Books of interest to co-counsellors

The Aware Baby

Aletha Solter, The Aware Parenting Institute

Helping Young Children Flourish

Aletha Solter (as The Aware Baby)

Tears and Tantrums: What to Do When Babies and Children Cry

Aletha Solter (as The Aware Baby) ISBN: 0-9613073-6-6 177 pages, $12.95
Tears and Tantrums describes a new way of understanding the purpose of crying during infancy and childhood. This revolutionary book will help you inprove your relationship with children, whether you are a parent, caregiver, teacher, or health professional. You will gain a better understanding of why babies and children cry, and you will learn how best to respond.

The Psychological Society

Martin Gross. Pub ???. 19??. Readable. Gross talks at length about how psychotherapies have never been scientifically proven to work any better than the natural healing of the psyche. this has been demonstrated by comparing patients who have received therapy to those forced onto waiting lists. Generally speaking, the two groups -- the treated and the waiting-- improve at the same rate. Big George

Against Therapy

Masson J. M. Pub ???. 19??. Readable. Masson looks more at the logical underpinnings of therapy, asking the fundamental question: can a therapist truly be objective when presented with the distress of a patient? (Masson also mentions RC in a footnote, calling it a "fad therapy." Perhaps that is a better characterisation than the cult label?). Big George

Group influence and the psychology of cultism within Re-evaluation Counselling: a critique

Re-evaluation counselling (often known as co-counselling, or simply RC) has recently been described as an 'innovative' form of therapy, despite the fact that it has existed for over forty years. It has also been suggested that it is, or is becoming, a psychotherapy 'cult.' This paper discusses the key theoretical ideas of Re-evaluation Counselling and assesses the extent to which some of these ideas could enable unscrupulous therapists to engineer artificial consent and impose their own belief systems on clients. RC's strong reliance on group based activities is also explored, and the extent to which this facilitates unthinking conformity is considered. Finally, guidelines are discussed which enable therapists and would-be clients to assess more clearly the potentially negative effects of involvement in groups such as RC.

The Barefoot Psychoanalyst

Gale Centre Publications 1989 ISBN: 1 870258 06 1. "An illustrated manual of self-help therapy" by John Southgate and Rosemary Randall. The preface says: "[A] unique (and some might say bizarre) combination of Harvey Jackins co-counselling with the work of 1930's psychoanalyst Karen Horney seems to have lasting appeal"

Personal Recommendations

David Colbourne (2 Aug 1999)

Books by John Heron and ...
Belbin, R. M. (1993)	Team Roles at Work 		Butterworth-Heineman
Boydell, T and Pedlar, M (Eds) (1981)	Management Self-Development	Gower 
Ernst, S & Goodison, (1981)	In Our Own Hands	The Women's Press
Garratt, R. (1987) 	The Learning Organisation. 	Fontana
Handy, C. (1989) 	The Age of Unreason	 	Business Books 
Heron, J (1989) 	The Facilitators' Handbook	Kogan Page 
Houston, G  (1990) 	The Red Book of Groups.  	Whitaker UK 
Hunter, D, Bailey, A & Taylor, B (1995) 	The Art of Facilitation : How to
Create Group Synergy.  	Fisher 
Hunter, D, Bailey, A & Taylor, B (1995)	 Zen of Groups : A Handbook for
People Meeting With a Purpose 	Fisher
Kaner, S. et al (1996)	 Facilitator's Guide to Participatory
Decision-Making		New Society
Luft, J. (1984). 	Group processes: An introduction to group dynamics.
Mayfield.
Peck, M Scott (1987)	The Different Drum		Rider

If you want just one simple, accessible, humorous text, then get Gaie
Houston's book - ISBN 095103233X.

You will find links on facilitation from the  OFAVS site.

The 
AHP has a cornucopia of resources, and you could do worse than
home in on John Rowan's definitive perspective on the humanistic
tendency, which I am surprised at him allowing out in the public
domain, as as far as I know it's a current text.  Eg, his account of
CoCo - now a bit dated.)