We are all more deeply connected to each other than we can
ever know, and sometimes it takes a tragedy to remind that this is so. All of my networks have been buzzing this week with the news of Jeremy Safran’s brutal and senseless
murder last Monday. Even if you’ve never heard of Jeremy
or haven’t read anything of his, if you are a psychotherapist or counsellor
today, the chances are very good that he has influenced your practice.
His was a maverick spirit, wandering restlessly between most
of the major approaches to psychotherapy, always open to new things. He started in the
humanistic-experiential therapy tradition, where he first studied with Les
Greenberg and help lay the theoretical ground work for
emotion-focused therapy. After that, with
Zindel Segal, he was responsible for broadening and softening CBT, by adding an
interpersonal emphasis.
Although I’d known him since the early 1980’s, mu closest
interactions with Jeremy were in the 1990’s, when we both were running American
clinical psychology doctoral programs.
We were both part of a rump faction of DCTs (Directors of Clinical
Training) who tried to resist the rising tide of CBT in American clinical
psychology in what felt like a dark time, as CBT advocates attempted to impose this approach as the dominant approach in our courses.
It was good to have an ally and we had lots of interesting talks.
In my opinion, his most important work was with Chris Muran,
with whom he initiated a major continuing line of research and practice on therapeutic rupture
and repair. If the phrase “alliance
rupture” is in your working vocabulary, there you will find Jeremy in your work
as a counsellor or psychotherapist. Finally,
I think, he found a home, or rather several homes, in psychoanalysis and Buddhism,
and the dialogue between them.
If you want to learn more about Jeremy Safran and his many contributions, you can
go to his website:
http://www.jeremysafran.com/
Rest in peace, Jeremy, you are part of us, and live on in us. We won’t forget you.
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