In Life Witness: Evolution of the Psychotherapist, T. Byram Karasu
demonstrates how a young therapist can become an expert clinician by
transcending his own school of therapy. Every young therapist attempts
to perfect his skills by anchoring onto a single paradigm and becoming
an expert technician of that particular school. Within the first five to
ten years of practice-the so-called experiential evolution phase-the
therapist finds that no single paradigm is suitable for treating all
psychopathology. The therapist thus begins to appropriate techniques
from other schools of psychotherapy, and by shifting paradigms,
synchronizes himself with the patient's mind. It is from this
synchronization that all his techniques begin to evolve and an expert
clinician can evolve into a master psychotherapist. The therapist who
has transcended his school of psychotherapy now must transcend the field
of psychotherapy itself. If he wants to address the patient's
existential issues as well, the therapist first has to come to terms
with those issues himself. After all, the therapist can take the patient
only so far as he himself has come. Life Witness demonstrates that this
formative evolution phase of a therapist encompasses a broad education
in literature, philosophy, and spirituality. Karasu ultimately concludes
that therapists must find the meaning and purpose of life before they
can cultivate an authentic self and become someone whose presence is
itself therapeutic. Once this occurs, all "therapeutic messages" will
naturally emanate from within.
