Emeritus Professor Russell Meares interviewed by Dr Kamal Touma

Dancing in the dark, moving towards the light: complex patterns of dyadic interaction in psychotherapy sessions

Cry and response

We announce our arrival in the world as separate individuals with the cry. The cry, and the environmental response to the cry, determines the initial atmosphere in the consciousness of the neonate.

Boundaries, caring and the Conversational Model: What can we do about complex trauma?

In therapy we are constantly struggling with the paradox and tension between firmness/rigidity and flexibility. The first provides the requisite clarity and stability that generates safety, the second provides for the possibility of change. Boundaries are important in a variety of ways in all therapies. Within the Conversational Model boundaries are seen as central to the notion of self and its development. Without developing the capacity to distinguish between inner and outer there can be no self and thus there can be no distinction between self and other.

Integration in the Psychotherapy of Borderline Personality.

The relationship between borderline personality disorder (BPD) and traumatic attachment and abuse in childhood is documented in numerous studies around the world. Over seventy per cent of these patients reported a childhood history of emotional abuse – that is frequent experiences of being shamed or humiliated, being frustrated by being given mixed messages, being put in impossible situations, having their thoughts and feelings denied. 

Marquis d'Hervey De Saint-Denys : Pioneer of Dream Studies

We tend to think that dream theories started with Freud and Jung. In fact a number of dream pioneers had published on the topic in the late 1800s’ Europe. I spent the last months reading one of

What do we do with dreams?

This talk puts forward some ideas towards an answer to this question. The discussion involves observations from two pioneers of dream research, Maury and Hervey de Saint-Denis; a dream of Jung, commented

Working at the interface of education and trauma in an Indigenous pre-school - the importance of deep soul listening

This seminar creates discussion around one of the most important problems facing any health professional working at the coalface. How do we recognise trauma in the infant, the toddler, the Pre-school child? How are an infant or preschool child’s physical, psychological and mental faculties affected by early trauma? How does the child respond to it in their body and in their psyche? How do we respond as professionals to help the parent, the teacher, the friend, the partner to intervene in a way that will prevent or undo harm? Trauma interferes with a child’s capacity to learn from experiences, trauma creates a vacuum where imagination could be, where play could enact his inner world, where learning as a pleasurable part of living could occur.

Metaphor Links Brain, Body and Mind

Keeping Developmental Trauma in Mind. Phil Graham, Kamal Touma, George Lianos

The Figure 8 Trauma Cycle and the Conversational Model

Working in the Flame. Conversational Model Psychotherapy with the Narcissistic Borderline Client

Self Coming Into Being

On Becoming a Psychotherapist

Resistance and Re-traumatisation – First Cut is the Deepest