This book combines a theoretical understanding of death anxiety with narratives recounting the life experiences of many individuals to illustrate how people can use an awareness of death to enhance their lives. The book discusses defensive reactions to death anxiety and offers guidelines to health practitioners on how to help clients overcome their fear of death. The authors set forth a new perspective, focusing on the ways that we try to protect ourselves from the anxiety and dread surrounding death. They show how defenses that offer comfort and an illusion of safety can lead to self-limiting, self-destructive ways of living. Challenging these defenses and learning to accept our feelings of sadness, anger, and fear about death can lead to more personal satisfaction, and expand the opportunity for self-realization. Topics include children's awareness of death, effects of death anxiety in every day life, defenses against death anxiety, challenging defenses that interfere with living fully, and more.

About the Author
Robert W. Firestone, PhD, is a clinical psychologist, author, and artist, who has established a comprehensive body of work that explains how defenses formed by children early in life in relation to interpersonal pain are strongly reinforced as they become aware of death. These defenses impair people's ability to sustain intimate adult relationships and have a damaging effect on their children. Dr. Firestone was engaged in the private practice of psychotherapy from 1957 to 1979, working with a wide range of patients, expanding his original ideas on schizophrenia, and applying these concepts to a theory of neurosis. In 1979 he joined the Glendon Association as its consulting theorist. Dr. Firestone's major publications include The Fantasy Bond, Compassionate Child-Rearing, Fear of Intimacy, and The Ethics of Interpersonal Relationships. His studies of negative thought processes-or internalized ""voices""-led to the development of an innovative therapeutic methodology described in Voice Therapy, Suicide and the Inner Voice, Combating Destructive Thought Processes, Conquer Your Critical Inner Voice, Creating a Life of Meaning and Compassion: The Wisdom of Psychotherapy, and Sex and Love in Intimate Relationships. In collaboration with his daughter, Dr. Lisa Firestone, he developed three assessment instruments based on the concept of the voice process: The Firestone Assessment of Self-Destructive Thoughts (2007), The Firestone Assessment of Suicide Intent (2007), and the Firestone Assessment of Violent Thoughts (2008).


Book Information
ISBN 9780826105516
Author Robert Firestone
Format Paperback
Page Count 392
Imprint Springer Publishing Co Inc
Publisher Springer Publishing Co Inc
Weight(grams) 674g