Positive Psychology
Book Review: Enchanted Self: A Positive Therapy
By Dr. Barbara Becker Holstein
Mar 5, 2008

This book review is part of a series that covers the topic of Positive Psychology. Positive Psychology is the study of the strengths and virtues that enable individuals and communities to thrive. Positive Psychology has three central concerns: positive emotions, positive individual traits, and positive institutions. Dr. Barbara Becker Holstein is the Official Guide to Positive Psychology.

Enchanted Self: A Positive Therapy, by Dr. Barbara Becker Holstein, is a valuable resource for people interested in Positive Psychology, and it is available through Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.

Asbury Park Press
Reclaiming the best times of your life and letting go of the most disturbing, dysfunctional experiences can improve your outlook and well- being.
That's the message delivered by Long Branch psychologist Barbara Becker Holstein in her book, "The Enchanted Self: A Positive Therapy".

Directed primarily at women "The Enchanted Self" asks readers to join Becker Holstein on a journey of personal discovery, a positive examination of their lives that stresses the magic and the uniqueness of the individual.

Susan Albert,
"...A book I couldn't resist...Written in an easy graceful style that makes it easily accessible... As I read Holstein's book, I thought about how her ideas are related to our need to tell our stories, and especially our stories of joyful discovery, self-realization, achievement and fulfillment-our gifts, graces, and glories."

New Jersey Psychologist
Therapists using The Enchanted Self framework no longer see clients as victims or people with various diagnostic labels. Clients are seen instead as "survivors, and as talented wondrous people who come into therapy with various problems and disorders". Although the therapist is still viewed as having professional training and special abilities in working with people, she maintains a sense of mutuality with the client at all times. The client is always seen as a hero or heroine rather than a dysfunctional person. The therapist asks questions and seeks answers in ways that enhance the person instead of limiting the focus to the presenting problem or clearly dysfunctional aspect of the person's life. In this way, even the most difficult life experiences contain information about a person's strengths and capacities to survive.

This book offers a fresh approach to helping our clients heal by retrieving and reintegrating positive aspects of themselves.

Ellen McGrath, American Psychological Assoc., Task Force on Women and Depression
"The Enchanted Self is a mystical journey to a new inner exploration of the lost or forgotten positive aspects of ourselves. The book describes a shared rich partnership between therapist and client toward empowering ourselves to make real changes in our lives."

Review
...an exciting book that offers the reader original and comprehensive perspectives. Dr. Holstein demonstrates her talents as both writer and psychotherapist for those seeking to access pleasurable and positive states. A groundbreaking approach to personal growth and fulfillment...
–Dr. Irene Deitch of The College of Staten Island, City University of New York

The Enchanted Self is a mystical journey to a new inner exploration of the lost or forgotten positive aspects of ourselves. The book describes a shared rich partnership between therapist and client toward empowering ourselves to make real changes in our lives.
–Ellen McGrath, American Psychological Association, Task Force on Women and Depression

. . . a warm and wise book whose positive message is one we cannot fail to notice. Her therapeutic approach to human growth is compelling because her own personal story is at its core. I highly recommend this book to all therapists and readers who seek relief from pathology-ridden concepts of mental health that often hurt more than they heal.
–Claudia Bepko, MSW, Center for Training, Family Institute of Maine, co-author of Singing at the Top of Our Lungs

Product Description
After listening to her clients mention and then discount the positive events and memories they had experienced in the past and present, Dr. Barbara Holstein realized that psychotherapy, as it is commonly practiced today, focuses almost exclusively on the client's "pathology." Her conclusion that clients cannot feel complete until their strengths, rather than their problems, become the fulcrum for therapy culminated in The Enchanted Self. This new therapy and book, written for therapists and therapy clients, describes how getting in touch with "The Enchanted Self" -- our core of health and strength -- promotes positive change.

From the Author
Joy is the re-invention of oneself in positive ways. Writing THE ENCHANTED SELF, A Positive Therapy gave me a chance to share with the public how psychology has spent too much time focusing on dysfunction, and what went wrong - often using our memories to augment this focus. Mental health and a sense of joy more readily appear when we focus on the positive reinvention of ourselves. To do this a clinician and/or anyone can practice ways of using the past to access positive information - our lost potential, our dreams, our proud sense of the story of our lives. There are so many marvelous things about each and every person. In my book I teach you how to go about recovering the best of yourselves. This paradigm shift, looking for the positive rather than the negative about ourselves, results in happier psychotherapy, often shorter psychotherapy and a more educational therapy where the client really learns to recognize and develop her talents, strengths and what gives her pleasure. I am often so thrilled and shocked when I realize how much I am able to learn from my clients. They have wisdom, humor, coping skills, great abilities to nurture and love others, they survive incredible obstacles. I am so lucky to have been able to talk to so many wonderful people and get a chance to learn from them as hopefully they have been able to learn from me.

Seeing one's life as an experience of Enchantment - a chance to bring pleasure and joy into your life and those who you are with - is what writing and working on THE ENCHANTED SELF, A Positive Therapy has reinforced for me. I hope it is part of your journey of growth and joy also.

About the Author
Barbara Becker Holstein, EdD, originator of THE ENCHANTED SELF therapy, is a psychologist with over 18 years experience, in private practice in Long Branch, New Jersey with her husband Dr. Russell Holstein. She has a diverse background including training and avocational interests in drama, creative thinking, writing,and poetry. Dr. Holstein is editor of THE ENCHANTED SELF newsletter which is in print several times a year and available via e-mail. To reach Dr. Holstein you can e-mail her at: encself@aol.com. She holds frequent workshops locally and nationally and has a weekly radio show, THE ENCHANTED SELF which is heard in Phoenix, Arizona and Providence, Rhode Island. Her motto is, "Let's find out what is right with you rather than what is wrong."