Why Join IAHIP?
    • Benefits of Membership of IAHIP
    • Categories of Membership
    • Fees
  • Publications
    • Inside Out
    • Subscribe
    • Buy Back Issues
    • Buy Full Page Ad
    • Buy Half Page Ad
    • Advertising
  • Training
    • Recognised Training Courses IAHIP
    • European Certificate of Psychotherapy (ECP)
  • Find a Therapist
  • Home
  • Inside Out
  • Issue 73: Summer 2014
  • Book Review: Beyond the Frustrated Self: Overcoming Avoidant Patterns and Opening to Life

Book Review: Beyond the Frustrated Self: Overcoming Avoidant Patterns and Opening to Life

Beyondby Barbara Dowds
Published by Karnac London 2014
ISBN 978-1-7822005-2-9
Reviewed by Aisling McMahon

Barbara Dowds is an Irish psychotherapist with a private practice just outside Dublin and a teaching practice in PCI College. She was a senior lecturer in molecular genetics before changing to a psychotherapy career over 10 years ago and her scientific background, as well as a self-professed love of literature, come through strongly in her recently-published book, Beyond the Frustrated Self.

Barbara’s book has many dimensions, engaging the reader at a number of levels. The book is strongly integrative in the various psychotherapy theories Barbara describes and draws from – including psychodynamic, existential, humanistic, body psychotherapy, attachment theory, developmental neuroscience and transpersonal psychotherapy. A particularly good description of developmental neuroscience is offered which I believe will be appreciated by practitioners, as well as by clients who want a stronger theoretical understanding of personal growth. However, the outstanding quality of Barbara’s book is how she intelligently and passionately engages in social and political commentary, philosophical and spiritual debate, while also offering insights and illustrations from a wide literary base. Here, the impressive integrative work is how she continuously weaves all these elements into her exploration of the blocks and the paths to personal fulfilment and contentment in today’s increasingly disconnected society.

Another striking and valuable feature of this book is the presence of ‘Brenda’ throughout – Barbara’s theoretical expositions are grounded in Brenda’s story and her personal journey to greater understanding and a fuller life. Barbara describes Brenda as a “kind of every (wo)man, albeit one with a particular attachment style” (xiii). Brenda’s attachment style is dismissive/avoidant, Barbara describing her as overcharged and overbounded. Barbara notes that the self “is inherently a process: creative, dynamic and relational. But for many of us like Brenda, it feels like a thing: stuck, grim and isolated” (66). Brenda keeps the world at bay, suppressing her engagement and responsiveness to others (as her early experience was that her significant others were not well attuned or responsive to her needs), relying on a rigid self- regulation (“driving with the brakes on”, 258) which leaves her empty, unfulfilled and yearning for more from life. Throughout her book, Barbara builds a well-researched argument that the path to greater fulfilment for each of us, but most particularly for those of us with Barbara’s attachment style, is to loosen the self-regulatory hold of the left brain, building greater connections between the analytical left and the creative, embodied right brain. This involves imaginatively and more playfully engaging with life rather than seeing it as something we must adapt to, taking risks to open our hearts and be more authentic, spontaneous and creative in our relationships, as well as counterbalancing our engagement in the world with time alone to connect with peace and silence. Barbara argues that we can find greater meaning in our lives by searching for our “higher loves” (258), the transformational objects (after Bollas) that represent our deepest values (whether these be social, political, aesthetic, spiritual, etc.), investing in giving as much as being open to receiving. Barbara concludes her book by stressing that we become what we do – “by attending to what we love, we become lovers of life” (265).

While reading this book, I increasingly found myself melding Brenda and Barbara in my mind and relating to them as one person. Barbara’s articulate descriptions of Brenda’s predicaments and frustrations (e.g., the difficulty of opening up to contact with others without losing herself), as well as her loves (e.g., of nature, of spiritual exploration) seemed to hold a strongly personal, emotional quality and even urgency at times. Barbara notes in her introduction that resemblances between herself and Brenda are inevitable and how the theory written about in subjective disciplines can amount to a “psychic autobiography of the theorist” (xvii) – this felt true to me and as I read I felt privileged to be invited in to share in Barbara’s intelligent, personal searching for understanding and authentic growth.

I very much enjoyed reading this book – I found it to be full of meaty wisdom to chew over. Although Barbara strongly advocates for our need to move from a dominant left-brain culture into being directed by our more embodied right-brain, there is particularly strong stimulation for the left-brain in her book. While this was engaging and satisfying, when Barbara brought in a literary quote I enjoyed the opportunity to rest my left-brain and resonate emotionally with the feeling of the quote. For me, more fleshed-out stories from Brenda’s life would have been welcome to offer even more balance to the strong theoretical, intellectual material in the book and to give me opportunities to rest in and be ‘held’ in the stories (Brenda’s experiences were more often brought in as condensed narrative overviews rather than more slowly opened out stories). However, I must note that this comment comes from my own need for more right-brain experience as I am of the same attachment style as Brenda and too left-brain dominated myself! Overall, I found Barbara’s book to be very satisfying, richly written and I look forward to further writing from her.

Search Inside Out

Latest from the Blog

Latest News

  • The CARI Foundation – Vacancy for National Head of Therapy
  • The Art of Wanting – Online Course, with Emma Philbin Bowman

Upcoming Events

Contact Us

The Administrator,
The Irish Association of Humanistic and Integrative Psychotherapy Ltd.
40 Northumberland Avenue,
Dun Laoghaire,
Co. Dublin

Telephone: +353 (0)1 284 1665
Email: admin@iahip.org

Office Hours

9.30am – 4.00pm Monday
9.30am – 5.00pm Tuesday to Friday

Telephone Line Answered
Monday – Friday 9.30am – 1.00pm.

Disclaimer

IAHIP Ltd. cannot be held liable for the services, products or information contained in ads posted on this website.

FIND A THERAPIST

Search in radius 0 miles
  • Contact Details
  • Privacy Statement
  • Code of Ethics for Psychotherapists
  • Company Registration

© 2018 All rights reserved.

TOP
This website uses cookies to enhance your browsing experience. Accept Read More
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled

Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.

Non-necessary

Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.