Meaning-Centered Marital and Family Therapy: Learning to Bear the Beams of Love

The purpose of this book is to present a meaning-centered approach to psychotherapy with couples and families that is based upon an understanding of the real and deep human difficulties that are always a part of a loving and intimate marital and family life. The book is divided into two parts: Treatment Concepts and Practice Illustrations. In Part One, family functioning and treatment elements and dynamics are explored. There are chapters that examine the use of art, poetry, recollection, and spirituality and how the therapist can use these processes to facilitate awareness and understanding with couples and families seeking help. There is also a chapter on the use of a cotherapist, with its attendant advantages and disadvantages in marital and family therapy. Part Two presents two case examples of troubled families in search of solutions. The Appendices contain examples of tools the therapist can use in serving their clients. This book will be useful to marital and family therapists in helping the family and/or couple overcome their fear of vulnerability and responsibility so that they can discover, actualize, and honor the love, meanings, and meaning potentials to be found in marital and family life and to ³learn to bear the beams of love.²