 Hello and welcome to MIP TV. Back again for book number 29. This man is a literally a literary devourer of literature. Mr Bob Cook, how are you doing Bob? I'm doing very well and this is the 29th book and I'm really looking forward to gearing up to 30. So I've picked a book by one of my mentors in my life. I have two or three mentors but this person really is close to my heart and I wouldn't be the psychotherapist I am today without meeting him. And I think I can guess who this is but do you want to tell us Bob? Yeah, this is Richard Erskine who you know well and I talk about it a lot well and so you guessed accurately. Yes, Richard Erskine he kind of developed relational transactional analysis, a big voice in the relational TA world isn't he? Yeah and you know not to be confused with two aspects. Richard Erskine created his own organisation called Integrative Psychotherapy. Now interestingly enough when he created it I said to him why don't you call it Integrative Relational Psychotherapy? Because it's very very you know you really believe in working with relationship. However I don't know what other influence is but he decided to call the organisation Integrative Psychotherapy in sort of 2002. And it was 2008 when Helena Hargid and Keith Tudor took the road or the terrain and named their school Relational Transaction Analysis which is very very different from Erskine's view of how he used the relationship. But having said all that lot he really was one of the few people that used the relationship in an integrated way. So it's a moot point but I know Helena Hargid and Co would say they were the authors and they possessed the intellectual property of the term Relational Transaction Analysis. So but this book is called Integrative Psychotherapy in Action one of his first books talking about clinical nuances 1988. And it's edited by him and his sub editor Janet Morrison who came along I met her while she was in one of the five day marathons that he ran. Lovely woman and she's a sub editor in this book. It's 1988 a fantastic book a fantastic read. What is it that kind of sparks your passion for this because you said that quite deliberately Bob? Yeah I did. Besides this assigned copy which is always nice to have. If you say to me what do I like about Richard Erskine besides his heart and his teachings. I would say he is a modern day genius of describing theory into practice. In other words this book is really about the workings of teachings of a five day marathon. It's a book of cases. It's a book of vision. It's a book of describing transaction by transaction by transaction what he did why he did it what he did the timing of it and what it all meant theoretically. You cannot get that you cannot buy that you cannot buy somebody who is a genius theoretically and a genius at explaining clinical practice into theory. You cannot buy that. It's a real crossover isn't it? One thing is as I'm hearing you saying talking about the theory but how it's applied and the method of its application that's a whole different ballgame isn't it? And he does it both. I would say to you quite truthfully that I haven't been more privileged in my life to sit in on his psychotherapy marathons. Of course doing therapy myself but to sit in it and listen to him talking about the work from not only from a theoretical perspective but from a relational perspective. And I've been very privileged and I can guess some of the people in this book because I was in a couple of the marathons where I think these case studies came from. One of the if you ask me what I like in terms of the overview of that book I've just told you but I really like one of the chapters talking about the parent-eager state. The parent-eager state in transaction analysis is the parental interjects. So it's your mother, your father, your teachers, your mentors, the significant other people and how you work with those people. Now if it's a healthy system of course their mentors, their positive guides, they're part of a healthy framework. But if their destructive parental interjects for you or their critical parental interjects for you, then the child in transaction analysis terms is often over defined, infantilized when we get a situation with a top heavy process. So in TA you have this technique of talking and working with the new vertical parent-eager figure which has been so destructive and helping through the parental technique the healing of the parent or at least as Eric Burn said turning down the noise of the intense negative parent in the psychological system in the service of cure. Very powerful phrase that Bob. Turn the volume down and trying to get the person to be in the hearing now as opposed to stuck in the past and hearing the voices of the past. Absolutely. And you know when people come to psychotherapy you're not only working with the unconscious or the child-eager state in transaction analysis terms but you're working with the parent-eager state. They come together. The parent and the child-eager states come together and there's many, many, many articles written about how you work with the unconscious or child-eager state in the service of healing even in many ways hearing now spiritual, physical worlds. There isn't that much written on the parent, the critical parent, the abusive interject, the person or the figures or the significant others which are so inhibiting and defining on the agency of the client. Not so much. How do you heal that? So he talks very well. He talks about the operations of how to work with that part of the personality in the service of cure. A fascinating read. It sounds like it. It sounds like it, Bob. How often do we come across that in our practices? Not much. I remember talking to Richard about the parent-eager state work which I'm a great fan of and I present at conferences and he said to me, well, go to an eithergenical church or go to some of the gospel churches and you'll see or you might see exorcisms. Yes. What is an exorcist work? What an exorcism work? I'll tell you what it is. It's the banishing of the parent. Yes. Yes. Which has been so negative on the human work of the person. So you're working with turning down the intensity, transforming the critical part of the organism, which has been so detrimental to health. Yeah. I never thought to be like that. I was just kind of taken away there for a second. But yeah, this idea of the exorcism being a way of ridding a person from those voices of the past, those critical voices and all that connects them. Yeah. Wow. What a great example. Yeah. And he talked about is, you know, watching these exorcists, if you like. Now, if you watch a parent interview done properly or parent therapy done properly from a transactional perspective, your definition just there is exactly what it is. The next bit is what replaces that space? Yes. Hopefully, hopefully, the child takes the space and the compassionate, compassionate narrative takes the place of the banishing of the parental negative interject. Yeah. The therapist almost fills the gap into some extent as well. For a while. For a while until the client then can be self generating or self efficacy, I guess, isn't it? Really good way of putting it. So in this book, you've got a case study which looks at the techniques, the operation of a parent interview. And you've also got a case study that looks at how to reach the child, the unconscious work with the child and the unconscious and the healing and the service of the relational pure. And how he does that, the timing, the work of the therapist in the relationship with the child, this inner child work, which is so important to our profession. Yes. Yeah. I mean, certainly in TA. And also I would say in other phenomenological therapies, you know, Gisdal and person centered, there is something about for a time, the therapist filling that gap in once that volume has been turned down until the client themselves can actualise or self-efficates. If that is even a word agency agency. Thank you agency, Bob. Yeah, to find their own agency in the world. Yeah. And to be to be in another place, I guess. Yeah. And you know, that takes that takes time. Oh, yeah. Do that in 17 sessions. No, you won't do that in six sessions. You won't even do that in 60 sessions. No, this is long term psychotherapy. And I and this book is really full of which learnings, which region X, the amazing book for learning. Well, I mean, you sold it to me, Bob. And I think I'm going to rush out and buy a copy of that. I'm going to go on to my favourite book seller and have a look. And if you want to have a look at the book, you go into the comments bar below just below the video. We're going to put in a link. Click that link. And it'll take you to a bookseller and you can inspect it. As always, Bob doesn't do this for profit. This is just Bob sharing his love of literature. Not being sponsored sponsored video in any way. And we'll pop a we'll pop a picture at the end as well. But that sounds to me like a not to be missed. But Bob, so as always, Bob, fantastic. Yes, sounds like it's fantastic. But Bob, so thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you.