Emotionally Focused Therapy in Action

Of dozens of excellent training tapes I have seen (many of which I own) this is, hands down, the finest in my experience. Before I go any further, I must disclaim that I am a friend and colleague of several of the collaborators who created the tape. However, as an experienced psychologist specializing in couples therapy, as well as an award-winning video producer and director, I don’t give such kudos lightly. First off, Sue Johnson is at her superbly masterful best, deftly managing what in most other hands would be a potentially very difficult couple. While her other DVD’s are useful (and I have seen about three or four, though not all) I believe this is the most volatile couple on any of her tapes. Since most of us work with lots of these couples, seeing a superb example of how to help them contain their hostility and get to their core attachment issues is invaluable. Perhaps the biggest weakness of this tape is that Sue is *so* seemingly effortless and seamless in her work that it could be hard for less experienced therapists to appreciate the subtleties of her intuition and the EFT model. Aiding in the effort to make those elements more transparent, the first of the two disc set is an extensive consultation interview between Sue and Joshua, the therapist getting the consultation. This allows the viewer not only to establish a context for the session, but also sets the stage for Sue’s thinking about couples therapy and EFT. Well selected and revealing video clips of segments from previous sessions with Joshua help introduce us to the couple and Sue’s early insights about them. A bonus is experiencing Sue’s wonderfully accepting and collaborative consultation style. The session itself is beautifully staged and shot with lovely, clear lighting and multiple cameras, allowing us to see the process of the session from the optimum point of view for each moment. Nicely detailed closeups show the emotional nuances of all the participants’ faces, while wider shots show broader gestures and multi-person transactions. The background is simple and low-key, making it easy to focus on the people in the session, and the sound is extremely present and clear. While many training videos use either voice-overs or subtitles, these often occur in real time with the video, which makes it hard to track both. This tape uses an extremely effective and graceful method for Sue’s helpful voice-overs, in which the the scene that she is highlighting is recycled silently in the background during her commentary. The video then returns smoothly to the real-time continuation of the session. If I had to pick only one training tape for working with couples, this would be it. It will be a masterpiece for years to come. This DVD set would be well worth twice the price, and you can bet I’ll be watching it over and over to soak up as much of it’s brilliance as I can! - Robert Solley, Ph.D., Staff Therapist Couples Institute, Menlo Park; Adjunct Faculty Golden Gate University, SF; Private Practice, San Francisco.

The real life example of couples therapy will be useful for students and therapists at every experience level. It will provoke deep discussions not only about EFT's technical emphases versus other approaches, but also about the person of the therapist, who is temporarily invited to join theintimacy of a couple. Specific and non-specific treatment issues abound in this "best-of-the-breed" training video.Kudos to Dr. Johnson and to the producers of this excellent work. - David Bullard, Ph.D., Clinical Professor of Medicine and of Medical Psychology (Psychiatry), University of California, San Francisco.