Recommended Books for Recovery from Primal
I think the knowledge contained within these works can really help someone who has previously been enchanted with the problematic and culture-attacking persuasion of primal therapy books and websites. To be clear, by “recovery” I refer here to recovery from several myths in primal theory and the rule-of-thumb simplistic thinking it creates. These books will also serve to clarify some popular myths about memory and catharsis that are now considered outdated due to newer data. Read these and share in a truely amazing journey out of woo.
1. How To Think Straight About Psychology, by psychologist Keith Stanovich
The quintessential antidote to The Primal Scream.
Still number one. It’s still there, almost three years after I first recommended it, still waiting to be read.
A truely inspiring and logical book that does not mention primal therapy directly, but in it’s pages contains an almost comprehensive set of tools to understand many of the problems. Read it to discover just why it is so important for those whose critical thinking skills and understanding of psychology were undermined by primal therapy. The amazon.com link to an affordable previous edition is included here.
2. Remembering Trauma, by the director of clinical psychology at Harvard University, Richard J McNally.
A shockingly complete and logical evidence-led review of the research on traumatic memory and repression. Essential life-changing reading for anyone enchanted by primal therapy and related therapies. A truely brilliant book that shows that there really is enough evidence in now to gives us a profound and nuanced understanding of the various types of memory. The argument that false memories are a real possibility in therapies is shown brilliantly in McNally’s own research on alien abduction memories, in which people have vivid memories of events that we know are false. These false memories are so emotional and so disruptive that they clearly show the tragedy of creating false traumatic memories.
If you read this book fully, and consider all the evidence, it becomes clear that Janov’s view is wrong: that traumas are repressed immediately (inspired by Freud’s guess) and can be recalled pristinely in therapy decades later (inspired by Wilder Penfield’s mistaken conclusions). Read it and regain a healthy, sane and accurate view of memory, a crucial step in recovering from questionable therapies.
